Supply Chain - October 2022

EDITOR-IN-CHIEF

SEAN ASHCROFT

EDITORIAL DIRECTOR

SCOTT BIRCH

PRODUCTION DIRECTORS

GEORGIA ALLEN DANIELA KIANICKOVÁ

PRODUCTION MANAGERS

CHARLIE KING

JANE ARNETA MARIA GONZALEZ

CHEIF DESIGN OFFICER

MATT JOHNSON

JOIN THE COMMUNITY

The SupplyChain Team

CREATIVE TEAM

OSCAR HATHAWAY SOPHIE-ANN PINNELL HECTOR PENROSE SAM HUBBARD

MIMI GUNN JUSTIN SMITH REBEKAH BIRLESON JORDAN WOOD DANILO CARDOOSO CALLUM HOOD

VIDEO PRODUCTION MANAGER KIERAN WAITE

DIGITAL VIDEO PRODUCERS MARTA EUGENID ERNEST DE NEVE THOMAS EASTERFORD DREW HARDMAN

JIINGXI WANG

JOSEPH HANNA

MARKETING MANAGER KAYLEIGH SHOOTER

PROJECT DIRECTORS

MIKE SADR CRAIG KILLINGBACK

MARKETING DIRECTOR

JASON ANDIKA-SMITH

MEDIA SALES DIRECTOR

JAMES WHITE

MANAGING DIRECTOR

LEWIS VAUGHAN

CHIEF OPERATIONS OFFICER

STACY NORMAN

CEO GLEN WHITE

Sustainability comes down to asking the right questions

Colgate-Palmolive is one of the world’s biggest companies yet is making impressive headway on sustainability. How? By asking the right questions.

There are few easy wins in sustainability, a reality that is made clear in an interview in this issue with ColgatePalmolive’s Chief Supply Chain Officer, Mike Corbo.

Colgate’s ambition is to ensure all its facilities –manufacturing sites, technology centres, strategic offices and owned warehouses – are ‘zero waste’ by 2025.

For a multinational with 34,000 staff across 200 countries, and net sales of US$17.4bn, this is a colossal undertaking. So how is it tackling the challenge?

“You’d be surprised,” says Corbo, with a grin. “It sounds kind of silly, but we started pretty much by doing dumpster dives – literally rifling through what we were putting in the waste stream.”

Corbo adds: ”We began to separate all that waste and then we started asking questions, such as why this or that piece of waste was not in the product, or why it wasn’t being recycled.”

Only by doing this, has Colgate been able to determine what is in its waste stream.

Corbo’s revelations drive home this truth: unless an organisation asks itself the right questions on sustainability, it can never expect to deliver meaningful solutions.

SEAN ASHCROFT sean.ashcroft@bizclikmedia.com

“Unless organisations ask the right questions on sustainability they can’t expect to deliver meaningful solutions”

MIKE CORBO CHIEF SUPPLY CHAIN OFFICER, COLGATE-PALMOLIVE

Join us at PROCUREMENT & SUPPLYCHAIN LIVE LONDON

Showcase your values, products and services to your partners and customers at PROCUREMENT & SUPPLYCHAIN LIVE LONDON 2022.

Brought to you by BizClik, PROCUREMENT & SUPPLYCHAIN LIVE LONDON, the hybrid event held between 12th-13th October is broadcast live to the world and incorporates two zone areas of SupplyChain LIVE plus Procurement LIVE in to one event.

With a comprehensive content programme featuring senior industry leaders and expert analysts, this is an opportunity to put yourself and your brand in front of key industry decision makers.

From keynote addresses to lively roundtables, fireside discussions to topical presentations, Q&A sessions to 1-2-1 networking, the 2-day hybrid show is an essential deep dive into issues impacting the future of each industry today.

Global giants and innovative startups will all find the perfect platform with direct access to an engaged and active audience. You can’t afford to miss this opportunity.

See you on: 12 - 13 October 2022

BIG PICTURE

Squash and a squeeze for Hallowe’en pumpkins

Floydada, USA

October is synonymous with one thing: Hallowe’en. And no country celebrates Hallowe’en with more gusto than the USA, who exported it to the rest of the world.

Floydada in West Texas is known as the pumpkin capital of the USA. Back in its heyday, between the 1960s and 1980s, pumpkin farming in the region yielded millions of pumpkins across 30-plus farms. Now, there are

just four farmers growing pumpkins on 1,000 acres each year.

They plant pumpkin seeds in mid-May and harvest them in September, cutting them off vines up to 30-feet-long when their skins are hard enough to endure being tossed onto shipping carts. In total, pumpkins are handled an average of seven times before reaching the supermarket.

THE BRIEF

BY THE NUMBERS

“We've dramatically increased female representation in manufacturing operations, where it was weakest”

Mike Corbo

Chief Supply Chain Officer, Colgate-Palmolive

READ

The ‘industrial revolution of services’, sparked by the pandemic, is transforming the operations landscape

Source: McKinsey

75%

of digital channel users expect to continue using digital, post-pandemic

70%

of senior execs expect to use more temporary and contract workers 65%

85%

 of businesses accelerated digital employee collaboration

CEO & Co-Founder, Vendorful

“If you're not there yet as a partner with us, our attitude is ‘Let's go on a journey, to get you there”

Rachel Dolan Head of Procurement & Supplier Relationship Management, Permanent TSB

of senior execs are increasing investment in automation and AI

EDITOR'S CHOICE

GLOBAL SUPPLY CHAINS 'UNPREPARED' FOR CHINA DROUGHTS

The UN reports that droughts are more frequent and prolonged, and, with China rationing hydropower, multinational firms need to rethink supply chains.

READ MORE

ACCENTURE URGES STRETCHED FOOD SUPPLY CHAINS TO COLLABORATE

Accenture report suggests global food supply chains lack agility because focus is on short-term food-shortage crisis management rather than long-term planning.

“Supplier relationships are complex, and you can't overstate the value of supply chain data”

Peter Bonney

Automation will cost 63mn APAC jobs, says Forrester report

A total of 63 million jobs are expected to be lost to automation by 2040 across India, China, South Korea, Australia and Japan, according to research and advisory firm Forrester.

Forrester’s latest Future of Jobs

Forecast says that automation will cost jobs across wholesale, retail, transport, accommodation, and leisure in the APAC region, but that the green economy will help offset this as more countries commit to carbon neutrality. It says an estimated 28.5 million new jobs will be created by 2040 in renewable energy, green buildings, smart cities, smart infrastructure, and professional services.

The report also highlighted how jobs in the major Asia Pacific economies are more at risk from robotic automation than in Europe and North America. The sectors most susceptible to automation, it says, are construction and agriculture.



RAIL FREIGHT European Union sustainability proposals include a plan to double rail freight across the territory by 2030, with the US also committed to increasing the role of rail as part of its transport infrastructure.

The move to rail is being driven by the fact it produces 75% less carbon emissions than road.

ELECTRICITY 4.0 Schneider Electric’s Energy Management Chief, Steve Smith, says sustainability is most promising at the point renewable energy meets digital – so-called Electricity 4.0. “It’s where energy becomes visible, connected, smarter, and more controllable,” says Smith.

SMALL TO MEDIUM SIZED BUSINESSES Gartner Associate Principal Supply Chain Analyst Olivia Montgomery tells Supply Chain Digital that, in too many SMBs, employer communication around sustainability doesn't align with what is actually happening.

GLOBAL

SUPPLY CHAINS

OCT 22

W I N N E R S L O S E R S

supplychaindigital.com 15 The UN reports that droughts are more frequent and prolonged, and, with China rationing hydropower, multinational firms need to rethink supply chains –yet most are unprepared for long-term droughts in China, Fortune says.

TIMELINE

BLOCKCHAIN THE HISTORY OF

1990

Much of the groundwork for the blockchain was set in the early 1990s.

Stuart Haber and Scott Stornetta met while working for US software company Bellcore, where they identified a problem: the world relied so heavily on records that weren’t authenticated by an independent party, diminishing trust in their efficacy – and the duo wanted to set about creating a solution.

1991 1998

Within a year of presenting their idea, Haber and Stornetta had written the algorithm that would become recognised as the blockchain.

The term itself is derived from the way data, such as the record of a transaction and its unique hash, is packaged into blocks and linked together like a chain. The more blocks are added, the stronger the chain.

By the end of the 1990s, computer scientist Nick Szabo had attempted one of the very first applications of this new ‘decentralised’ system, proposing ‘bit gold’ – a forerunner to the very popular bitcoin. Bit gold was never implemented, and it would take another decade before anybody would build on Haber and Stornetta’s work to launch a decentralised currency.

In the space of 30 years, blockchain has been catapulted to the forefront of tech from virtually nowhere. At first, it seemed a niche concept that would have little benefit, before being rightly recognised as a potential game-changer in supply chain, finance and society in general.

2008 2013 2017-Present

A developer or team of developers using the pseudonym Satoshi Nakamoto published a white paper that conceptualises the cryptocurrency bitcoin, establishing the blockchain as the public transaction ledger used for bitcoin. This lit the flame for the cryptocurrency market, which would explode over the next decade.

Five years after the white paper was published, early bitcoin enthusiast Vitalik Buterin created Ethereum. He thought bitcoin needed a scripting language for application development and, failing to establish a consensus among the bitcoin community, built his own blockchain-based platform. It utilises smart contracts and is the platform on which NFTs are built, for example.

Supply chain professionals begin to leverage the power of blockchain. Instead of coins, supply chain blockchains ‘tokenise’ a variety of transactionrelated data, creating unique and readily verifiable identifiers for purchase orders, inventory units and bills of lading. Every participant in the chain has their own unique digital signature, which is used to ‘sign’ tokens moving through the chain.

Meri Stevens

JOB TITLE: WORLDWIDE VP CONSUMER HEALTH SUPPLY CHAIN COMPANY: J&J

Meri Stevens of J&J is a trailblazer in every sense of the word – both in supply chain and as a role model for women in senior STEM roles

In a world crying out for more women in jobs with STEM requirements, Meri Stevens is a trailblazer in every sense of

Currently Worldwide VP Consumer Health Supply Chain at Johnson & Johnson, Stevens started out by gaining a BSc in mechanical and electrical engineering, a field of learning not uncommon among senior supply chain professionals. Now, she is a supply chain veteran with more than 30 years’ experience.

In that time, Stevens has proven adept at all aspects of supply.

“I have expertise across all five supply chain pillars,” she says. “Planning, sourcing, manufacturing, delivering, and serving.”

She describes herself as “a dynamic leader” who is “successful at attracting, cultivating and retaining diverse and high-performing teams”.

Recognising the levers of success

Stevens certainly knows how to identify the right levers to drive success, which she has proven time and again by delivering strategic transformation across industries including consumer durable goods, media,

installation services, electronics, pharma and aerospace.

She began her career in operations management at GE, where she spent more than a decade honing her skill. Then there were spells at a diverse range of companies, including Bertelsmann (media), Tyco (fire protection) and Newell Rubbermaid (consumer products), where she was the chief supply chain officer for two years.

“I think I’ve been in every industry but food,” she laughs – which, from an overview of her career, appears to be the case.

It was in 2015 that she joined J&J, as VP Supply Chain Strategy & Deployment, with the move marking her third foray into the healthcare industry.

Healthcare is an area where you want to drive something different “If you think about leaving a lasting impact, healthcare is one area where you really want to drive something different,” she says of being drawn back to this sector.

In her current role, Stevens very much has the opportunity to drive change and make a difference, because her portfolio includes everything from planning to sourcing direct materials through to the make, deliver and return functions.

She is also responsible for delivery of the household J&J brands that we all know so well, such as BAND-AID plasters and Listerine mouthwash. Her team was also responsible for the ‘cold chain’ that delivered J&J’s Janssen COVID19 vaccine.

The market Stevens serves is colossal. She oversees a consumer health supply chain that, every day, serves more than 1 billion people across 60 countries.

Health supply chains ‘come down to reliability and resilience’

Driving such a vast supply chain always, according to Stevens, comes down to “choices around reliability and resilience”.

Speaking to Supply Chain Management Review, Stevens said: “When you’re serving more than a billion people a day, the most important thing is to make sure that when you reach for our product on the shelf then it’s going to be there for you.” Stevens says that this focus influences how J&J balances what it manufactures in its own facilities versus manufacturing partners –something she describes as “manufacturing in a way that creates agility”.

She continues: “One of the things we are working on extensively is understanding our dual sourcing strategy.”

Dual sourcing strategy is key to J&J

She explains that, because J&J’s portfolio has been created through acquisitions, “this can sometimes take us longer”. She continues: “Our two axes are where is the consumption happening and where is the best source of supply. With those, we look at the partnerships we’ve developed.

“In a perfect world, I would have everything nearby, with infinite capacity and 100% agility. But, in an imperfect world, I’m constrained by where I am today and the changes that I can make now. So, it’s about balancing those things as we go.”

And one cannot discuss a healthcare supply chain professional like Stevens without referencing the challenges of the pandemic.

Of that time, she says: “The biggest thing we experienced was volatility, especially in the consumer business. We saw lots of variation in where people were buying products and what they were buying. The demand for some traditionally stable products doubled and tripled.”

TANIA SEARY

Q. TELL US A LITTLE OF YOURSELF AND PROCURIOUS

» I am a procurement and supply chain entrepreneur. Throughout my career, I have been committed to raising the profile of the procurement and supply chain professions and connecting its leaders.

Procurious is a free-to-join, online business network for the new generation of procurement and supply chain professionals. Members have access to the latest news, advice and best practices, can build their personal brand, advance their careers, network with peers, thought leaders and decision makers, and develop skills through online training.

Q. WHAT HAS CHANGED MOST IN PROCUREMENT AND SUPPLY CHAIN?

» In the past, procurement and supply chain were afterthoughts for most organisations. Now, with supply shortages and logistical challenges dominating the news, boards are turning to procurement and supply chain leaders to drive change and offer value.

There’s also been advancement in technology, such as AI and machine learning. More companies are realising the urgent need to accelerate digital transformation to keep up with the

increased expectations on supply chain and procurement professionals.

Q. AND WHAT HASN'T CHANGED?

» The gender pay-gap issue still plagues our profession. The average pay gap is between 20-25%, while women in senior roles may be paid up to 35% less than their male counterparts. Taking it a step further, the gap increases when women become mothers. Researchers have estimated that raising children accounts for a 17% loss in lifetime wages. This is unacceptable, and it needs to change. Our BRAVO programme aims to solve this issue. This is a global network dedicated to helping women get the resources they need to advance in their careers and shape a better future. It’s paramount that women have the

Tania Seary is founder of Procurious, a business network for the latest generation of procurement and supply chain professionals

“THE BEST BIT OF ADVICE I WAS GIVEN IS THAT THE ONLY COMMON DENOMINATOR IN CAREER IS YOU”

SEARY

mentoring, peer-to-peer guidance, and coaching they need to tackle the inequalities they still face in the workplace today.

Helping women in our profession close that gap by providing them with the skills and knowledge they need is what BRAVO is all about.

Q. HOW DO YOU SEE PROCURIOUS EVOLVING?

» Procurement and supply chain will be very different in a decade’s time.

Just look at how procurement's changed in the past few years. As the Founder of Procurious, my challenge is to ensure we

ADVICE THAT COMMON IN YOUR

support our community by keeping ahead of the curve. We will stay up to date with the issues affecting the profession and the opportunities and challenges it faces. We will continue to provide our members with useful information, resources and tools to seize opportunities and overcome difficult challenges.

Q. WHO INSPIRES YOU?

» Our global community of 40,000 members inspires me daily with the way they step up to the enormous and varied challenges we face on a daily basis with increasing frequency.

And our 400 female BRAVO programme participants inspire me to take this programme global.

Q. BEST PIECE OF ADVICE EVER GIVEN?

» That the only common denominator in your career is you. Bosses and peers may come and go, but you will be the constant in managing your own career path.

It’s too easy to find excuses for why your career is not panning out the way you intended. Soft targets for blame include employers, peers, or even your personal life. If you’re going to get anywhere with your career, you have to take control.

Another one of my favourite sayings is ‘Hope is not a strategy’. Why do so many of us simply ‘hope’ for a promotion? Women, in particular, think our work speaks for itself. We believe that if we strive for perfection, our hard work will naturally be rewarded with a pay rise and a promotion. Unfortunately, the opposite is true. Perfectionism won’t necessarily help you move forward – it can actually hold you back.

00 01

A BizClik Brand

AD FEATURE WRITTEN BY: SEAN ASHCROFT

PRODUCED BY: GLEN WHITE

After 40 years with Colgate-Palmolive, the company’s Chief Supply Chain Officer Mike Corbo drew on his deep knowledge to face global disruption and uncertainty

When Colgate-Palmolive Chief Supply Chain Officer Mike Corbo first joined the company, the world was a very different place.

If you wanted to fill your car, a gallon of petrol cost 34 pence in the UK and $1.31 in the US. Still in the US, Ronald Reagan had been in the Oval Office for just a year, and Michael Jackson’s Thriller was fresh off the press.

We’re talking 1982. This was the year Corbo left Lafayette College in Pennsylvania andwith the ink on his chemical engineering degree barely dry - secured himself a job with ColgatePalmolive (Colgate).

In the intervening four decades, Corbo has worked his way around the world, excelling in a host of manufacturing and supply chain roles.

“One of the things that attracted me to Colgate is that it was hiring people to work in plant operations, and operations really interested me,” says Corbo. “I never really intended to follow chemical engineering.”

After a six-month training programme, Corbo was sent out onto the factory floor as a foreman. For the first 14 years of his career, he “worked in locations around the US”, before he finally got the opportunity to fulfil his ambition to travel, taking up a position as Manufacturing Director in the Philippines.

“I always wanted to work outside of the US,” he says. “I just had that desire to learn.”

“We've dramatically increased female representation in manufacturing operations”

MIKE CORBO CHIEF SUPPLY CHAIN OFFICER, COLGATE-PALMOLIVE

Corbo headed Colgate manufacturing in regions worldwide

There followed a similar role in Malaysia. Before Corbo worked in Colgate’s divisional teams, starting in central Europe and Russia, and then heading back to the company’s Asia Division.

“The one I had the most fun in terms of learning was as Head of Supply Chain for Latin America,” he says. “It’s the biggest division in Colgate and covers almost all of our product categories.”

Corbo believes his long years in manufacturing provided “an incredible foundation for what was to come.”

He says: “I was learning how people produced things, day in and day out, and how they achieved the required consistency and discipline to do it right and do it well.

Company founded

Number of employees

Colgate sells its products in more than 200 countries and territories Colgate is found in more homes than any other brand

“What people want in a supply chain is consistency and reliability, and that’s what manufacturing is about. The definition of quality is making the same thing over and over, with low variability.”

Corbo is now a veteran of the supply chain, including manufacturing, and says the past two years have been the most challenging period he has experienced since joining the company.

He says: “We had lots of contingency plans, and they were very helpful, but they were at their limit when countries shut down, lanes shut down, and materials couldn't be procured.”

On a personal level, Corbo says his team has risen to the challenge.

“I'm very lucky to have an excellent team,” he says.”We communicated more

“Change always starts with educating people”

MIKE CORBO CHIEF SUPPLY CHAIN OFFICER, COLGATE-PALMOLIVE

than we ever did before. Our channels of communication have improved dramatically, and I think that has helped get us through this.”

The pandemic taught us supply chains were fragile

As for operational lessons learned since the pandemic struck, Corbo says that one stands out above all others: “If we take one thing from the past two years of disruptions, it has to be that running supply chains at lowest cost leaves them fragile. We need to build resilience into them, as a matter of priority.”

The pandemic disruptions that so tested the stamina of Corbo’s team – and the resilience of the company’s supply chain – show little sign of abating, and the biggest single challenge of his role remains “the magnitude and the frequency of disruptions”.

He adds: “Whether it's a government intervention, a business intervention or a rising commodity price, the shocks come frequently and without warning, and how quickly we can rebound and continue to keep supply running is really our daily challenge.”

MIKE CORBO

TITLE: CHIEF SUPPLY CHAIN OFFICER

INDUSTRY: CONSUMER GOODS LOCATION: NEW YORK, USA

Mike Corbo is Chief Supply Chain Officer for Colgate-Palmolive Company, where the global supply chain is recognised as a key driver of growth, profitability, and corporate strategy, powering Colgate-Palmolive’s purpose as a caring, innovative growth company that’s reimagining a healthier future for all people, their pets and our planet by producing and delivering health and hygiene products to millions of people across the globe. Mike is responsible for the Global End-toEnd Supply Chain, which includes Engineering, Manufacturing, Procurement, Customer Service & Logistics and Sustainability & EHS. Additionally, Mike is a member of both the Corporate Information Technology and Global Analytics Steering Committees.

Throughout his four decades of leadership at Colgate, Mike has worked in key Manufacturing and Supply Chain positions in Latin America, North America, Asia and Central Europe/Russia.

Mike joined Colgate in 1982 as an Industrial Engineer. He was elected Corporate Officer in 2012. He holds a BS degree in chemical engineering from Lafayette College.

To counteract disruption and uncertainty, Colgate has engaged on an enterprise-wide digital transformation, to give it visibility across its supply chain.

“Data gives you visibility over what you're doing, where you're headed, and where the potential pinch points are going to be,” explains Corbo.

Pacing toward visibility

So does Colgate currently enjoy end-toend supply chain visibility, or is it something the company is still working towards?

“I would say in certain supply chains, we do have end-to-end visibility, but not all,” Corbo says. “From manufacturing to commercial hubs and to retailers, we have visibility. But we're still working on the different tiers of suppliers.”

Colgate is hardly alone here; it’s a generally held truth that the closer to the source of raw materials one gets, the

harder it becomes to maintain a handle on things such as ESG compliance and Scope 3 emissions.

Yet Colgate is working positively towards this goal, and collaboration with suppliers is an important factor in how it will get there.

“We segment suppliers to align with our company goals, including efficiency, innovation and sustainability. All require close partnerships on risk mitigation, new formulations, network agility and digital engagement,” says Corbo.

He continues: “We audit suppliers, work with them on new compliance areas, and we ask them to provide documentation to certify their performance against an evolving regulatory landscape. With rules changing globally all the time, that makes it challenging, and we have prioritised supplier connectivity in our digital roadmap. It's a lot of work and a lot of resources to define and convert the data.”

Colgate Palmolive's Mike Corbo BizClik Video

Sustainable supply chains ‘take time, effort and focus’

In terms of Colgate’s internal journey towards net zero, Corbo says the company is “continually looking at reducing waste, and has been for a long time”. The key, he stresses, is measuring waste.

“We measure many things -- how much electricity and water we use and how much waste we generate, and then we come up with innovative ways to reduce usage.”

He adds: “I'm very proud of the fact that we've taken on a zero-waste-to-landfills initiative in our manufacturing operation. We have it certified externally and we are on pace to have all 45 plants certified.”

The certification is from Green Business Certification TRUE Zero Waste , a zerowaste certification programme designed to measure, improve and recognise zero waste performance. Colgate has more TRUE Zero Waste certified facilities than any other company.

“You’d be surprised at how we achieved this,” says Corbo. “It sounds kind of silly but we started pretty much by doing dumpster dives - literally rifling through what we were putting in the waste stream.”

“We began to separate it all and started asking questions. Why is this or that not in the product? Why isn't this being recycled? What exactly is our waste stream? This is where you have to start. It takes years and it takes focus. But money and resources we were throwing out in materials doesn't get thrown out anymore. It gets reused, repurposed, or put back into the product.”

Building a diverse, best-in-class, people-centric supply chain Colgate strives to create a workplace where everyone is empowered to be their authentic selves. Within Colgate’s supply chain, Corbo

says the company has “been spending a lot of time and focus on diversity for many years”.

He adds: “In the supply chain, we've increased female representation, especially in manufacturing operations. The first thing we did was recruit a lot of great interns, many of whom were women. Then we exposed them to plant operations, to show that manufacturing could reflect state-ofthe-art and automated facilities.”

MIKE CORBO CHIEF SUPPLY CHAIN OFFICER, COLGATE-PALMOLIVE

“The main supply chain challenges are the magnitude and the frequency of disruptions”

MIKE CORBO CHIEF SUPPLY CHAIN OFFICER, COLGATE-PALMOLIVE

For Corbo, educating recruits and new hires in this way is the secret to making progress.

“It always starts with educating people,” he says. “That way, they get excited and want to work there. Also, in a manufacturing operation you can see the fruit of your work. It's right there in the cases being loaded on trucks and the product that you made. So it's a very rewarding job.”

“The drive for talent in the workplace is incredible now, and to retain people

“Running supply chains at lowest cost leaves them fragile. We need to build resilience as a matter of priority”

across the industry is challenging, and we have to do it with a focus on diversity and inclusion.”

Colgate – powered by purpose

It’s been an eventful 40 years for Mike Corbo, but what of the years still to come? How does he see these panning out for Colgate and his supply chain team?

“We are focused on reimagining a healthier future for all people, their pets,

and our planet,” he says. “That is our purpose. We are a health company – we provide products to improve the health of people and our pets. In the supply chain, we contribute to this purpose because we make the products that provide those health benefits, empowering brighter, healthier futures for all.”

WRITTEN BY: SEAN ASHCROFT

In a world of rampant inflation, uncertainty and disruption, supplier relationship management (SRM) has never been more important. Here, two experts in the field offer insight on a subject that no organisation can afford to neglect.

Sheldon Mydat (SM) is CEO of Suppeco, whose AI-driven collaborative platform enables companies across all industries to optimise their customer-supplier relationships.

Peter Bonney (PB), CEO & Co-Founder of Vendorful, an SaaS sourcing and SRM solution.

How has the pandemic changed supplier relations management?

SM: The pandemic exposed several design faults of supply chain and supplier management, the most obvious being cost-driven relationships. Not long into the pandemic, we began to see analysts such as McKinsey and Gartner espousing greater focus on the just-in-case inventory model, rather than just-in-time.

PB: To me, the biggest change is an emphasis on the ‘relationship’ part in SRM that now exists all the way up to board level. In 2021, CPOs at a number of our customers still had their board setting cost reduction targets for 2021.

After another couple of years of supply disruptions, boards will have a better

Sheldon Mydat of Suppeco and Vendorful’s Peter Bonney on why supplier relationship management is integral to innovative, resilient supply chains

Sheldon Mydat (SM) CEO of Suppeco

Peter Bonney (PB) CEO & Co-Founder of Vendorful

SHELDON MYDAT CEO, SUPPECO

understanding of our ‘new normal’, where you can't just be trying to get a better price from your supplier year after year. Besides, you shouldn't want to have that kind of relationship with your suppliers.

How does SRM promote collaboration on ESG?

SM: An EcoVadis study shows that CSR clauses have become little more than boxticking and paper-pushing exercises, due to irrelevant standard clauses being pushed

en masse to all suppliers. The fact is that it’s very hard to conduct SRM from the drive for supply chain sustainability. Thus, effective change cannot be imposed. Achievements are possible only through working together in structured, targeted collaborations.

PB: You can't understand Scope 3 emissions without supplier collaboration, and you can't make progress on supplier diversity goals without understanding the makeup of your supply base. It requires an investment of time and resources to have that kind of collaboration, without which you probably won't achieve your goals.

How does SRM result in cost savings?

SM: Modern SRM is live and dynamic; it does not do static data. By digitally measuring –

“It’s vital to foster collaborative relationships as a way of mitigating global supply challenges and rising inflation”

and acting upon – live performance data, procurement leaders and operational teams can now minimise the costs of timeto-action and time-on-task. This hugely accelerates their rates of return.

PB: The CPO of a major coatings manufacturer told me about a project they undertook with a core supplier to reduce a 30-step manufacturing process to 15 steps, with a significant positive impact for both buyer and supplier. If your SRM programme isn't fostering that level of trust then you're missing out on such opportunities.

While cost savings shouldn't be the focus of any SRM programme, solid relationship management opens more channels for finding cost savings. Also, having a better understanding of supplier relationships gives insight into how spend allocations can impact potential savings.

How important are customer and supplier-of-choice relationships?

SM: In a world where turbulence is constant and disruption is on the rise, it’s never been more important to foster collaborative relationships as a way of mitigating global supply challenges and rising inflation.

Change laggards will find themselves struggling to keep pace with those organisations that embrace change and explore ways to collaborate as partners.

Suppliers and buyers are seeking to drive value through reciprocal relationships, joint values, innovation, shared responsibilities and thought leadership.

PB: I think companies have long seen the value of having suppliers of choice. Vendorful customers always set up some kind of ‘preferred supplier’ field in our system. What's new is the emphasis on

‘customer of choice’. More and more companies are asking if they are a preferred customer – sometimes by asking suppliers outright on questionnaires.

It’s very important to have this kind of relationship with suppliers.

What benefits do such relationships bring?

SM: Parties can create an infinite array of opportunities to generate value. These include improved visibility that produces actionable insight. Also, collaboration fosters diverse creativity and shared R&D, as well as reducing risk, promoting trust, and driving better communication.

PB: One obvious benefit is being the last customer to have a delivery cancelled when something goes wrong and the first to get fulfilled when deliveries resume. There's also the lesser benefit of being able to collaborate on mitigation strategies before problems arise.

But there's something bigger at play, too: data.

A company’s competitors have access to the same suppliers, methodologies, and playbooks. What they don't have access to is your data, and the absolute best source of forward-looking supply chain data is suppliers.

Vizibl extends supplier management offering

Supplier collaboration and innovation platform Vizibl has added Supplier Sustainability Management functionality to its digital procurement solution. It will help organisations align on sustainability targets and solve problems collaboratively with supplier ecosystems. The new module allows organisations to configure multiple ESG programmes, attach common disclosure frameworks, and invite suppliers to the programmes. It allows allows users to:

• View overall programme performance according to the attached frameworks.

• View sustainability performance across the entire cohort of suppliers or drill down into individual supplier performance.

• Set a roadmap of phased improvement targets for the programme to chart a course towards improved supplier sustainability.

Mark Perera, Vizibl CEO, said: “There is mounting consumer and shareholder pressure on businesses to operate more sustainably.”

He added that the new features “underpin existing supplier collaboration and innovation functionality to drive sustainable business growth”.

Companies that have sound supplier relationships hear of downstream supply chain problems a lot earlier than those that don’t. That's incredibly valuable.

How does SRM fit into digital transformation?

SM: Modern SRM, such as Suppeco, is designed for the digital ecosystem. Working with static spreadsheets and PowerPoints

“Supplier relationships are complex, and you can't overstate the value of supply chain data”

PETER BONNEY, CEO & CO-FOUNDER, VENDORFUL

isn’t effective in an increasingly dynamic global ecosystem. Businesses need to implement repeatable processes that are live, dynamic, structured, measurable, scalable, and deliverable via digital platforms.

PB: You can't overstate the value of supply chain data. Supplier relationships are complex, and, typically, data about those relationships is spread across multiple

systems that don't talk to one another. Step one on data is getting visibility on supplier relationships across all data silos and making this visible to all stakeholders.

The next step is to make it easy for suppliers to collaborate with you. In Vendorful, suppliers can manage multiple customer relationships in one place and reduce time spent filling out forms. This improves both compliance with data requests and also the quality of responses, providing meaningful insight into performance and trends.

How do you see SRM evolving?

SM: SRM saw big changes throughout the pandemic and it will continue to grow in prominence, as measuring relationships through hard-coded values becomes even more mission-critical.

PB: The biggest change will be the redefinition of what the term ‘strategic supplier’ means. For years, ‘spend’ has been the measure of how important a supplier is. But a better metric of importance is the business impact of a problem with any given supplier.

What if a low-cost item you've been happily buying on a no-bid contract for 15 years suddenly doesn't show up, or you’re faced with having to shut down an entire factory because it is critical to a vital process?

By the way, that is an actual story from a CPO. You can be sure that his company now has a different view of what makes a supplier ‘strategic’.

Over coming years, I expect more organisations to reach a similar conclusion. They will begin prioritising – and strengthening – relationships that might not look important on the basis of spend, but that pose the greatest risk to their operations.

Permanent TSB enjoying fruits of strategic supplier management

46 October 2022 WRITTEN BY: SEAN ASHCROFT

PRODUCED BY: CRAIG KILLINGBACK

As one of the leading retail banks in Ireland, Permanent TSB (PTSB) is in the vanguard of businesses who see procurement as a means to deliver strategic advantage.

PTSB’s values have remained unchanged through time. It prides itself on its customer service and traditional, personal approach to banking, which is why its branches remain a common sight on the high streets of Irish cities. Yet these same values are also driving it into a digital future, so it can meet modern business and customer demands.

PTSB sees change not as a problem, but as an opportunity, which is why it embraced the digital reinvention of its procurement function with such passion and focus that the bank has become a poster child for digital transformation, winning two prestigious industry awards.

At the National Procurement Awards, held in Dublin on September 15, PTSB won two awards: Best Transformation Project and Best External Collaboration Project.

A key figure behind the award wins is Rachel Dolan, a dynamic and transformational leader in her role as Head of Procurement and Supplier Relationship Management for PTSB.

Dolan is a straight-talker, a troubleshooter and problem-solver who has not only designed and delivered cost savings,

Permanent TSB’s Rachel Dolan reveals how an award-winning collaborative procurement partnership with Efficio helped save the Irish bank €12mn

Permanent TSB’s procurement and supplier management journey

Her programme and change-management expertise – coupled with a strategic approach to organisational and process improvement –made her the perfect candidate for overseeing one of the most ambitious procurement transformation projects undertaken by any bank in recent times.

RACHEL DOLAN HEAD OF PROCUREMENT, PERMANENT TSB

but has also implemented risk and governance frameworks to support enterprise goals. She is a graduate of both Trinity College Dublin and University College Dublin.

In a 15-year-career, Dolan has developed deep expertise and experience across retail banking operations, service and product development, and organisational design and transformation.

Dolan was tasked with delivering a cost optimisation programme, coupled with the transformation of the processes and technology supporting the entire source-tocontract journey.

Traditional banking in a digital era

“While we are probably one of the only banks anywhere expanding our branch footprint we also plan to satisfy our customers’ appetite for more digital banking,” says Dolan, who adds: “What sets us apart is we want to be part of the communities we serve. We want to remain as a physical bank, with branches where we can meet people and serve their day-to-day banking needs.

“If you're not there yet as a partner with us, let's go on a journey to try and get you there, to try and help”

“Supporting customers and our community is our highest priority, and the procurement team purchases everything we need to serve our customers, such as ATM machines, cash-in-transit services, docket slips, and printed materials. We also procure to serve the needs of employees, including canteen and security facilities, as well as uniforms.”

The Permanent approach to procurement

PTSB’s old-school-new-school approach to banking puts it in a unique position when it comes to sourcing, for not only is it tasked with maintaining and developing traditional banking infrastructures, it is also fully embracing the digital world.

“Technology purchases are high on our agenda as we develop and grow our digital solutions,” says Dolan.

The Bank has enlisted the support of its partners to ensure that its roll-out of technology is seamless and meets the needs of customers. A key partner in its digital transformation journey has been Infosys and its digital banking product, Finnacle.

“Around 80% of our spend is on technology and professional services,” explains Dolan. “This helps us deliver better, leaner and more effective customer journeys through digital applications.”

But PTSB’s digital ambitions go beyond servicing the needs of customers; it is also undergoing an internal digital transformation to help it leverage the power of procurement in delivering strategic advantages.

Enter its award-winning digital transformation project, called Titan: One Team, One Target. To deliver this, PTSB

RACHEL DOLAN

TITLE: HEAD OF PROCUREMENT

INDUSTRY: BANKING LOCATION: DUBLIN, IRELAND

Rachel Dolan is a dynamic and transformational leader currently working in Ireland's financial services sector. In her role as Head of Procurement and Supplier Relationship Management for Permanent TSB Bank, she has put environment and social governance at the heart of her mission. Rachel is a straight-talker, a trouble-shooter and problem-solver who has designed and delivered cost savings, and has implemented risk and governance frameworks to support enterprise goals. She is a graduate of both Trinity College Dublin and University College Dublin.

Efficio is the world’s largest procurement and supply chain consultancy, helping clients to identify, deliver, and sustain improvement opportunities.

Our international team combines unparalleled expertise and industry experience with a unique blend of intellectual capital and technology to deliver results and advance our clients’ procurement capability.

www.efficioconsulting.com

Efficio drives efficient sourcing activities at Permanent TSB

Simon Whatson, Vice President at Efficio, reflects on the company’s partnership with Permanent TSB to drive efficiency in its sourcing activity

As the world’s largest specialist procurement and supply chain consultancy, Efficio was founded in 2000 and has since grown into a global organisation, with 650+ procurement professionals operating in 13 locations worldwide.

Having worked at Efficio for seven years, Whatson leads the work that the company does with Irish bank, Permanent TSB.

“Efficio started working with Permanent TSB about two years ago. Our engagement started with an opportunity analysis. After that, we ran three waves of sourcing activity on specific spend areas to help Permanent TSB achieve the savings it needed,” explains Whatson.

“We have been firmly embedded into Permanent TSB’s procurement team, working alongside and in collaboration with the business to source spend that had either been previously addressed without having achieved full value, or had not been addressed at all over the last few months,” he adds.

“We have also embarked on a ‘sourcing-asa-service’ relationship, where we are helping to drive efficiency throughout its sourcing through our digital platform, eFlow.”

Future plans for Permanent TSB and Efficio

As their partnership expands, Efficio will continue to refine its ‘sourcing-as-a-service’ model to become even more efficient when it comes to strategic sourcing requirements.

“I believe that the future partnership between Efficio and Permanent TSB will become more and more embedded,” says Whatson.

“Efficio and the eFlow platform will also become more deeply embedded in the way Permanent TSB does procurement. And what that brings to Permanent TSB is an extremely efficient engine of servicing procurement requirements,” he continues. “Where previously these mid- to low-complexity sourcing requirements would take up all of the procurement team’s time, now they are largely automated and streamlined through the service that we provide.

“This automation also means the team can focus on more complex and strategic sourcing initiatives with our consultants. It removes a lot of noise and allows Permanent TSB to service those more complex sourcing requirements, which, of course, is where the biggest value is going to be.”

teamed-up with Efficio, the world's largest strategic, tech-enabled procurement and supply chain consultancy, operating across 13 offices in Europe, North America and the Middle East.

Titan was born out of PTSB’s need to find significant savings across its thirdparty spend, and, in just over a year, Efficio had helped it deliver annualised savings of €12mn, much of which sprung out of Titan’s consolidation of PTSB’s large and disparate supplier landscape.

“This enabled us to secure the most competitive resources from selected partners across high-spend categories,” says Dolan. “For example, the IT reseller

landscape was consolidated from 12 to 2 providers, and the IT consulting and development supply base from 29 to 10 providers.

PTSB was founded in 1816 as the Irish Savings Bank in Waterford, before expanding to Dublin and Limerick. This makes it one of the oldest financial services institutions in Ireland.

Following a merger with Irish Life & Irish Permanent, PTSB became Ireland’s leading provider of mortgage services, current accounts and assurance products.

“The approach that our joint PTSB-Efficio procurement team took not only established unprecedented visibility of supplier rates to ensure consistent application across all business areas, but it also encouraged greater collaboration between PTSB and its vendors.”

Dolan says the bank’s procurement team identified several separate, critical projects that were engaging the same key vendors.

“By collaborating with the relevant business stakeholders, we were able to forge strategic partnerships to optimise the commercial model,” says Dolan.

“We undertook a coordinated effort to revise the approach to contracting. We led commercial reviews, seeking outcome-

RACHEL DOLAN HEAD OF PROCUREMENT, PERMANENT TSB

based fixed-fee contracting models, and, on the supplier relationship management front, we also helped facilitate closer integration between parties.”

“Our ethos is very much communitybased and traditional in nature”

are carbon neutral since

years ahead of the

Infosys helps PSTB to strategically digitally transform

Manish Panicker, Associate VP at Infosys, discusses the firm’s strategic partnership with Permanent TSB (PTSB) spearheading the bank’s digital transformation

Founded in 1981, Infosys is a global IT services and consulting firm that enables clients across more than 50 countries navigate their digital transformations. “We currently have over 335,000 associates globally managing US$16bn worth of business. As a firm, we provide end-toend services including business consulting, bespoke development and maintenance of applications, and next-generation technology transformations,” explains Manish Panicker , Associate Vice President at Infosys .

Infosys and Permanent TSB’s (PTSB) Partnership

Dating back to 2019, Infosys has built a close relationship with Permanent TSB (PTSB) over the years.

The relationship started with the selection of Finacle as PTSB’s strategic platform for the bank’s digital transformation.

“Since then, we have helped PTSB launch its mobile account opening capabilities, supported the launch of products and services to rapidly disperse loans during COVID-19, and we are currently working with the bank to transform and digitise their customer journeys,” explains Panicker.

“We have been supporting PTSB across a broad set of digital initiatives. We believe we now have a very strategic relationship – one in which we are a trusted partner and adviser for PTSB.”

Future work with PTSB Infosys sees this relationship continuing to evolve, mature, and broaden over time. “Our primary focus today is to ensure that we deliver the programme of work in the digital space that we are currently engaged in. This is something that is not only important to us, but is of strategic importance to PTSB,” says Panicker.

Panicker concludes: “Beyond that, we continue to have conversations with PTSB to identify further partnership opportunities to help them to adopt innovative solutions such as intelligent automation, AI, and machine learning into their business and IT operations.”

Learn more

“We are trying to support our customers' digital appetites for a more digital type of banking”

RACHEL DOLAN HEAD OF PROCUREMENT, PERMANENT TSB

The significant savings delivered by Project Titan meant that it had also succeeded in another vital area: changing the perception of procurement within the bank. Now, it is no longer viewed as an administrative function but as the bank’s preferred partner in driving competitive and strategic advantages through data-driven cost control.

The programme followed a three-phase delivery roadmap over 12 months: Waves 1 and 2 comprised 34 initiatives, while PTSB expects a further €2mn in savings from Wave 3.

To meet the challenge, the joint PTSB-Efficio procurement team got their collective shoulder behind the ‘One Team, One Target’ ethos. This partnership approach saw both parties jointly define strategic recommendations and deliver against the targets.

“The delivery model was not typical of a consulting engagement,” says Dolan. “It is more usual for consultancy services to be advisory, with the client executing on recommendations. But, with Efficio, we established a supportive, trusting relationship, and the two procurement teams presented as a single collaborative function to the wider business.”

That the project was delivered midpandemic, with all parties working remotely, makes the achievement all the more impressive. But COVID-19 was not the only challenge. To be successful, Project Titan also had to win over PTSB staff.

“Most colleagues were not cost-conscious at that time, and they saw Project Titan as a threat, rather than a means of support for them to reach their own objectives,” says Dolan.

To persuade the doubters, Project Titan leaders worked hard to first understand, and then realign, the prevailing corporate mindset.

“Through a range of stakeholder interviews, we gained a clearer picture of the biggest pain points,” says Dolan. “Bringing the business along on the transformation journey was vital to its success.”

She says that because Titan leaders involved stakeholders, the changes they introduced “felt familiar, and the business developed a greater appreciation of procurement”. Key to this process were a number of strategies, one of which was proactive outreach across different areas of the bank.

“This meant we were able to develop a pipeline of procurement initiatives, which allowed us to mobilise the resources we needed to deliver on our need to source strategically.” Dolan says these new ways of working are now embedded across the Bank and that they will be finessed as the ongoing relationship with Efficio continues to evolve.

She also explains that says the collaboration has delivered improvement to PTSB’s procurement function in areas, including:

• IN-HOUSE EXPERTISE

“Efficio subject-matter experts were available on demand across different initiatives,” says Dolan. “We leveraged their internal benchmarks so we had ‘shouldcost’ benchmarks for supplier negotiations.”

• STRATEGIC SOURCING

“Implementing Efficio’s strategic sourcing methodology revitalised the cost-savings agenda,” Dolan says. “It established cost baselines and analysis of relevant supplier markets, which helped us develop creative sourcing strategies.”

• EMBEDDING NEW TECHNOLOGY

Dolan says: “The communication tools in Efficio’s proprietary eFlow technology simplified the management and tracking of all suppliers.”

On the more general point of supplier relations, Dolan says PTSB is committed to helping them become ESG compliant so that they are suitable candidates for collaboration.

Concluding, Dolan says: “If they’re not there yet as a partner, we like to go on a journey with them and get them where they need to be. In the grander scheme of things, we are a small organisation, and we deal with lots of other small organisations, particularly in the FinTech space.

“There’s an old Irish saying: ‘A rising tide lifts all boats’,” she says. “We don’t want to penalise suppliers for ESG transgressions, but instead educate them to ensure they’re compliant with sustainability regulations and our ethos.

“It's really important we take a partnership approach to helping people in our supply chain, to help them understand how we can help each other for mutual benefit.”

SEA SHIPPING BEGINS TO EMBRACE GLOBAL DATA STANDARDS

Rex Paschall of Apex Logistics and John Veson of Veson Nautical discuss the importance – and impact – that data standardisation will have on the global sea shipping industry

WRITTEN BY: SEAN ASHCROFT

One of the oldest known methods of transporting supplies is by boat. Yet, the business of shipping freight around the world by sea has always been hugely complex, and the past two years – with the pandemic and its resultant disruptions – have brought the need for simplification into sharp focus.

The industry is now striving to create digital standards that will foster efficiencies, collaboration and resilience.

Here, two sea freight experts explore the importance of digital standards for global sea shipping.

Rex Paschall (RP) is Director of Sea Freight Logistics at Apex Logistics International, which provides cargo transportation services, including ocean, land, and air freight forwarding.

John Veson (JV) is Co-founder & CEO of Veson Nautical, a dynamic digital maritime platform for commercial freight management.

Rex Paschall (RP) Director of Sea Freight Logistics, Apex Logistics

John Veson (JV) CEO & Co-Founder, Veson Nautical

The connected supply chain turns volatility into opportunity.

The e2open connected supply chain platform provides the end-to-end visibility and collaboration you need to tackle unpredictability. Build trust and confidence with your channel, supply, logistics, and global trade partners. Take control of supply constraints through direct procurement and meet customer commitments in the face of disruptions and scarcity.

The connected supply chain. Moving as one™. www.e2open.com

E2open and the e2open logo are registered trademarks of e2open, LLC, or its affiliates.

Why is sea freight data standardisation important?

RP: All modes of transport are gravitating toward the standardisation of data. Both shippers and logistics providers are increasingly being called upon to be a ‘divining rod’ – guiding companies’ supply chains to desired places.

JV: While the marine freight industry has always been dynamic and volatile, the past few years have been particularly fraught. It is now harder, and commercially unwise, to make decisions based on ‘gut’ experience. Data-driven decision making is a critical part of helping shipping companies and their counterparties make better informed decisions, optimise operations and drive efficiencies.

Sub-segments of standards already exist within shipping segments – Q88 in the

tanker space comes to mind. This is the platform that shipping professionals use to conduct business, and the benefits have been substantial.

Yet, in many spaces, there remains no standard way to exchange or interpret commercial information, and therefore no way to speak in a common language across the industry.

Standardising data will enable important information – such as voyage updates, realtime visibility on shipments or contract details – to be shared directly with charterers, brokers, agents, and other trusted counterparties.

What’s the biggest challenge to rolling out such a system?

RP: Harmonising data from both internal and external sources, and even within one’s

REX PASCHALL, DIRECTOR OF SEA FREIGHT, APEX LOGISTICS INTERNATIONAL

“HARMONISING DATA FROM INTERNAL AND EXTERNAL SOURCES – EVEN WITHIN ONE’S OWN ORGANISATION –IS NO WALK IN THE PARK”

own organisation, is no walk in the park. An example: since June in the US, ocean carriers have been adapting to the demurrage invoicing requirements of the newly-passed federal legislation, the Ocean Shipping Reform Act.

One newly required data element that we must report to customers when invoicing these container port storage fees is ‘freight available date’. But what is the definition of this? The ocean port, ocean carrier, rail terminal, and truckers all down the line have varying degrees of understanding in what it is.

For instance, an imported ocean container may be unloaded from the ship and the carrier says it’s available, yet there’s no chassis, which is a type of semi-trailer designed to securely carry an intermodal container. The port will say chassis availability is not its responsibility, and the result is that the lingering container will at some point become subject to port storage (demurrage).

So, in the eyes of the importer, the container wasn’t ever truly available though the port says it was. This is why a clear and succinct definition of each data element is so important.

JV: The amount of industry data generated and collected has increased exponentially over the past decade. This information spans vessel performance data to commercial data on current and future vessel location. The sheer volume of data within organisations is often overwhelming, and leaves businesses unsure of how to even begin deriving meaningful insights.

Similarly, standards can only be adopted if they are universal and yet first need to be widely accepted before they can become universal. This will require significant change management within those organisations that adopt them.

TRIAL RUN FOR DCSA CONTAINER SHIPPING DIGITAL STANDARDS

The Digital Container Shipping Association (DCSA) is moving forward with establishing an interoperability platform to streamline global shipping.

The DCSA – a non-profit group established to further the digitalisation and standardisation of container shipping – is seeking to introduce an electronic bill of lading (eBL) platform.

It says an interoperable eBL system will enable shippers to choose an eBL provider based on service levels and capabilities, while maintaining the ability to exchange electronic documentation with carriers, banks and other parties that may use different platforms.

In conjunction with its nine member carriers, the DCSA is now moving forward to a proof of concept (PoC) stage. The PoC will be conducted in conjunction with CargoX, edoxOnline and EssDocs, among others. The companies will test eBL interoperability using data that mirrors a live shipment.

Previously, the DCSA had released standards for eBL data formats and interfaces. Upon completion of the PoC, these standards will be released and free to download for any platform provider to incorporate into their eBL solutions, ensuring interoperability with DCSA standards-based eBLs.

Successful completion of the PoC is expected before the end of 2022. The DCSA is also working to address the legal framework needed between solution providers to enable cross-platform eBL transfer.

Such standards are designed to enable faster eBL adoption and to reduce reliance on paper documents.

Thomas Bagge, CEO of DCSA, said: “For the global supply chain, fully interoperable eBL is a starting point for digital trade. It will make today’s practices more efficient, reliable and sustainable, and ultimately will provide a foundation for further digitalisation.

“For service providers, it will remove barriers to adoption and create an operational foundation that fosters innovation and collaboration.”

Is there any resistance to data standardisation?

RP: Think of logistics as a war to deliver freight when you need it. As with any battle, it is essential to eliminate misleading information and have a clear vision of the path to victory. Data standardisation is an essential piece to this end.

JV: Historically, there has been resistance to data sharing in the industry. Organisations have been unsure of the benefits, instead feeling that sharing will lead to loss of competitive disadvantage.

The industry is now coming to understand the benefits that data sharing can bring, yet the standardisation needed to achieve this is seen as being overly complex and time consuming. Change is therefore stifled by myriad data sources. This is changing, but progress is slow.

Will data standardisation ease supply congestion?

RP: When applied in the right context, yes. Most importantly, it will help both logistics providers and our customers understand past and present performance deviations,

“STANDARDISATION WILL ENABLE CARGO OWNERS TO PLAN FURTHER AHEAD AND AVOID LONG WAIT TIMES”

JOHN VESON CEO & CO-FOUNDER, VESON NAUTICAL

while helping to formulate innovative supply chain solutions.

JV: Optimising port arrival time is critical, as port congestion issues continue to cause increased delays and emissions. In-port congestion, for example, could be managed by methods such as slow steaming – when a ship reduces its speed to between 12-19 knots – to achieve just-in-time arrival, with an agreement to share any benefits with counterparties. Having an accurate, common view of relevant voyage data can help drive optimal decision making for multiple parties in such a scenario.

Standardisation will facilitate both the sharing and the analysis of the data that would enable cargo owners to plan further ahead, avoiding situations that might lead to long wait times.

Supply congestion is a multifaceted issue that stretches up and down the supply chain. The further we can share information up and down that chain, the better – and standardisation makes this easier to achieve.

Are governments helping to make standardisation happen?

RP: Aside from customs and security data –where governments are taking leading roles – for the most part, the global network of private enterprises engaging in supply chain is helping make it happen. Businesses that are able to model accurate data have an advantage over their competitors that don’t.

Are the super-rich shipping companies helping fund the move to data standardisation?

RP: In a company, it is always a balancing act between returning profits to shareholders versus forward-looking R&D. Some will focus on improving their data, people, and the overall services they deliver to the customer; others will not. Apex Logistics International has opted for the former.

JV: This question, and the one about government support, are linked. Freight rates are constantly moving up and down, so to put the funding of standardisation on any one group based on near-term financial performance is a mistake. This is – and needs to be – driven by the entire industry. Owners, charterers, brokers, agents, software platforms and other vendors all have a role to play in driving the development and adoption of standards in the industry.

PRODUCED BY: MIKE SADR

supplychaindigital.com 69 WRITTEN BY: HELEN ADAMS

Research from SEO Tribunal suggests that there are over three million Google searches every minute. But behind the familiar question tab is Supriya Iyer – the Director of Supply Chain and Commercial Operations at Google.

Born in India, Iyer went on to complete her schooling there, all the way through to postgraduate study. After completing a double Master’s in Mathematics and Information Systems from B.I.T.S Pilani India, Iyer then moved to Melbourne, Australia, where she became a formidable player working in global supply chain and operations roles across a variety of industry sectors, such as automotive and high tech.

“My work at General Electric was especially pertinent to my growth as a professional,” she explains. “It was there that I truly learnt about managing change and driving transformation.”

In 2016, Iyer moved to the Bay Area with her family and started working at Google Cloud in the global partner programmes team and subsequently in the professional services organisation.

Supriya Iyer is the Director of Supply Chain and Commercial Operations at Google. Here, she explains what it takes to lead and who inspires her

SUPRIYA IYER DIRECTOR OF SUPPLY CHAIN AND COMMERCIAL OPERATIONS, GOOGLE

“Compassionate and competent leaders have always inspired me to challenge the status quo and invite diverse perspectives”

“In October 2019, I took on my current role in the Google networking team as the Director of Supply Chain and Commercial Operations. The Google networking supply chain & commercial operations team is structured to effectively manage procurement and supply of networking equipment to sites, overseeing significant investment in assets and services across the business.”

The challenges in this role range from supporting Google Cloud’s enterprise customers to ensuring effective procurement and delivery to complex countries.

“The shift over the past 40+ years to just-intime inventory and global manufacturing has helped to optimise costs,” says Iyer. “However, the pandemic added a new set of unforeseen challenges. On the supply side, border closings combined with lockdowns constrained the manufacturing and shipping of key components and goods, significantly increasing lead times. Juggling supply to meet growing demand has therefore posed new challenges.”

Hiring supply chain and project management talent globally in a labour constrained environment has been more of a challenge recently.

“As a leader, supporting team members to take care of their health and overall wellbeing during the pandemic has been critical, but not always easy to do. The last two years have been a marathon and it isn’t over by any stretch of imagination!”

Iyer and her team are working hard to overcome these challenges.

“We have developed frameworks, processes and metrics to help better understand and quantify these challenges. For example, working with business stakeholders on an emerging market roadmap, developing a materials supply playbook for these markets and investing in planning ahead to support timely deployment in these markets have helped.

Juniper Networks - keeping cloud providers operational

Juniper Networks on how it provides infrastructure to cloud providers, including the largest hyperscale networks

Juniper Networks might just be one of the biggest companies you’ve never heard of. A US multinational corporation, Juniper offers networking products including routers, switches, network management software and security products and solutions.

Its customers consist of service providers, enterprises, and cloud providers, including the largest hyperscale cloud providers, as part of its Cloud segment.

“Our customers are building clouds that serve businesses and the public globally,” says Jason Fritch, Senior Vice President of Global Sales, Juniper Networks Cloud Segment. He adds that the company also provides “high-end, high-performance, high-scale networking solutions” that not only connect clients’ data centres to one another, but also connect them directly to their end-users. “Tens of thousands of products and hardware components are required from us to do this at planet scale, like we do for some of our global cloud clients.”

Such vast quantities of components and products demand a great deal of both Juniper’s

supply chain and the man who oversees it – Mitch Haynes, Supply Chain Planning & Fulfillment VP at Juniper.

“What’s super important is our ability to scale-up with a customer. We have to physically produce all of the hardware that makes that possible.”

This requires an ecosystem of partners, says Haynes: “There are the customers, and the operation of their data centres, and then there are our manufacturing partners, and their suppliers.”

It’s a difficult job at the best of times, but over the past two, pandemic-hit, years, it has been inordinately challenging - which is when Juniper’s strong relationship with their customers came into its own.

“We work with customers so that together we can make the best operational decision we can at any given point in time,” says Haynes. “That might be whether to place a new order for a product earlier than we typically would, or looking at a design or use-case and making early-stage decisions on future engineering.”

SUPRIYA IYER

TITLE: DIRECTOR OF SUPPLY CHAIN AND COMMERCIAL OPERATIONS

LOCATION: PALO ALTO, CALIFORNIA, UNITED STATES

Supriya leads Supply Chain and Commercial Operations, with a focus on predictable materials supply and operations to operate Google’s network at scale. With 20+ years experience transforming value chains and growing small teams into mature organisations to deliver high quality products and services, Supriya enjoys fast-paced and dynamic environments while fostering people-first culture and stakeholder engagement. Previously, she has held global leadership positions at VMWare, GE and Imperial Chemical Industries (ICI). Supriya holds a Master's degree in Computer Science and a Master’s degree in Mathematics. In her free time, she enjoys reading, hiking,

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“Similarly, developing a two-year capability roadmap has helped not only supply chain but also our partner teams to work on the right tools, data structures, reporting and processes to enable scale and velocity.

“Strong partnerships with strategic suppliers has been pivotal to ensure smooth supply and early notification of supply constraints. Jointly, we have been able to develop solutions that have supported Google networking’s rapid growth.”

Vulnerability and authenticity in leadership

The best piece of advice Iyer has ever been given is to “get out of the office and connect with customers, vendors, peers and team members” – pretty difficult to do in the pandemic, but not impossible.

“Only then can you hope to understand them and build relationships of trust and open communication,” she says.

This advice is in part inspired by an eclectic range of Iyers personal heroes.

“I’m inspired by seekers – anyone who is committed to learning, growth and giving back: Malala Yousafzai, Mahatma Gandhi, Greta Thunberg and Maya Angelou, they are some examples of people who inspire me by what they stand for and how they lead. They demonstrate vulnerability, authenticity and standing up for the community.

SUPRIYA IYER DIRECTOR OF SUPPLY CHAIN AND COMMERCIAL OPERATIONS, GOOGLE

“I’m inspired by seekers –anyone who is committed to learning, growth and giving back”

“At work, I am inspired by the Google leaders, my peers and of course my team who have shown customer centricity, perseverance and teamwork despite the tough challenges of the last 2 years. Compassionate and competent leaders – my first mentor (John Gafferena) and my father (Alak Sundararaman) – have always inspired me to challenge the status quo, invite diverse perspectives and focus on the customer.”

Making the Google supply chain resilient Google is a planet-scale network, but there are some figures that can provide a more easily digestible view of the organisation:

• Google’s global network consists of a system of high-capacity fibre optic cables that encircle the globe, under both land and sea, connecting data centres to each other and to users

• Globally, Google operates data centres in 23 locations, 34 cloud regions and 103 zones

• The company has 147 points of presence and has announced 20 subsea cable investments around the globe

• Google also has thousands of edge locations around the world in over 200 countries and territories, offering users and customers very low latency services such as Google Assistant and rich content such as YouTube and Google Photos

“Strong partnerships with strategic suppliers have been pivotal to ensure smooth supply and early notification of supply constraints”

SUPRIYA IYER DIRECTOR OF SUPPLY CHAIN AND COMMERCIAL OPERATIONS, GOOGLE

complex, multi-layered role, which elements of growing this worldwide network demand most from Iyer?

“Anticipation is key and asking the right questions to pre-empt the needs of a rapidly growing and evolving network is a challenge,” she says. “The only guarantee is the next 12 months won’t be like the previous 12 months, for sure!”

Innovating material supply in ways that enables responsiveness at short notice will be key in the coming years – most likely for all industries. Part standardisation, rationalisation and in-region customisation are some approaches that Google is taking to reduce long lead-times. Iyer’s team invests considerable time in building on the strong partnership with their strategic vendors and jointly innovating with them. Similarly, working with the engineering, deployment and network operations teams within Google, to ensure alignment, is a key part of Iyer’s work. Over time, the Google network hopes to be able to deliver greater predictably with innovative solutions to meet industry needs, while

operating an autonomous network. Similar to a self-driving car, Google’s intent-driven automated network needs to evolve into an autonomous network.

“In addition to thinking about reliability as ‘How do we minimise failures?’, at Google we think as well about ‘How we can make our services resilient to failures when they happen?’. In our organisation, we spend as much time on systems and processes to respond to failures as we do in preventing them in the first place. Google Cloud has grown significantly, and we are continuously increasing the number of enterprise customers we support.”

Supply chain and digital transformation at Google Iyer has a roadmap for Google’s networking supply chain. She and her team have devoted considerable effort to optimise their supply chain tools and systems to reengineer across the end to end value chain and enable FLOW and agility.

“Revisiting processes and systems in light of both the demand and supply variability is essential to predictably deliver at scale,” she says. “The frequency and volume of change will increase and we are developing

processes and tools where we can react within a lead time that our customers need to sustainably succeed.”

Iyer plans to leverage AI and ML capabilities to further automate supply chain processes and simplify decision making. An example of this could be scaled invoice validation to support timely processing and payment.

“Integration with vendor systems and tools for timely information flow across the materials supply chain,” she explains. “For example, integration with third-party warehouse providers is key to ensure the right information is available to make the right decisions in a timely manner.

SUPRIYA IYER DIRECTOR OF SUPPLY CHAIN AND COMMERCIAL OPERATIONS, GOOGLE

“We are actively working to deliver an agreed capability roadmap. We are well progressed on all fronts and, in light of the recent supply constraints and demand growth, we have further refined our capability roadmap to predictably meet customer demand in the coming years.”

“Revisiting processes and systems in light of both the demand and supply variability is essential to predictably deliver at scale”

SUPRIYA IYER DIRECTOR OF SUPPLY CHAIN AND COMMERCIAL OPERATIONS, GOOGLE

This transformation will help Google to offer customers capabilities that it hasn’t been able to offer before, with the investment in enhancing tools, systems, processes and data frameworks helping Google to support cloud customers with new networking products and capabilities at scale. It will support customers’ growing businesses and help them to achieve their purpose and strategy.

“Responsive and

and

is our mission; that is what motivates us”

However, Google’s longterm strategy for the Google networking supply chain links right back to Google’s vision: ‘To organise the world's information and make it universally accessible and useful’. “My team’s vision aligns with this as we aim to provide access to networking materials and all material related information to our customers easily and simply,” says Iyer. “Responsive and responsible supply of

networking materials and services is our mission; that is what motivates us.”

Such a mission would not be possible without a reliable partner ecosystem. At Google, vendors are valued partners and the company actively collaborates with them at all levels to develop innovative solutions and products. Google networking engineering, product, supply chain and other teams regularly connect, discuss and work closely with vendors.

“They are vital to delivering our vision and strategy and, likewise, Google as a customer is critical for them and their organisations,” says Iyer. “There is mutual respect, trust and confidence in our ability to shape Google’s network in the coming years.

“Our relationship with our vendors has deepened in the last two years; we’ve been learning from each other. We have also supported each other in developing innovative solutions and ensuring timely execution of critical projects.”

Increased digitisation; stronger partnerships with suppliers; working closely with governments; holding larger inventory buffers for critical components; bringing supply chains closer to home; and increasing optionality will be key to protect from future shocks.

The pandemic has given supply chain professionals a platform to appropriately influence design, engineering and deployment – and Iyer is ready for the next stage.

RECYCLING KEY TO

WASTE & CLOSING SUPPLY CHAIN CIRCLE

Colgate-Palmolive is leading the way on waste reduction in the multinational world, while OnProcess is part of the tech ecosystem helping SMBs make vital progress on sustainability

WRITTEN BY: SEAN ASHCROFT

At the heart of the drive towards circular supply chains are moves to reduce waste and increase recycling.

Progress on this front is important, whether on a modest scale – such as with solutions adopted by small- to mediumsized businesses – or a macro scale, as with multinationals.

One multinational that is leading the way on this front is Colgate-Palmolive (CP). With 34,000 staff and total net sales of more than US$17.4bn in 2021, CP is one of the most valuable brands in the world. Its products are sold in 200 countries and territories, and include some of the most recognisable household brands: Speed Stick, Palmolive, Ajax, and Hill’s Pet Nutrition. Unsurprisingly, its supply chain is colossal.

Though CP’s journey to net zero is a mammoth undertaking, it is making eye-catching progress nevertheless, central to which is its commitment to TRUE Zero Waste – a zero-waste certification programme designed to measure, improve and recognise zerowaste performance. CP is also part of the vanguard of companies forging a more sustainable future.

“We have more TRUE Zero Wastecertified facilities than any other company on the planet,” says Colgate-Palmolive’s Chief Supply Chain Officer, Mike Corbo. “A total of 18 sites, altogether, in 10 countries spread across five continents – including the first ever TRUE ZeroWaste-certified facilities in Africa, Latin America, continental Europe, India, China and Vietnam.”

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“A TYPICAL SERVICE SUPPLY CHAIN IS A WEB OF DISCONNECTED, MANUAL PROCESSES MANAGED BY SILOED DEPARTMENTS”

OLIVER LEMANSKI CEO, ONPROCESS

Colgate-Palmolive’s zerowaste commitment

Yet, this is just the start for CP; its ambition is to ensure all its facilities are Zero Waste by 2025.

“We’re aiming for Zero-Waste certification for our global operations, including our manufacturing sites, technology centres, strategic offices and owned warehouses,” says Corbo.

The company has made significant strides in this area, but how CP has managed

to make such great progress on waste reduction could hardly be less glamorous.

“You’d be surprised at how we achieved this,” says Corbo. “It sounds kind of silly, but we started pretty much by doing dumpster dives – literally rifling through what we were putting in the waste stream.”

”We began to separate it all and started asking questions. Why is this or that not in the product? Why isn't this being recycled? What exactly is our waste stream?

“This is where you have to start. It takes years, and it takes focus. But money and resources we were throwing out in materials doesn't get thrown out anymore. It gets reused, repurposed, or put back into the product. We’re continually looking to reduce waste and have been for a long time.”

Sustainable supply chains ‘take time, effort and focus’

The key to waste reduction, he says, is measuring everything: “We measure how much electricity and water we use, and how much waste we generate, then we come up with innovative ways to reduce usage.”

“I'm very proud of the fact that we've taken on a zero-waste-to-landfills initiative in our manufacturing operation. We have it certified externally and will soon have all 45 plants certified.”

The company is also working towards making all of its new manufacturing sites LEED certified. LEED stands for Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design and is a worldwide green building certification programme.

“We want to ensure these sites are optimised for energy efficiency, water savings and waste minimisation from day one,” says Corbo,

While CP is a poster child for waste reduction on the multinational front, progress among small companies is equally

important, as is the vast tech ecosystem that is helping SMBs hit their net-zero targets.

One such company is OnProcess Technology, which helps organisations harvest meaning from vast fields of data with a view to optimising their after-sales service supply chains.

Move to net zero is changing linear supply chains

This is the part of the supply chain that’s helping to close the circle on sustainability, whereby businesses provide services around

a product – such as parts and materials, repair and maintenance – once it is sold. Supply chains have always been linear and, until recently, have had a ‘take, make, use and throw away’ mindset.

OnProcess is helping customers reimagine this model through its digital platform, Agora, an

REFURBISHED PARTS ‘COULD EASE MANUFACTURING SUPPLY WOES’

New, used, reconditioned and obsolete industrial automation spares help manufacturers mitigate supply chain woes, says Sven Bretschneider, Head of Supply Chain at EU Automation (EUA), a company that specialises in this area.

Manufacturing as a whole has had issues with supply capacity, in addition to difficulties responding quickly to changes in demand, meaning companies globally are starting to rethink their supply chain strategies.

Bretschneider says the ‘reduce, reuse, recycle’ mantra common in production circles could also provide a solution to supply chain issues. “Refurbished or reconditioned parts could replace new components when spare parts are hard to find. The use of such parts can help reduce lead times for manufacturers, prevent unnecessary downtime and keep machinery up and running just like new.”

He adds: “Refurbished parts also usually have quality assurance checks and warranties that match the equivalent of a new component, both in length and specification.

“If manufacturers are to overcome the worst supply issues in nearly 50 years, it’s worth noting that reconditioned or refurbished parts can go a long way by contributing to the circular economy, maintaining efficiency and shortening lead times.”

“WE HAVE MORE ZEROWASTE-CERTIFIED FACILITIES THAN ANY OTHER COMPANY ON THE PLANET”

MIKE CORBO CHIEF SUPPLY CHAIN OFFICER, COLGATE-PALMOLIVE

integrated stack of tools that offers insight and untangles problems.

“When I started in this industry 20 years ago, bits of kit were manufactured in factories, went through a forward supply chain, were sold through some sort of retail network, and then ended up in the bin or landfill after they had been used,” explains OnProcess CEO Oliver Lemanski.

The circular supply chain acts as an antidote to this. Manufacturers and distributors recover products and parts from the field when no longer needed and repurpose them back into the value chain, either as raw materials for new products or as refurbished or remade new products.

And, because the service portion of supply is the point at which products and parts are identified as unnecessary, companies such as OnProcess are vital if the circular supply model is to gain traction sooner, rather than later.

Too many firms slow to join digital transformation party

But Lemanski says many service supply chain firms have been slow to join the digitaltransformation party.

“A typical service supply chain is a web of disconnected, manual processes managed by siloed departments,” he says. “It’s in desperate need of digitisation and automation.”

He adds: “We give such businesses the ability to reimagine and automate processes on the fly – dramatically reducing costs, transforming the customer experience and helping our clients hit their sustainability targets.

“Sustainability is in our mission. We help companies reduce carbon emissions by facilitating the use of local tracking, recycling or disposal offerings. We also help reduce the use of Earth’s resources by improving

product and part returns, while driving greater circularity into their service supply chains.”

Often, waste can run into tens of millions of pounds, dollars or euros and can be difficult to manage effectively. One example of waste running up costs is that of an OnProcess customer who is a leading provider of TV

entertainment services via set-top boxes. With subscribers to such services often moving to other providers or deciding they can no longer afford the fees, many boxes become obsolete, which was the case with this company. So how has OnProcess helped fix this?

“The company’s focus was on helping its customers use the boxes, rather than on returning them, so its box-retrieval record

was patchy,” says Lemanski. “But now, every disconnecting customer is sent a recovery kit that includes a fitted shipping box and prepaid UPS label.

“As a result, box returns are running at 95% for voluntary disconnects and 55% for nonvoluntary, producing $60mn in cost savings. This is what agility and transparency in the service supply chain looks like on the ground.”

“WE PRETTY MUCH STARTED REDUCING WASTE BY DOING DUMPSTER DIVESLITERALLY RIFLING THROUGH THE WASTE STREAM”

MIKE CORBO CHIEF SUPPLY CHAIN OFFICER, COLGATE-PALMOLIVE

PRODUCED BY: CRAIG KILLINGBACK

supplychaindigital.com 95 WRITTEN BY: ILKHAN OZSEVIM

Leading a transformation to digitise and automate Shell’s S2C (Sourceto-Contract) and E2E (End-to-End) processes, Sander Voorn, the S2C Digital and Process Transformation Design Manager at Shell, discusses how the use of certain digital systems and tools have had a huge and measurable impact on their output.

“My current role is really focused on looking at how we can digitalise,” he says, “and with that, largely automate these processes.”

Voorn has been in procurement for the last 20 years, starting in an internal supply chain management consulting practice and within that role, helping to manage one of the company’s strategic supplier relationships — their technology partner for telecoms. From there, he was integral in centralising their procurement activities, moving into a role to digitalise their contingent workforce spend and activities.

How digital tools fuel Shell’s procurement process

Now at Shell, and describing the interplay of procurement structures and systems that brought this transformation about, Voorn says: “Each business has a procurement function, but they fall under one Executive Vice President, and my organisation supports all of these different businesses

Through its digitalisation, automation and AI systems in procurement Shell is receiving global recognition for its productivity and growing ethical standards

centrally. We have a few key tools to carry out this function. We have our Category Management and Contracting Process framework, which lays out the requirements that everybody needs to meet, which we incorporated into the system, SAP Ariba, which has embedded DocuSign. We also have Salesforce to complement this process, and a few other systems which together operate to manage the entire end-to-end (E2E) process.”

With the rise of digital systems in business, and their inevitable impact on global procurement processes, the effects are considerable.

Voorn says: “The biggest changes have been around centralisation, and a growing awareness of the importance and value of data, and the need to structure and standardise that data in order to extract value from it. The risk-management aspect of procurement has fluctuated a little, but in the last couple of years I’ve seen a growing awareness of its importance not only from a cost perspective, but also from a differentiator perspective.

“The ability to identify viable organisations — that is, who from a risk and ESG perspective we want and do not want to be doing business with — is becoming increasingly important, and I think this trend will continue to grow.”

Growing digitalisation has unmistakable global consequences, according to Voorn: “We are now able to connect the process End-To-End (E2E) that would not have been possible in the past.”

“The key to E2E system and process optimisation and integration is to create Natural Working Teams (NWT) composed of all relevant disciplines. The core of these NWTs consists of the Process Architects from my team, our partners from IT and the

Data Analytics team. These experts make the digitalisation happen!”

One of the main systems in Shell’s entire S2C process is SAP Ariba, where they now manage all of their spend. Describing the process, he says: “From my perspective, it begins with category management. We have categories like contingent workforce, rotating equipment or consulting, for example. These categories are managed by the Category Managers (CMs) who help collect market intelligence and are responsible for providing global steer to a group of buyers.

“The CMs set up these category strategies that detail how we want to go to market. They typically create global framework agreements, which are then made available through SAP Ariba. The next step begins when our buyers are looking to identify demand for a specific contract. They come up with a sourcing strategy, tie this into the global category strategies and leverage the information from them.”

SANDER VOORN S2C DIGITAL &PROCESS TRANSFORMATION DESIGN MANAGER, SHELL

“MY CURRENT ROLE IS REALLY FOCUSED ON LOOKING AT HOW WE CAN DIGITALISE AND, WITH THAT, LARGELY AUTOMATE OUR SOURCE-TO-CONTRACT (S2C) PROCESS”

BIO

SANDER VOORN

TITLE: S2C DIGITAL & PROCESS TRANSFORMATION DESIGN MANAGER

INDUSTRY: ENERGY SUPPLIER

LOCATION: NETHERLANDS

Sander Voorn is the Source to Contract Digital & Process Transformation design manager at Shell where he has led the S2C digital transformation over the past 4 years. During this time the S2C cycle-time was reduced by over 25%. Prior to this, he developed and implemented Shell’s Supplier Performance Management best practices for its Arctic operations. Ensuring safe and efficient performance throughout its supply chain.

Sander’s first global digital transformation was in 2005 when he developed a global programme for the sourcing and management of Shell’s 10,000+ Contingent workforce. The transparency and control this enabled reduced Contingent Workforce cost by USD 60 Mln+ annually.

Build Supply Chain Resilience By Disrupting It

Winning supply chains achieve breakthrough business outcomes by leveraging analytics automation on internal and external data to develop actionable insight into the needs of customers across product, channels and other factors that influence demand.

Some of the most successful supply chains use Alteryx to improve forecasts, assortment and inventory decisions, and the uptime of in- service equipment:

y Demand Forecasting: Improve on-shelf-availability and avoid out of stock conditions

y Assortment and Inventory Optimization: Operate a competitive supply chain with a clear line of sight

y Predictive Maintenance: Identify and address potential downtime before it arises

We can already see how much of Shell’s procurement process is carried out within SAP Ariba.

“We also review and approve them within SAP Ariba,” he says, “which provides the added benefit of being able to reuse and leverage existing or prior strategies, and we then use SAP Ariba to go to market, eSourcing either auctions or tenders. “We typically provide our suppliers during the tender with our fit-for-purpose contract proposal, in order for them to base their quote on. This draft, too, is created in SAP Ariba, which is done by leveraging

the metadata or the header data of the contract, which identify things like country, commodity, dates, contract value and so on to automatically assemble a fit for purpose contract for that unique situation.”

This is where SAP Ariba’s Artificial Intelligence starts to play a greater role.

How Artificial Intelligence and Automation lead to increased productivity “Contract Authoring was a time consuming and non-compliance risk area until we were able to use SAP Ariba Contract Authoring technology. There are about 50 key data points that the system uses to automatically assemble from around 4000 different elements of clauses, in order to determine the right contract for a specific situation. We have about 6 million possible combinations,

and that's the draft that we give to our suppliers to base their bids on. Once we get the quotes back, we finalise the contract agreement, then use DocuSign to get a quick signature on those contracts.”

Once contracts have been signed, they have an automated bot – referred to as an RPA (Robotic Process Automation) – that then releases the outline agreement of the contract on the SAP ERP system, from which the volume of spending for individual contacts is monitored.

The sheer volume and complexity of data that is sifted through and analysed highlights the extraordinary productivity and efficiency that AI is able to achieve compared to its relative human elements. Shell also employs a selection of other (AI) systems to bolster and complete their operations.

One of these is Microsoft Power BI (Business Intelligence), which is used in conjunction with SAP Ariba to allow procurement staff and stakeholders to easily follow contract journeys. A new Suite Dashboard for Shell’s Contract Management Teams (CMTs) is to be implemented into Salesforce, too, where they can see and collaborate on the contract relevant to each party.

Digital contracts, the limitations of AI and the need for human intervention Voorn’s position is that, even as part of the Shell procurement process – widely recognised as one of the most effective in the world – it is not yet perfect. And this is, he believes, due to the fact much of it still requires a certain amount of human intervention: “Presently, from a workflow

perspective, contracts are integrated and to a degree, automated. From an Artificial Intelligence (AI) perspective, however, most of the technology that I see is quite limited, and still needs a lot of human intervention.

“AI, no doubt, is able to perform numerous activities, but in reality for many applications it only has around a 60-70% accuracy rate, which means that you still need to have a person double-checking its work, which kind of defeats the purpose.”

He adds: “Truth be told, when people talk about Machine Learning, it's really about training the algorithm. We train the algorithm what is and what is not permitted, by embedding that training (or that learning) into our regular workflows.”

How AI can help to drive creativity and ethical standards

The AI aspect of Shell’s procurement systems is not only able to improve costeffectiveness and operational efficiency, but is also able to free up staff from certain laborious and time-consuming tasks, enabling them to work more creatively, as well as having an impact on ethical procurement.

“If you look at our strategy at Shell

‘Powering Progress’,” says Voorn. “It consists of a number of elements, a key one being ‘Powering Lives’. This means that Shell is concerned with supporting inclusive societies, but it also means making sure that we only ever do business with ethical suppliers, and also that there is supplierdiversity, where we do a lot of supplier development which can take time.

“So, thanks to the AI and automation process, we can free up staff to spend more time finding potentially viable suppliers and to look at how Shell can help these suppliers reduce their own carbon footprint.”

SANDER VOORN

MANAGER,

“THE ABILITY TO IDENTIFY VIABLE ORGANISATIONS – THAT IS, WHO FROM A RISK AND ESG PERSPECTIVE WE WANT AND DO NOT WANT TO DO BUSINESS WITH – IS BECOMING INCREASINGLY IMPORTANT, AND I THINK THIS TREND WILL CONTINUE TO GROW”

When considering ethical procurement at Shell, the company takes time to develop actions and solutions to diversify their suppliers, as well as how to ensure that workers’ welfare rights and ethical standards are not only complied with, but substantially increased.

Artificial Intelligence also plays a significant role in the quality of Shell’s health and safety standards, with Voorn saying: “As part of our process, we ask suppliers about their safety standards and worker-welfare policies. Some suppliers respond, some don't, or don’t do so quickly enough. In order to tackle this problem, we are building bots to ask these questions and to follow them up.

“Once suppliers come back with their Health and Safety and Welfare Policy documents, they need, of course, to be fully read and digested. We typically know what kind of HSE (Health, Safety and Environmental) policy their documents should cover. With AI NLP (Natural Language processing) capabilities, we can see whether this document and their policy is up to a certain standard and whether it meets our thresholds, so we can then determine where there’s a safety risk for a specific category.

Shell’s Scope 3 ambitions and data driven sustainability

As an energy company, Shell is looking at its own CO2 emissions, as well as Scope 2 and 3 – which includes the CO2 footprint of their suppliers. One of Shell’s policies, implemented last year, surrounds the company’s drive to identify those suppliers who want to actively reduce their CO2 footprint, who can then register themselves in the Supplier Energy Transition Hub (a Shell-initiated programme), which Shell has made available as a public application

Shell uses Whatfix to drive adoption of its S2P digital applications

Shell transformed its contract management and procurement processes with SAP Ariba to keep up with the competitor landscape, streamline operations, cut supply chain costs, and meet evolving customer expectations. However, with a complex new application and outdated training practices, Shell struggled to meet its adoption goals, meaning longer process times, large amounts of support tickets, high training costs, and poor data quality.

With Whatfix’s digital adoption platform (DAP), Shell created a simple application experience with in-app content providing personalized guidance for employees. With in-app elements like step-by-step flows, task lists, and tooltips, Shell provided its contract and procurement departments with engaging onboarding and training, in the flow of work.

“Whatfix provides a great way to store information where it’s most needed, reducing the number of users' questions, and simplifying training. It’s a great way to communicate changes - ‘just follow the Whatfix flow!’”

With Whatfix, Shell launched its in-app digital assistant, SCAI, which embedded a knowledge base into SAP Ariba - allowing users to search for any applicationrelated questions.

“Whatfix enabled SCAI, which answers the majority of questions related to our contract and procurement processes, hence we don’t have to answer each support question from the frontline! Users ask SCAI anything they need on the contracting process or tool, allowing my team to focus on more important activities.”

With Whatfix, Shell created an intuitive SAP Ariba experience that supported its workforce through complex contract and procurement workflows. Whatfix provided an intuitive point-and-click digital adoption solution that accelerated its SAP Ariba adoption.

Empower your workforce with better in-app experiences and on-demand support with Whatfix!

By the Numbers:

The Whatfix Difference

• 20% reduction in SAP Ariba support queries & 30% reduction in time spent on application-related support tickets

• 100% change communication to all SAP Ariba end-users

• 20 minute reduction in end-to-end cycle time per contract

to which any company can join. In turn, Shell then works with these companies to reduce their carbon footprint.

“This is where you see a touch of symbiosis between our suppliers as customers, and our customers as suppliers; nobody can do this alone, what’s needed is collaboration.”

Shell is currently upgrading one of its SAP Ariba modules, called Supplier Life Cycle and Performance Management (SLP). SLP will allow Shell to develop sophisticated supplier profiles, by being able to analyse the qualifications of a supplier’s performance data from a variety of different angles and lenses. Everything from safety to delivery methods, through to their pricing, quality – and even worker-welfare – will be considered. Voorn says: “I think that SLP capability is going to be critical in our ‘Powering Lives’ development, and as partof our Net-Zero ambitions.”

Electrifying energy: Shell’s strategy to move away from Fossil Fuels

Shell has set out a strategy to accelerate the transition of our business to net-zero emissions. “Shell is working to provide more renewable and low-carbon energy options for customers through investments in wind, solar, electric vehicle charging, hydrogen, and more,” says Voorn. ‘For example, Shell is investing in lower-carbon options – from electric-vehicle charging points and solutions to fuels like hydrogen and biofuels.”

Additionally, Shell recently announced that it plans to increase the number of charging points from 80,000 to 500,000 worldwide by 2025.

“We've been recognised on a number of elements of our portfolio, from CIPS (Chartered Institute of Procurement & Supply) and others. With CIPS, it was for our end-to-end (E2E) process,” says Voorn. “Our source to contact (S2C) digitalisation

strategy was recognised due to our global journey, but also due to our position moving forward. We have a fairly high percentage of sourcing that’s done through e-sourcing and e-auctions – when compared to the market standard – with around 88% of our contracts being signed through DocuSign. Just a few years ago, this was very uncommon. We encourage its use at Shell and, once you've used it, you know that it's a better way to go.”

Unexpected Data-Synergies and Value from Artificial Intelligence

For Voorn, the Salesforce programme that Shell uses has two primary functions: it acts as both a kind of dashboard where data from different sources can be directly

“I

SEEN GREAT CHANGES IN PROCUREMENT OVER THE PAST 20 YEARS. THE BIGGEST HAVE BEEN AROUND

A

OF THE IMPORTANCE AND

OF

pulled, as well as having the ability to jump via embedded hyperlinks into SAP Ariba to a specific task or activity.

Salesforce gives them the ability to collaborate, whereas most Source-toContract (S2C) tools have limited collaboration capabilities. It also allows them to collaborate on documents and pulls in documents and data from other systems, while also pushing these back into SAP Ariba via a systematic record–keeping function. The entire system is streamlined toward higher productivity.

Voorn says: “A big surprise to me was that data analytics with Alteryx identified activities that were being done that didn’t require doing. We then saw the number of contracts that staff could manage increase and the time

it took to complete a contract decrease. The game changer in process optimisation through process mining was when we decided to use Alteryx. We fed the system all our SAP Ariba workflow data which we analysed to identify frictions points, waste and other inefficiencies. This generated very surprising insights that enabled us to close knowledge gaps with some of our users, take out process steps that were not needed, re-engage with key process participants that were ignoring their tasks in the system and were still using e-mail and implement many more improvements. All combined this led to a 25% shorter cycle time and very material reduction in effort by procurement staff and key stakeholders.

“ONE OF THE MAIN SYSTEMS IN SHELL’S ENTIRE S2C PROCESS IS SAP ARIBA”

Another programme that Shell uses is Whatfix, which is a digital assistant that’s implemented inside SAP Ariba. Voorn says: “We have about 10 different features that Whatfix can do to help a user who’s, for example, using a feature that's never been used before. Or, if we change something in the system affecting a certain field, they will be notified of this change – and even explain the purpose of that field. Whatfix has enabled us to stop ‘classroom’ training and replaced this with short demos, guided tours, real time tips and similar features. So our users are much more comfortable trying new things because the system will support them. It will also detect in real-time any incongruent data, flag this to the user and guide the user to correct this, avoiding errors further down in the process. This again leads to increased productivity.

The impact of these systems at Shell is palpable. Productivity has been increased and the company is able to react to geopolitical shifts through automation and raising ethical standards while increasing productivity.

Sander Voorn predicts that these trends will continue to grow, serving as a perfect example of the essential nature of digitisation and automation in contributing to the success of any company aiming to thrive in an everexpanding digital landscape.

SANDER VOORN

S2C DIGITAL &PROCESS TRANSFORMATION DESIGN MANAGER, SHELL

RESILIENCE AND SUSTAINABILITY?

DIGITAL TWINS TO THE RESCUE

Mark Landry – Intelligent Industry Leader for Capgemini Americas –offers insight into how digital twin tech is helping take supply chains to the next level

WRITTEN BY: SEAN ASHCROFT

They may sound like something sinister from a sci-fi movie, but digital twin technology is fast capturing the attention of organisations across all major sectors.

A digital twin (DT) is a dynamic digitised model of a physical thing or system that relies on sensor data to understand its state, respond to changes, improve operations and to add value.

In the context of supply chains, a DT is a virtual replica, comprising potentially thousands of assets, warehouses, logistics and inventory positions. It offers

a clear view of the risks facing complex, interconnected supply chains. This allows supply chains to be agile, because risk is identified early and disruption is minimised, or perhaps even averted.

Here, Mark Landry – Intelligent Industry Leader for Capgemini Americas – offers insight into DT tech within the sphere of supply chain, providing insights and advice for organisations that are struggling with its implementation.

How do digital twins help supply chains? DTs allow organisations to improve on a number of metrics, such as costs, operational efficiency, turn-around times, and sustainability. The tech allows companies to digitally model, simulate, test, and analyse their products, services, and systems. Used in multiple cases across the value chain – from design through to manufacturing and production – businesses can experiment with different scenarios and assess the impact of each decision without any real-world, tangible risks. The benefits? Risk-free, low-cost system improvement across the value chain.

DTs can also transform ways of working, alter employee experience, and improve safety.

How does digital twin tech help with ESG compliance?

While DTs offer a range of benefits, recent Capgemini research shows 57% of organisations agree that improving sustainability efforts is one of the key drivers of their digital twin investments. The technology can help increase efficiencies, propose interventions, and potentially automate change. This can reduce waste, minimise energy

Ensuring the agility and resilience of your business and supply chain starts with identifying the risks.

Download our report to start your resilience planning today.

Because Insight Beats Hindsight

“By their nature

digital twins help organisations bake innovation into their supply chains”

MARK LANDRY

INTELLIGENT INDUSTRY LEADER, CAPGEMINI AMERICAS

consumption, and, ultimately, help organisations and societies become more sustainable as they simultaneously become more digital.

Siemens, for example, is modelling energy demand and infrastructure using a digital twin in a project with a German city of about 200,000 residents. It has so far found that cutting emissions by 70% by 2035 is a feasible target.

How do digital twins help build resilience? Digital twins can monitor entire systems and adapt to changes in real-time, as they arise.

An example of this is Philip Morris International (PMI), which has created a digital twin of its global manufacturing

footprint. This allows the company to model and assess the impact of changes in product portfolios, market regulations, and even business disruption. This means PMI can run optimisation scenarios around manufacturing cost, import and export duty, and transportation costs across the network, reducing its use of spreadsheet simulations by 90% and cutting scenario-evaluation times from weeks to hours.

Which sectors are ahead of the game on digital twin tech? When looking to achieve ESG goals, streamline operations and improve efficiencies, the first point of focus is hazard to human life. Energy and utilities organisations operate in dangerous environments – such as offshore oil fields – and, as a result, there is widespread adoption of DTs in the energy and utilities industries.

Also, it’s not uncommon to see large organisations dealing with thousands of suppliers throughout their supply chain. To work with these suppliers more efficiently and deliver on sustainability objectives, collaboration is essential.

This is also something we’ve seen players in the energy and utilities industry do well with the help of DT tech – working with software vendors and equipment providers to deliver digital continuity and subsequently drive results.

TADA NOW LAUNCHES DIGITAL TWIN SOLUTION FOR PRODUCTION

Tada Now recently announced the industry’s first digital twin-enabled Production Control Tower (PCT).

Built on the company’s digital supply chain twin technology, Digital Duplicate, it is designed to stabilise factory operations by providing actionable intelligence to avert production line interruptions.

One of PCT’s applications delivers failuremode analytics for productivity losses across end-to-end operations.

Using Tada Now’s cloud-native architecture, PCT is scalable and accessible from both web browsers and mobile devices.

Tada Now CPO Amit Gupta said: “Traditional planning solutions fail to rapidly synchronise factory operations from dock to point of application once material is received, or there is a change in labour availability.”

One business using PCT to good effect is Toro, a provider of outdoor environment solutions, including turf and landscape maintenance, as well as snow management.

Senior Materials Manager at Tada Now Adam Nuttall said: “We have eliminated tedious manipulations of spreadsheets and chains of emails, allowing our teams to get some more product out of the door while simultaneously lowering our overall costs.”

E.ON, for example, is working alongside multiple industry partners through a consortium to create a digital twin that monitors the health and performance of its 110kV power transformers.

As a general point, organisations looking to derive greater benefits from digital twin technologies should collaborate with partners – something that’s possible if they on-board critical partners to their digital-twin vision and deploy collaboration platforms from the get-go.

What are some of the most innovative uses of digital twins in the supply chain? By their nature, DTs help organisations bake innovation into their supply chains. With the sole purpose of optimising existing capabilities all along the value chain, they hold the power to transform disparate systems into intelligent, connected systems.

But, while DT tech is being leveraged across the world to increase efficiencies and raise companies’ top and bottom

“A third of organisations say sustainability is the key driver of their digital twin investments”

MARK LANDRY INTELLIGENT INDUSTRY LEADER, CAPGEMINI AMERICAS

lines, it is not limited to simply achieving corporate outcomes.

Perhaps the most amazing example of DT deployment is the project to create a digital twin of the entire Earth. Slated to be completed by 2030, Destination Earth, or DestinE, aims to produce a highly accurate digital model of the Earth that is able to simulate the atmosphere, oceans, and human systems. This innovative project holds huge potential in helping to combat climate change.

What are typical barriers to progress on DT tech?

Many businesses realise the benefits of digital twins and are already making moves to implement the technology into their value chains. Capgemini research reveals digital twin implementations are set to grow over the next five years by around 36%. However, the path to successful DT deployment is far from hurdle-free. Governance and lack of managerial support

stand out as critical barriers slowing digital twin deployment.

In terms of overcoming typical barriers to deployment, organisations should look to develop a strong, well-defined vision backed by firm managerial commitment to harness the full potential of digital twin investment. Building a clear roadmap is also essential, especially in identifying pain points that require attention or extra funding.

DT implementation also requires a specific skillset, the lack of which poses a significant challenge for many organisations.

However, tech and digital skills are increasingly becoming hot commodities, with many sectors competing for a decreasing pool of candidates.

Organisations should invest in upskilling existing employees to ensure they have the skills necessary for DT implementation. Such skills include knowledge and competency in embedded software, cybersecurity and blockchain, data capture and hybrid cloud systems.

Realising procurement savings and added value

BY: GEORGIA WILSON

BY: MIKE SADR

Damon Ascolani, Head of Global Procurement at TransUnion

TransUnion is a global information and insights company that makes trust possible between businesses and consumers and is one of the three largest consumer reporting agencies in the US.

“We provide the information that makes the relationship between consumers and business possible,” says Damon Ascolani, Head of Global Procurement at TransUnion. From credit scores to ID verification, alternative credit data, analytics, marketing, and debt collection strategies, TransUnion is the single source of information for aiding its clients in these areas.

Whilst Ascolani’s current stint at the company began in 2017, he previously worked for the company back in 1998. “I was able to see the company before it became a public organisation,” says Ascolani.

“20 years ago, the company was private and very back office. Today – and ever since it became public – TransUnion has a very entrepreneurial mindset. It’s an older company, but it acts like a startup with an open-minded and innovative culture. Its mission statement is ‘Information for Good’, enabling financial inclusion to people everywhere in the world.”

Damon Ascolani, Head of Global Procurement at TransUnion, discusses the importance of procurement in M&A activity and how organisations can realise value

DAMON ASCOLANI

HEAD OF GLOBAL PROCUREMENT, TRANS UNION

Procurement’s growing importance in M&A activity

When it comes to mergers and acquisitions (M&A), procurement is steadily becoming an important process both before and after a merger or acquisition. “In particular, this can be seen in the due diligence process, assessing vendor footprints to build a business case for synergies,” explains Ascolani.

“There are also contractual elements, servicing rights with partial divestitures and acquisitions, and I’ve found that the more

“TransUnion has a very entrepreneurial mindset. It’s an older company, but it acts like a startup with an open-minded and innovative culture”

DAMON ASCOLANI

TITLE: HEAD OF GLOBAL PROCUREMENT INDUSTRY: PROCUREMENT LOCATION: CHICAGO, US

Damon Ascolani is a highly accomplished, legally trained senior procurement leader with global experience managing purchasing departments with specialties in building procurement departments, M&A, cost savings initiatives, contracts management, and process streamlining.

He received a Bachelor’s Degree in Economics from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign and has a law degree from The University of Illinois-Chicago John Marshall Law School and was admitted to the Illinois Bar in 2012.

Mr. Ascolani currently works at TransUnion, one of the three national credit bureaus, serving the company’s first-ever Head of Global Procurement. Prior to that, he spent 15 years at HSBC holding a variety of senior management positions in risk and procurement.

procurement is involved in M&A activities, the more value we are able to provide due to our expertise in vendor spend and dynamic product suites.

“In this scenario, TransUnion helps organisations to develop business cases for potential M&A activity – we provide the information that is valuable to that discussion. After the deal is done, its then about achieving those synergies, making sure that all vendors are integrated and that our stakeholders are getting the best rates, terms, and overall value from their spend.”

EXECUTIVE BIO

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Dun & Bradstreet/ TransUnion: Understanding risk and opportunity

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Dun & Bradstreet’s Brian Farley discusses the company’s long-standing relationship with TransUnion and what sets their it apart from others

Founded in 1841, Dun & Bradstreet has been helping its customers understand risk and opportunities in business for nearly two centuries. As a provider of data and analytics, the company serves its customers by collecting information on a global scale about hundreds of millions of different business locations worldwide. “At Dun & Bradstreet, we are known for providing commercial insight,” says Brian Farley, Vice President and Business Segment Manager of Third-Party Risk and Compliance at Dun & Bradstreet.

“Two of our biggest operating areas are ownership information and financial risk. With the information we gather, we are able to provide predictive indicators and describe the future behaviours of businesses worldwide.”

Dun & Bradstreet and TransUnion have a long history of working together. “We’ve been mutual customers, as well as mutual suppliers for decades. Our services complement each other, with TransUnion focusing on consumer financial behaviours and Dun & Bradstreet focusing on commercial behaviours. Our history has really been about addressing specific customer problems by linking our expertise.”

Discoverourcontinuously updateddata›

Two key areas where Dun & Bradstreet and TransUnion are working together include fraud and micro-businesses. “Combining both Dun & Bradstreet’s and TransUnion’s data, we are using information to develop a strong picture of not only the business entity, but also individuals associated with the business to mitigate commercial fraud and misrepresentation of identity,” says Farley.

“We have also been working together on a broader area – micro-businesses. This is a trend that is accelerating in our market in the wake of COVID-19; there has been a significant rise in remote working and freelance workers,” he adds. “This new approach to the working model has created these micro-businesses and this is where we are working with TransUnion to combine our mutual strengths to gain a greater understanding of these businesses and how they behave in the marketplace.”

Dun & Bradstreet and TransUnion

NAVIGATING COVID-19 RELATED DISRUPTION AT TRANSUNION

When it comes to navigating disruption, Ascolani explains that much of it comes down to communication. “A lot of it is keeping tabs on all vendors that provide our strategic products and services, as well as communicating any timeline changes internally. This communication allows all stakeholders to understand the dynamics of the industry and plan accordingly,” explains Ascolani.

Initially when COVID-19 hit, it was ‘all hands on deck’ for TransUnion. “We had key third parties that supported our business that couldn’t go into the office and didn’t have work-from-home capabilities,” says Ascolani.

“We helped get laptops to many places all over the world where we had workers. We also had one staff member physically drive out of state – Chicago, Illinois – to

Iowa in search of masks and hand sanitiser that could be brought back to our home office. And in order to ensure that we had safe on-site meetings, we supplied testing kits for our staff.

“So, initially, it was this collaborative allhands-on-deck effort as there was not a great playbook for an event such as this; we didn’t have processes in place for this level of global disruption in the supply chain - you would never think that you would actually be living through something like this.”

Having good relationships with vendors and stakeholders, TU Procure were able to provide throughout the pandemic and mitigate the issues that arose as best as they could. “We also managed to successfully implement a custom portal for our staff to order the equipment they needed from home to continue to operate,” says Ascolani.

DAMON ASCOLANI HEAD OF GLOBAL PROCUREMENT, TRANS UNION

The need for CEO mandates in procurement

“I always say: you would never review a contract from a legal perspective without sending it to your legal department, so why wouldn’t the same apply to procurement for the commercial terms?” says Ascolani.

Procurement is a hard function to integrate throughout an organisation without having topdown mandates. TU Procure, the company's internally rebranded global procurement team acts as a centre of excellence for organisations, providing them with a control point to make sure that their stakeholders are getting the best market rates, and the most up to date product and service offerings. “We drive that discussion when it comes to supplier management and assessment. As companies grow, the economic benefits and the risk management benefits of a mature procurement organisation become increasingly vital.”

“TU Procure, our internally rebranded global procurement team acts as a centre of excellence for organisations, providing them with a control point to make sure that their stakeholders are getting the best market rates, and the most up to date product and service offerings”

DAMON ASCOLANI

HEAD OF GLOBAL PROCUREMENT, TRANS UNION

What makes data management critical to procurement

When it comes down to being successful or unsuccessful in procurement, quality data is at its core. Whether it's understanding cost savings, predicting demand or managing suppliers, data management is critical.

“An organisation can have multiple vendor relationships for a single toolset and central visibility that procurement reporting provides is the key to ensuring tail spend is well managed and vendor synergies achieved in M&A scenarios,” says Ascolani.

“At TransUnion, we help organisations to navigate the noise, aggregating that data into manageable and insightful reports”

“At TransUnion, we help organisations to navigate the noise, aggregating that data into manageable and insightful reports. This is also important for our own supplier diversity reporting at TransUnion.

He adds: “We have a robust process for analysing our data and classifying it, so in order to make an impact, we have to be able to report against a baseline and if you don’t have good analytics, then that can’t happen. Particularly in a growing organisation, you can quickly lose sight of third-party spend, so bringing stability to that and providing reporting is valuable to the decision-making process.”

TRANSUNION AND ITS RELATIONSHIPS

Critical to the success of any organisation, particularly when it comes to large-scale initiatives, TransUnion values its relationships. The company selects its relations based on their dedication to the long-term goal: the art of what is possible over time, not just the quick wins. TransUnion looks for relations with those that are innovative and will grow with the organisation.

“We have a cloud initiative, a global business system and a customer interaction tool set that we internally call ‘Project Illuminate’ that we are working on,” explains Ascolani.

“In order to successfully implement projects like these – especially global ones – you need to have strong relationships with the providers that assist you in that implementation. In my team, we have expanded multiple aspects of our procurement function. One in particular is our risk analytics capabilities, where we have just begun an automation project with the

help of Dun and Bradstreet. We went through an extensive sourcing exercise to select them, and we are very excited to be able to better screen our vendors, customers, and other third party relationships.”

Another relationship for TransUnion is Slalom, which helps it from a staffing perspective for a number of critical projects. “Their skillset pairs well with our culture and environment. They understand what we are trying to do and provide us the resources to get us there quickly,” says Ascolani.

“We also have a strong relationship with Salesforce, who support our customer journey from a business customer perspective and with whom we have a long-standing relationship. And then we have Coupa Software, our procure-topay (P2P) tool, which transformed us from a spreadsheet-based, manual processdriven organisation into a more structured, cloud-based organisation for our analytics and sourcing.”

Realising procurement savings and added value

A common struggle for many in procurement is the calculation of savings and value, as well as realising it in a way that people can really feel the benefits. “Every conference I go to, this is always a topic,” says Ascolani.

“It is not always a straightforward proposition, especially in a rapidly growing organisation such as ours, but I find that being able to realise savings so that they are felt comes down to an organisation's relationship with the finance team and stakeholders. Procurement’s value add to an organisation goes well beyond budgetary savings, but oftentimes, this type of savings is the one that feels most real to budget owners and stakeholders. So regardless of your savings methodology, tying it to the budget is key. Once you’ve established the budgetary savings with validation by your finance team, it is much easier to champion the other aspects of the value that procurement provides such as cost avoidance and tail spend management. This is critical so that all aspects of the procurement teams’ value to the organisation are recognised.”

TransUnion over the next 12 to 18 months

Over the next 12 to 18 months, TransUnion will be heavily focused on navigating the complex activities that follow M&A activity. “We’ve conducted a fair amount of acquisitions and divestitures, so there is a lot of work to be done to navigate the challenges of these activities,” says Ascolani.

“But we’re up for the challenge! It’s an exciting time – there is a lot to do, we are leveraging a lot of strategic relationships during this time – and, had we not had these relationships, this process would have been significantly more difficult.

“So the next 12 to 18 months will include merging the organisations that we bought under a single, common operating model, as well as further navigating recovery from COVID-19.”

WRITTEN BY: SEAN ASHCROFT

10

Ask what else might happen next

For supply chain professionals, Black Swan events can come in all shapes and sizes, from a macro disruption, such as war in Ukraine or a cargo ship accidentally corking the Suez Canal, to a company-specific problem, such as the failure of a subcontractor. In the long run, anticipating those risks and then acting to head off their impact may turn out to be the most important thing you do this year.

Consider other geopolitical factors

Wars often have unexpected knock-on effects in other places.

What events are likely to happen now than before the Russian invasion? What impact will the war have on the next European elections? What will happen to international trade agreements?

How can you protect yourself against those other potential stressors?

“In the long run, anticipating those risks and then acting to head off their impact may turn out to be the most important thing you do this year”

Undertake scenario planning

Nobody has a crystal ball to see into the future. Plan for the unexpected – when the unexpected happens how would you respond? Understanding where you stand and what your options are if a crucial supply input becomes suddenly much more difficult to procure may be an important exercise to undertake now.

Ask how risk management will affect profitability

Moving supply chains nearer home may have an impact on your costs. Find out what the impact might be, then brace yourself by cost cutting or redesigning products where you can. Decoupling globalised markets may reduce opportunities by challenging predictable quarterly growth, stable prices, access to cheap capital, and global access to a mobile skilled workforce.

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You can know every single thing about how all your partners do business. Or you can read it in papers.

“66% of procurement teams rate reducing supply risk as their number one priority right now”

Seek single points of supply failure

Are you over-reliant on any particular supplier or geography? Have you neglected opportunities to build resilience or agility into your supply base? Can you regionalise your supplies? 66% of procurement teams rate reducing supply risk as their number one priority right now. If you don’t, you probably haven’t been paying attention.

Forecast what happens if Ukraine war drags on

After five months of the war there doesn't appear to be an easy conclusion in sight and this situation could easily continue into 2023/24 or even longer. How much longer could it go on? What implications would a long war have on your business? It may well be that planning 3-5 years ahead (the norm in many industries) is simply not sufficient.

Screen for supply sanctions compliance

Roughly 50 of the world’s countries have joined in the sanctions against Russia. Suppliers on the sanctions list may find themselves running into regulatory difficulties as they try to sell their offerings in the West. Are any of your offshore partners putting you at risk? How is your enhanced screening and due diligence proceeding? How are you progressing supplier transitions where you have identified potential origin-of-source issues?

if you're at a cost disadvantage

Some companies and countries outside of Western sanctions are buying Russian oil at a significant discount to the WTI/ Brent market price. Is this going to create a cost disadvantage that you will need to find a way to counter? Some analysts forecast that, war or no war, energy prices are likely to remain cheaper in emerging markets and higher in the West all the way to 2030, in part due to higher Western renewable energy production costs and subsidies.

Perform cost structure analysis of suppliers

How inflation affects you depends largely on the inputs of your offering. What input costs are likely to change most? If in the past, you relied on Ukrainian steel, car parts, coal, petroleum products, or wheat, you may be facing a particularly challenging time. Given that extended volatile and recessionary periods often last as long as 15 years, it’s important to develop a clear understanding now.

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The consequences of Russia's war on energy security

Understand your energy supplies' risk

In recent weeks, we have seen the topic of energy security emerge as a top concern among our clients. How resilient are your energy supplies? What are the government’s policies about energy rationing? Where would your industry rank if rationing begins? As consumer heating and electricity demands increase this winter, industrial users could find themselves facing the devastating impact of a shutdown.

“In recent weeks, we have seen the topic of energy security emerge as a top concern among our clients”

APPROACH TO A PRAGMATIC DIGITAL TRANSFORMATION

PRODUCED BY: TOM VENTURO

supplychaindigital.com 145 WRITTEN BY: ILKHAN OZSEVIM

When we think about logistics, when we picture the oceans being crisscrossed by thousands of gargantuan cargo ships with their huge multicoloured containers stacked sky-high; when we picture the multitudes of blimp-like cargo planes that saturate the stratospheres with their freight-in-tonnage; the land, the sea, the skies – we doubtless take it to be the very paradigm of efficient processes. It must be, surely?

With the entire business world – indeed, the entire human world – depending on its arterial and vascular traffic (‘vessels’ being named so for a reason), it must be the case that until now efficiency has been at the very pulse and feedback of this entire system.

Admittedly, then, it was a surprise to discover that this has categorically not been the case for central aspects of logistics or the supply chain as a whole, both in the past and in most cases, even the present.

Mac Sullivan, Head of Technology and Digital Promotion at NNR Global Logistics (USA), is the man who supplied this rude awakening. “I have cargo that I need to send from Dallas to London. In order to figure out all the different ways that I can get it there, all the relevant contracts as well as all the potentially different routes have to be centralised to a specific location. What we've found is that logistics as a whole, has

Mac Sullivan, Head of Tech and Digital Promotion of NNR Global Logistics (USA), on the outmoded state of the logistics industry and NNR’s advancement

been way, way behind in its modus operandi. A great number of logistics companies have, up until now, been working with paperbased (literally ‘written-down’) information. This goes all the way through from the tracking of orders to the recording of sales receipts and information,” he says.

This must be a mistake of some kind – we have our eyes on Mars; we are at the forefront of quantum computation and have systems in AI and big data that are so sophisticated that,

schematically at least, they know more about us than we do about ourselves. “Way, way behind.”

“If data isn't entered into a digital system, you simply don't have ‘visibility,’ which means that you don't have all the pieces to the logistical puzzle,” he says. This sounds like a crash-course in how not to run the global supply chain.

The ability to digitise elements of the supply chain and more specifically, the logistics chain, helps provide greater visibility to potential

MAC SULLIVAN

HEAD OF TECH AND DIGITAL PROMOTION, NNR GLOBAL LOGISTICS

“WHAT WE'VE FOUND IS THAT LOGISTICS AS A WHOLE HAS BEEN WAY, WAY BEHIND IN ITS MODUS OPERANDI”

solutions. In a globalised world, the use of paper is tantamount to the obfuscation of processes, whereas the digitalisation of data is equal to their elucidation. If supply chain is the realm, data is king.

Once elucidated through digitalisation, the data of course needs to be sifted-through and sorted – in a sort of vast problemsolving operation, and this is where Artificial Intelligence ‘traditionally’ comes in. But here again, in supply-chain terms, we have been

MAC SULLIVAN

TITLE: HEAD OF TECH AND DIGITAL PROMOTION

INDUSTRY: LOGISTICS LOCATION: TOKYO

EXECUTIVE BIO

Mac aspires to facilitate a retooling and upskilling of the logistics industry through promoting collaboration between education, business, and technology. His work in sales and marketing in the logistics industry prompted him to pursue his PhD in Political Theory from ECNU where he is finalising his dissertation on how government policies can deal with the disruptive effects of digitalisation and automation on the logistics industry. Self-study and a passion for this topic has helped him recently become the Head of Technology and Digital Promotion, where he is facilitating the digital transformation of NNR Global Logistics, a division of the Nishitetsu Group. Mac has an EMBA from Hult International Business School and a Bachelor’s degree in Communications from the University of Georgia. He is an adjunct professor at Tongji University and has taught at universities such as Texas Christian University (TCU) and Elon University in the past. Mac spent nearly a third of his life as an ex-pat, living in Spain, Thailand and China during his 20s. His first book, “The Digital Transformation of Logistics: Demystifying Impacts of the Fourth Industrial Revolution” is available on Amazon as of early 2021.

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labouring under the misconception that, until now, AI has been doing its god-like work of solving all such humanly insurmountable problems in an algorithmic whizz, so that we can rest easy that our supplies will be efficiently delivered and that no complications will arise. But Sullivan says, “the truth is that independently, AI still hasn't been able to solve the problems that we actually have”.

So, the schema goes: AI needs human intervention, and humans need to digitise

their data in order that AI can then provide our goods through the supply chain and help us to breathe easy.

But then, in a much-needed cause for exhale, he provides respite to this unacceptable state of affairs: “This is however, finally starting to change,” he says. “The technology and the availability of data that allows us to present the problems to AI - so that it can begin to solve those problems - is now at our fingertips. It’s a really exciting time in the logistics industry, because through the digitisation of data, we are starting to make solutions more readily available. But it will then be – contrary to popular opinion – about the further narrowing-down of those AI solutions through a human agent, enabling us to start assigning the technology to then solve the important issues.”

MAC SULLIVAN HEAD OF TECH AND DIGITAL PROMOTION, NNR GLOBAL LOGISTICS

“IF DATA ISN'T ENTERED INTO A DIGITAL SYSTEM, YOU SIMPLY DON'T HAVE ‘VISIBILITY’, WHICH MEANS THAT YOU DON'T HAVE ALL THE PIECES TO THE LOGISTICAL PUZZLE”

The exposition is interesting. Sullivan, while teaching Business English at university-level in Shanghai, met his present boss Jeff McDonald, who then introduced him to the world of international logistics. “I hit the ground running, with zero background in international business, and started learning how to move freight around the world,” says Sullivan – and he has come a long way since.

The issue of technological disruption for supply chain and logistics is one that

he has been turning over in his mind for some time now.

“Many years ago, I began looking at logistics and the lack of technological adoption in this industry in the broadest sense. I started reading a lot on the subject, doing some of my Master's level work on this topic and then started my PhD work again (which was then on hold) on the thesis of how technology could disrupt the entire international logistics industry. That was in 2016. So then, with this insight, I aimed to

get out of the commercial world of logistics and into the technology side of things,” he says.

Now Head of Technology and Digital Promotion at NNR, Sullivan’s role involves running a now 41-headcount team that is broken up into four sub-teams. “Firstly, we have EDI (Electronic Data Interchange) and API teams, together making up 'connectivity', which deals with connecting with our vendors, customers, and agents. Secondly, we have a product

MAC SULLIVAN HEAD OF TECH AND DIGITAL PROMOTION, NNR GLOBAL LOGISTICS

development and maintenance team for our homegrown global ERP. Third, we have two smaller programmes, one called NNR Connect, which is our new showcase product, and then a homegrown CRM system. We then have traditional IT, hardware, networking, cybersecurity, etc that falls into another (fourth) bucket.”

Of these, NNR Connect deserves a place in the spotlight. NNR Connect is a customer-facing portal that uses AI and cloud tech where customers can easily book, pay for, and track in realtime all their shipments through a truly frictionless, intuitive interface. This is where tech and data intersect to fulfil NNR Global’s vision of a streamlined, customerfocused logistics experience.

NNR’s corporate slogan is 'connecting your dreams', which means providing comfort, confidence and enjoyment for their customers, “and that means that your cargo is getting to the right place, at the right time and at the right cost,” says Sullivan.

“THE TECHNOLOGY AND THE AVAILABILITY OF DATA THAT ALLOWS US TO PRESENT THE PROBLEMS TO AI – SO THAT IT CAN BEGIN TO SOLVE THOSE PROBLEMS – IS NOW AT OUR FINGERTIPS”

NNR’s digitisation in the logistics industry

On the conceptual issue of digitalisation in the logistics industry, Sullivan says: “I wrote a book on the subject that was subtitled: Demystifying Impacts of the Fourth Industrial Revolution, where we brought together a group of 27 authors from around the world, from different segments of the logistics industry, and gave them this broad theme, ranging from blockchain to 3D printing to digital platforms

and rate management. We tried to drive home the idea of a pragmatic framework, so it’s neither your consultant's version, nor is it your academic version of digital transformation. It is a kind of ‘where top-down meets bottom-up’ approach – that is, right in the middle. It is about looking at big problems, while also solving them for the desk-level users.’

When asked what Digital Transformation means for NNR Global, Sullivan answers with a single word: tracking. He then unfolds this idea: “If you go on Amazon, you can order a $2 mug. It will show up at your door, either two hours or two days later, but with turn-byturn instructions and information on where it is along the way. ‘It's left the warehouse’; ‘it's nearing your location’; ‘it's been delivered’. That visibility has not been found in the business logistics industry, even though the cargo could be worth upwards of $2 million. So, tracking and shipment visibility is now a big push, and that is where a lot of people are spending their money, because that’s where the demand is – and that’s why we developed NNR Connect.”

MAC SULLIVAN

HEAD OF TECH AND DIGITAL PROMOTION, NNR GLOBAL LOGISTICS

“WE'RE GOING TO BE QUICKLY EXPANDING OUR OFFERING THROUGH NNR CONNECT AND ROLLING THAT OUT TO OUR OFFICE AND GLOBAL CUSTOMERS”

Global shifts and ratemanagement through tech

With global occurrences such as the obvious 2020 pandemic and its initially not-soobvious supply-chain consequences, the US-China trade war and Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, price fluctuations are at truly unstable levels. NNR has about 15 to 30 different ocean carriers, about 50 to 100 different air-carriers and about 2000 to 5000 different trucking carriers that they work with.

Sullivan says: “We make contracts with all these different carriers, trying to aggregate and then filter-through all the related contracts in order to find the right rates, for the right type of shipment, with the right validity. This is why Amazon has made so much money – applying the right filters in the right places.”

“Rate-management has really come down in price, in that the filters and the technology have been able to aggregate all that data, add some basic AI in terms of scraping through the different documents as they come in, and then centralising them. But post-2019, because there is so much fluctuation in price due to the inconsistencies in supply and demand, you can throw all of that out of the window. We are finding ourselves in a situation where we must pick up the phone and say, 'hey, what rate can you give me for this car, right now?', which has really made the environment a lot more competitive again – where it's not just all about big-buy. Now, it's all about local relationships and about picking up the phone and working hard to get it done.”

How technology is utilised for sourcing

On the question of utilising technology for sourcing, Sullivan also expresses how large companies are having a transformational

MAC SULLIVAN HEAD OF TECH AND DIGITAL PROMOTION, NNR GLOBAL LOGISTICS

impact. “Alibaba, for example, has changed the face of globalisation by making products in mass quantities available through their site. On the consumer side, between Alibaba and China, Amazon, and the US, and also on a global scale, we're starting to see how you can now track demand.

“Another example would be Jungle Scouts, a SaaS company that helps facilitate the sourcing of different product categories, where Amazon FBA sellers can go and find products that are undersold and under-priced, which will then help them to actually go upstream to the very sources of those products.”

NNR's customer facing portal

In 2019 NNR were faced with deciding on whether to update their old customer facing portal, or to completely rebuild it. “We decided to start from scratch,” he says, “and to rebuild it from the ground up. We brought in a very young, aesthetically driven team to bring a product to market that is completely unique. We have handcrafted every button, every component, every page, and colour scheme, and we were able to do this with a fairly limited number of resources. We’re rolling out different modules as we speak and have already rolled out our shipment module, our billing module and so on.

“VECTOR AI CAME ALONG WITH A STRONG RECOMMENDATION, LED BY LOGISTICIANS, AND CO LED BY TECHNOLOGISTS – IT WAS THE RIGHT COMPANY AT THE RIGHT TIME”

Our accounting team said, 'we need our customers to be able to pay via credit card', so we reached out to different vendors and put together a smooth, user-friendly, frictionless customer-experience, where our customers can easily go and pay their invoices. We're releasing some pretty exciting stuff that relates to the partnership we have with vector AI, in terms of seriously starting to eliminate any redundant manual entry upstream and have many upcoming releases in the pipeline.”

NNR partner ecosystem

This partnership with Vector AI has been an important one for NNR. Workflow automation and OCR technology has been used by big banks and big insurance companies for about two decades. But you had to have millions of remarkably similar documents that were being processed to be able to extract those different data elements to utilise, and so the cost was prohibitively high.

Sullivan says: “Even when I started looking at this just five years ago, you still couldn't get a solid pilot with any OCR company without a significant initial investment. Vector AI came along with next gen AI-driven automation, led by logisticians, and co-led by technologists – it was the right company at the right time. What we've been working on with them is outside of their traditional service offering, as it's about going upstream and looking at what documents our customers can provide there, so that we can extract the data from those documents, pre-populate what we need in order to process the shipments, and then recanalise that information to flow downstream. So, we're aggressively partnering with Vector AI to go way upstream and extract the more difficult information from many different customers in many different formats.

“With NNR Connect, we're about to rollout our product called Quick Book, which has

automation powered by Vector AI. They're also working with our accounting team on the more traditional avenue of getting better invoices via email, extracting the information, and then helping to facilitate that automation of accounts payable.”

Another key partner for NNR is Snyder Technology. “Snyder has been with me since day one in this role,” says Sullivan. “Ben Snyder, the CEO, is somebody that I was introduced to by a friend of mine, also in the logistics and technology space. They have helped us move 100% to the cloud, as well as to rapidly accelerate our adoption onto Microsoft's 365 platform. They are developing NNR Connect – the customer facing portal – alongside us, as well as doing everything from data recovery

to API integrations with vendors. It's a broad partnership in terms of digital transformation, product development, infrastructure and they are our licensed Microsoft CSP.”

What do the next 12 to 18 months look like for NNR? The next 12 to 18 months are going to continue to be dynamic for NNR. They are aiming to take on their technical debt through a massive database consolidation, aiming to go from the 52 databases that they either control or deal with on a day-to-day basis and instead reduce that number down to 12 to 15.

Sullivan says: “That's a big effort to reduce our technical debt, to make sure we're going to the new age with less baggage. We're going

to be quickly expanding our offering through NNR Connect and rolling that out to our office and global customers. We're also looking to rapidly improve our connectivity speed and efficacy, bring on new vendors and customers, and connect to them electronically at a much faster rate utilising everything from restful APIs to the toolkit that we have to keep around in terms of PDI integrations. We're trying to take 1,100 different screens in our ERP and get that down to really what it needs to be, to declutter as much as possible. In other words, it's not all about expansion right now, as much as it is about reduction and concentration.”