Archive for March, 2014

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The “Elephant” In Your Company

Friday, March 14th, 2014

Today’s post is from Alyson Usserman, an Account Manager at SafeSourcing, Inc.

We have all heard the saying, “the elephant in the room,” when referring to an awkward situation, but have you applied this strategy to your company?

Often times an awkward situation can arise socially and financially for a company. Usually, when an awkward situation arises within a company the first instinct to the employees is to ignore it. This approach has the potential to be detrimental to the company, especially when the upper echelons do not know that there is an internal issue.

Within your company the social atmosphere can be positive, upbeat, with a conductive energy for maximum productivity. But when this lags in the company the productivity can be affected by how happy your employees are. If the employees dread coming to work, seem unmotivated, and lacking then you may have an elephant to talk about. Addressing these issues within your company would be the best strategy to alleviate any issues. Scare tactics for the employees is not the best strategy because then your valuable employees that have a relationship with you will start leaving. When employees begin leaving you are then left to find replacements and working to figure out how to get the new employees trained while you still have a business to run and maintain.

The financial elephant that can be threatening your company is an extreme issue. If your employees are not happy and they are giving that over to the customers, then you will have unhappy customers that won’t come back. In conjunction with the unhappy employees they may not care if the company is successful or not. Meaning that they may not tell you about potential issues or red flags when it comes to the financials of your company.

These issues can turn your company down a path that it may not be able to come back from without help. SafeSourcing can help you determine the “elephants” in your company by using our “Risk Free” trial program, please contact a Customer Service Representative.

We look forward to and appreciate your comments

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The ?Elephant? In Your Company

Friday, March 14th, 2014

Today?s post is from Alyson Usserman, an Account Manager at SafeSourcing, Inc.

We have all heard the saying, ?the elephant in the room,? when referring to an awkward situation, but have you applied this strategy to your company?

Often times an awkward situation can arise socially and financially for a company. Usually, when an awkward situation arises within a company the first instinct to the employees is to ignore it. This approach has the potential to be detrimental to the company, especially when the upper echelons do not know that there is an internal issue.

Within your company the social atmosphere can be positive, upbeat, with a conductive energy for maximum productivity. But when this lags in the company the productivity can be affected by how happy your employees are. If the employees dread coming to work, seem unmotivated, and lacking then you may have an elephant to talk about. Addressing these issues within your company would be the best strategy to alleviate any issues. Scare tactics for the employees is not the best strategy because then your valuable employees that have a relationship with you will start leaving. When employees begin leaving you are then left to find replacements and working to figure out how to get the new employees trained while you still have a business to run and maintain.

The financial elephant that can be threatening your company is an extreme issue. If your employees are not happy and they are giving that over to the customers, then you will have unhappy customers that won?t come back. In conjunction with the unhappy employees they may not care if the company is successful or not. Meaning that they may not tell you about potential issues or red flags when it comes to the financials of your company.

These issues can turn your company down a path that it may not be able to come back from without help. SafeSourcing can help you determine the ?elephants? in your company by using our “Risk Free” trial program, please contact a Customer Service Representative.

We look forward to and appreciate your comments

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I’m GREEN You’re GREEN! What does it really mean?

Thursday, March 13th, 2014

Today’s post is by Ron Southard, CEO at SafeSourcing Inc.

The word green has been thrown around for years and driven  even further  and more detailed discussion relative to companies desire to reduce their carbon footprint. This has touched every segment of industry from producers to users and in trades a wide ranging as construction to energy.

I’m sure the term global warming is not new to anyone any more. It might be humorous if Jay Leno (it’s too bad he is gone) conducted one of his street segments to get passersby to try and define the term. Many don’t even care what your company is doing about it or that you have adopted triple bottom line accounting methods either. In fact most definitions as mentioned above would likely center around the crazy weather we have all experienced the last several years. (Know Your Audience)

Here’s an opinion for you. If your company’s buyers are vetting your supply chain for their green initiatives in order to support your own initiatives, you might not be getting what you think you are. The fact that a supplier is certified in some particular area such as LEED or The Marine Stewardship Council and you do business with them does not automatically transfer that certification or greenness or the savings associated with the process to your company or the specific product or project the vendor is supporting.

As an example, I was recently reading the Conversation Starters section of the Arizona Republic. A small blurb by Anastasia Swearingen a research analyst for the Environmental Policy Alliance titled MIS-LEEDING GREEN REFORM indicated that a comparison of buildings that were LEED certified vs. those that were non LEED certified showed that LEED certification has no bearing on buildings energy efficiency.

SafeSourcing maintains the SafeSourceIt™ Supplier Database and constantly VETTS our suppliers to insure that your green standards are adhered to and deliver the benefits you expect them to as indicated in your terms and conditions and specifications.

If you’d like to learn more as to how SafeSourcing can assist your sourcing in support of your reduced carbon footprint initiatives, please contact a SafeSourcing Customer Services Account Manager.

We look forward to and appreciate your comments.

 

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I?m GREEN You?re GREEN! What does it really mean?

Thursday, March 13th, 2014

Today?s post is by Ron Southard, CEO at SafeSourcing Inc.

The word green has been thrown around for years and driven? even further? and more detailed discussion relative to companies desire to reduce their carbon footprint. This has touched every segment of industry from producers to users and in trades a wide ranging as construction to energy.

I?m sure the term global warming is not new to anyone any more. It might be humorous if Jay Leno (it?s too bad he is gone) conducted one of his street segments to get passersby to try and define the term. Many don?t even care what your company is doing about it or that you have adopted triple bottom line accounting methods either. In fact most definitions as mentioned above would likely center around the crazy weather we have all experienced the last several years. (Know Your Audience)

Here?s an opinion for you. If your company?s buyers are vetting your supply chain for their green initiatives in order to support your own initiatives, you might not be getting what you think you are. The fact that a supplier is certified in some particular area such as LEED or The Marine Stewardship Council and you do business with them does not automatically transfer that certification or greenness or the savings associated with the process to your company or the specific product or project the vendor is supporting.

As an example, I was recently reading the Conversation Starters section of the Arizona Republic. A small blurb by Anastasia Swearingen a research analyst for the Environmental Policy Alliance titled MIS-LEEDING GREEN REFORM indicated that a comparison of buildings that were LEED certified vs. those that were non LEED certified showed that LEED certification has no bearing on buildings energy efficiency.

SafeSourcing maintains the SafeSourceIt? Supplier Database and constantly VETTS our suppliers to insure that your green standards are adhered to and deliver the benefits you expect them to as indicated in your terms and conditions and specifications.

If you?d like to learn more as to how SafeSourcing can assist your sourcing in support of your reduced carbon footprint initiatives, please contact a SafeSourcing Customer Services Account Manager.

We look forward to and appreciate your comments.

 

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Spring into Change With spring on its way, are you ready for change?

Wednesday, March 12th, 2014

Today?s post is by Margaret Stewart, Executive Assistant at SafeSourcing.

Most of us will agree that spring is a welcome change to the long winter we have endured, but changing seasons brings other changes as well.

Spring cleaning is one of the biggest changes people make this time of year. It?s a time for sweeping out the old and bringing in the new and getting things cleaned up. This can be applied to more than just housework, though. In business, spring cleaning is a time when companies may reevaluate their current sources and try to find options that may better fit their needs. Spring is the time to see what other companies can offer a business. SafeSourcing may be able to help you with your spring cleaning by customizing a procurement plan for your business, giving you the knowledge you need to polish up this year?s business plan that you are just rolling out.

Spring is also a time of re-growth. The flowers begin blooming and trees begin sprouting leaves. It is also a time for business growth. How do you plan on growing your business this year? You should already have that answer at the tip of your tongue. Now is the time to determine if you have the right tools to really support that growth, like technology, and resources, like vendor and supplier contacts, for your business to flourish. SafeSourcing may be able to help you find the right tools and resources that your business needs to grow. By having the means to nurture growth, your company could bloom into the business you?d like it to be whether you are a multinational conglomerate or and independent small business owner.

We, at SafeSourcing, enjoy bringing this blog to you every day and hope you find value in it. For more information about how SafeSourcing can help you implement spring changes in your organization or on our ?Rick Free? trial program, please contact a SafeSourcing Customer Service representative. We have an entire team ready to assist you today.

We look forward to your comments.

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Corporate Social Responsibility

Tuesday, March 11th, 2014

Today?s post is by Shelly Hayre; Customer Service Representative at SafeSourcing.
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Corporate Social Responsibility is a corporation?s self-regulated responsibility to uphold a certain ethical standard. It can be a specialized department within a business, enforced by Human Resources, or even outsourced. Corporate Social Responsibility can achieve many things for a corporation. It can provide a clear outline regarding the ethics under which the corporation will operate, provide security in risk management, and achieve good faith among shareholders. Corporate Social Responsibility, when governed well, can also provide relief from government restrictions to control any discrepancies.
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There are several advantages to having a strong CSR policy. Public opinion and support can largely be influenced by a company?s CSR operations. For example, employing a department to research and monitor all potential “Green” opportunities within a company?s operations can be viewed admirably by the public. Also, involvement in charitable causes and foundations, will receive positive feedback from consumers and communities. Providing employees with proper work conditions and treatment, along with a standard of quality for the product are all covered in the CSR. All these are huge factors in the sustainability of a corporation, the willingness of potential investors, and trust of current shareholders.

The relationship between a corporations CSR policy and sustainability is parallel. The outline provided by the CSR can actually help establish a distinction in your brand. And, even if a corporation?s CSR doesn?t help them publicly, it can still hurt them internally. Establishing an in-house set of checks and balances provides ethical structure in the everyday operation of a business.

So, how can an eProcurement company help with your CSR needs?

???? The suppliers your company purchases products from can affect your quality of products produced. Garbage in = garbage out!
???? Can your company become more ?green?? Let us help you find better solutions to meet these goals.
???? Is your supplier compliant in all regulations and meeting standards your company holds them to? ? If you have a relationship with a supplier that does not meet your company?s standards and expectations, this will reflect poorly on your company too.

SafeSourcing’s SafeSourceIt?? Supplier Database?contains suppliers who can meet all your expectations. We will ask the right questions to achieve the right results for you.
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For more information on how we can help you with your procurement needs or on our ?Risk Free? trial program, please contact a SafeSourcing Customer Service Representative.? We have an entire customer services team waiting to assist you today.

We look forward to your comments.

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Procurement Benefits That Come from Acquisitions

Monday, March 10th, 2014

Today?s post is by Mark Davis; Sr. Vice President and COO at SafeSourcing

With the recent news of mergers and acquisitions such as Cerberus? offer of $9B for Safeway, FaceBook?s offer of $19B for WhatsApp, or Comcast?s $45B offer to purchase Time Warner there is no doubt that periods of transition and adjustment are necessary and these times frequently lead to procurement opportunities for the new organization.?? In today?s blog we will look at three areas that procurement and supply chain organizations can focus on to get the most out of their efforts

Combined Spend ? One of the obvious advantages to having a larger company due a merger or acquisition is the increase in the spend that accompanies it.? This low-hanging fruit allows the company to establish stronger contracts and services due to taking the best features of what each company had before.? Being able to understand the common categories and services will be important to determining which categories get addressed first.? This involves creating a baseline view of each category for both companies that looks at price, volume, contracts and service levels that each company currently has.? An additional outcome of this process will be to streamline the number of different products and vendors the new company works with leaving less to manage by the procurement team.

Efficiencies in Process ? Every successful company does some things really well and usually every company being purchased by one of those successful companies presumably does a number of things really well too.? One of the important tasks that gets done during a merger or acquisition is determining quickly what each piece does well and leverage that against the weaker areas of the other.? If one company is strong in logistics but weaker in IT, then those should be areas of synergy early on.? Learning these things and implementing new services and products can mean a very large increase in Request For Proposal and Information projects.? Having a team prepared to execute these or a 3rd party strategic sourcing partner can help make this process go much smoother.

New products & Services ? Along with the new products and services that will be required early in the merge process there will usually be many other things that must be quickly sourced as well especially with Marketing and Branding, assuming a new image or company name is a result of the process.? Bags, signage, business cards, websites, and uniforms just begin to scratch the surface of the marketing related items that are frequently needed on the day a merger or acquisition is complete.? There are other projects as it relates to IT infrastructure, temporary labor, warehouse supplies and raw material, however, that are just as important and especially so if keeping a unified standard of product or service is required and more than one standard between both companies exist.?

Companies involved with a merger or acquisition should have teams assigned to determine where the synergies and gaps are between the two companies and prepare plans for how sourcing will move forward starting at day one.? For more information on how SafeSourcing can assist your team with this type of planning or on our ?Risk Free? trial program, please contact a SafeSourcing Customer Service Representative.? We have an entire customer services team waiting to assist you today.

We look forward to your comments.

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Retail spend management basics for e-procurement professionals and knowledge workers.

Friday, March 7th, 2014

Todays post is by Ron Southard, CEO at SafeSourcing.

I meet with buyers, category managers and? other e-procurement knowledge workers on a regular basis that want to know what categories are the best to select in the short term to prove the benefit of e-procurement or e-negotiation tools. This quite honestly is not a bad approach for pilot selection as it creates an almost sure thing that results in a lot of excitement and the energy to move the process forward within a company.

Quite often before meeting with a new client, I will analyze their annual report and their summary P&L to get a good idea of where the opportunities are hiding that can have quick hit impact. However in order to have long term viability as a way to conduct the business of buying, a more detailed analysis is required. Quite frankly before you can even begin to discuss vendor or supplier selection, management or evaluation this process is critical to long term success.

Some of the key data required to prepare you for this analysis can consist of but is certainly not limited to the following. All of this data is readily available from a variety of industry sources. Quite often the data is a year old but you can bet it is better than anything else your customer may be using today.

1.?Research and accumulate your specific Industry data
2.?Analyze last years P&L, GL and other financial data sources
3.?Compare your cost of goods with your Industries averages
4.?Compare your gross margins with you Industry averages
5.?Compare your net earnings with your industry averages
6.?Conduct the same comparisons with selected retailers with whom you compete
7.?Compare your departmental sales and contribution margin results to those of your specific industry.
8.?Look for department level anomalies
9.?Look for specific product anomalies within major and sub departments.
10.?Select top categories that are below plan and outside industry average for cost of goods and margin.
11.?Select top products that are underperforming to industry averages and plan

An example of the above might be to look at the major department of grocery and the major category of pet care then drill down to the sub category of cat and dog products and a list of all accessories. Now look at what products are underperforming to the industry and plan.? Continue your analysis with other underperforming categories.

Ask your e-procurement provider how they can assist you in accomplishing this with their tools.

Please contact a SafeSourcing Customer Services Account Manager to learn more about our risk free trial and conducting a category discovery on your behalf.

We look forward to and appreciate your comments.

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An Ounce of Prevention Is Worth A Pound of Cure~ Benjamin Franklin

Thursday, March 6th, 2014

Today?s post is written by Heather Powell, Manager of the COE Department & Project Manager at SafeSourcing Inc.

Colon cancer affects men and women of all racial and ethnic groups, and is most often found in people 50 years or older. It is the third most common cancer in the United States, behind only lung and prostate cancers in men and lung and breast cancers in women, and the second leading cause of cancer death.

In fact, it is estimated that in 2013, 50,830 people will die of colon cancer. But the truth is: it doesn’t have to be this way. If everyone 50 years or older had a regular screening test, as many as 80% of deaths from colon cancer could be prevented.

Colon cancer is on the rise in the under 50 population too. Four words you don?t expect to hear when you?re young. But cancer doesn’t care how old you are. And colon cancer, although considered an older man’s disease, can strike anyone at any time. The hard reality: you’re never too young for colon cancer. That?s why we need to educate ourselves about the risks of this disease now.

Some people are at a higher risk than others for developing colorectal cancer. Having any of these things may increase your risk?

?? Inflammatory bowel disease, Crohn’s disease, or ulcerative colitis.
?? A personal or family history of colorectal cancer or colorectal polyps.
?? A genetic syndrome such as familial adenomatous polyposis (FAP) or hereditary non-polyposis colorectal cancer (Lynch syndrome).

If you think you may be at high risk for colorectal cancer, talk to your doctor about when and how often to get tested.

There are few symptoms of colorectal cancer. Please visit http://www.cdc.gov/cancer/dcpc/resources/features/ColorectalAwareness/ for a list of symptoms, and screening methods.

Wear BLUE March 7, 2014!

National Dress In Blue Day? fundraising efforts will benefit the Colon Cancer Alliance’s mission and screening, patient support and research programs. – See more at: http://support.ccalliance.org/site/TR?fr_id=1830&pg=entry#sthash.qoGkHI7X.dpuf

Colon Cancer has touched several SafeSourcing employees? lives and we care about our readers, customers, and vendor community health and happiness.

For more information on how SafeSourcing can help you with your eProcurement needs or on our ?Risk Free? trial program, please contact a SafeSourcing Customer Service Representative at 888-261-9070.

We look forward to and appreciate your comments!

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Apathy towards the use of e-procurement tools is dangerous for suppliers and sends the wrong message to host companies.

Tuesday, March 4th, 2014

How should a company react when a supplier tells them that e-procurement tools have been around for a long time and are an old way of sourcing products and services or that they are not interested?

I think we all know what APATHY is, but to ground us I looked it up at answers.com and got the following definitions.

1. Lack of interest or concern, especially regarding matters of general importance or appeal; indifference.
2. Lack of emotion or feeling; impassiveness.

The question now is what do you do when you run into it during the e-procurement process?

Before I address that particular question, let me go on record as saying that any supplier who does not currently have a piece of a host companies business may not be worth doing business with if they tell you that they do not participate in reverse auctions or e-procurement events. I can’t imagine as a CEO taking that position or not wanting to bid on business that we don’t already have, particularly when it is being brought to us by a third party when my own sales team had not already uncovered it or created an opportunity with the company in the 1st place. I do not believe I would get any argument there from any other CEO either. So, to begin with make sure you are getting the answer from the top.

Here’s what to do if you are the host. Either have your sourcing partner call the supplier or call the supplier yourself. At SafeSourcing this is something we agree upon during the early stages of customer SOP development.

During the call be considerate of the supplier’s position, be brief and to the point and politely provide the following information.

1. We appreciate your concern with this process but want to make sure you understand that this is our preferred method of sourcing and it is fully supported by our executive office.
2. This is the only method we will use to evaluate vendors.
3. If you choose not to participate you will not be awarded any portion of the business going forward.
4. In the current economic environment are you sure you want to pass up an opportunity for new business?
5. Is your senior management aware of the fact that you are rejecting this opportunity?
6. Thank them for their time and request that they reconsider!   

We look forward to and appreciate your comments.

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