One of the reasons procurement has always been a process-driven function is because we are tasked with managing buyer behaviors as much as we are addressing and analyzing spend. Spend is trackable, re...

If you are following my LinkedIn Creator Accelerator project, last week brought a new slate of insights, updates, and opportunities to engage. This article summarizes the week’s content and includes t...

The procurement events schedule continues to be slow, so I’m going to give you another 2 weeks’ worth of recommendations in one post. Check out these great options if you’re in the office chugging alo...

According to TechInsider, there are warehouse robots currently in place that could potentially boost productivity up to 800%. Yes, you read that correctly: eight hundred percent. With huge boosts in p...

The ‘app boom’ is widely recognized to be slowing as we approach the half way mark of 2017. Success stories such as Snapchat and Uber remain (in terms of continued, steep growth), but the aggregate gr...

“Because technology has become an extension of the knowledge worker’s business and personal life, it has become apparent that to separate the two is not just pointless, it is impossible.” (p. 15) &nbs...

These notes are from a September 2^nd webinar presented by Alexander Linden, Research Director at Gartner. The event is available on demand and can be viewed here. You don’t have to be a hard core analyst to benefit from this event – the take aways were interesting and applicable to procurement even though it wasn’t a procurement-specific event.

Last week, Procurious ran a webinar on cognitive technology along with panelists from IBM, Cognitive Scale, and the Entrepreneur’s Fund. The webinar is available on demand as a free, 2-part course on Procurious. For more about the webinar, or to view it on demand, click here.

As you might expect, terminology and definitions were very important in this webinar. What is cognitive computing? How is it different than AI? And who, exactly, is Watson?

Spend analysis solutions have long been critical enablers of procurement organizations. Over the last couple of years, however, the term analysis has gradually been replaced by analytics. In order to gather information on this transition, I reached out to Rosslyn Analytics, a company that has operated under the ‘analytics’ label since their founding in 2005, long before it was the prevailing term. I'd like to thank them for their help in putting this post together.

Let me begin by giving working definitions for both terms. According to BigDataCraft.com,

“Analysis is the examination process itself where analytics is the supporting technology and associated tools.”

Automation and Artificial Intelligence, terms that generate both controversy and wonder, have established themselves as critical elements of our future. Not everyone is pleased by this; the looming prospect of a sci-fi world has engendered fear and reluctance throughout the workforce.

As we close out the end of July, webinars are just starting to post for August. If you look at all of this week’s webinars, there is a clear note of defiant optimism with the focus returning to supply resiliency, leadership, and automation over necessary but fatigued coverage of the pandemic. Next week also marks the release of the July ISM-New York Report on Business, so we’ll get another look at how the professional services economy is recovering from the various shutdowns.

The events continue to roll in – I added another dozen new events to the calendar this week. In addition to the events listed below, I’ll be making the case that procurement is not the ‘enemy’ when it comes to sourcing projects for IT solutions with MyComplianceOffice.

As we turn the corner into June, the pace of even virtual events has slowed back to what I would expect to see in the summer months of a ‘normal’ year, which this decidedly is not. One sign of light at the end of the tunnel is this: I added a live event (yes, live – in person and with people in attendance) for November of 2020. Time will tell if that is going to hold and what it will look like, but it feels like a glimmer of hope all the same.

You’ve probably heard that many industry events – not just in procurement – are being cancelled out of an abundance of caution in the face of the coronavirus threat. I’m tracking some of those updates here, and I will continue to update that post as additional information becomes available. All of the events affected so far are this month, but there are quite a few events on the calendar for April and May, and we’re watching for decisions and news about those.

If you are planning your event schedule beyond this week – especially if you live or work in the Boston area – I encourage you to check out NESCON 2019: The New England Supply Chain Conference & Exhibition taking place on October 7th. If you have any questions or if you make the decision to attend, please let me know. I’m always happy to connect in person!

BTW: If you haven’t already, sign up for our mailing list to be sure you get my weekly recommendations in your Inbox each Monday.

We’re back from the 4^th of July holiday in the US, which pretty much shut everything down for a full week. And while there are only 4 events on the calendar for this week, I added 11 events for the month on Friday. The week of July 22-26 is shaping up to be a busy one.

If you are planning your webinar schedule beyond this week, I recommend ‘The Big Procurement Makeover Debate: Why Procurement Struggles to Deliver Value Beyond Cost-Reduction’ from HfS Research, Horizon Blue Cross Blue Shield of NJ and IBM on July 25th at 11am ET.

BTW: If you haven’t already, sign up for our mailing list to be sure you get my weekly recommendations in your Inbox each Monday.

This is one of those weeks – clearly everyone waited for the exact same week to set up events. There are two live events: ProcureCon IT Sourcing in Denver, CO Tuesday through Thursday and the inaugural Supply Chain, Innovation, Technology 2019 (SCIT19) event in New York City. In addition to that, we have 8 webinars.

BTW: If you haven’t already, sign up for our mailing list to be sure you get my weekly recommendations in your Inbox each Monday.

We’ve officially entered the summer slowdown from a webinar perspective. While this means the volume of events to choose from is down, it means that anyone hosting an event is committed to it and will hopefully put in a bit of extra effort to make the investment of time worthwhile!

If you are planning your webinar schedule beyond this week, I recommend ‘Lessons in Transformation: What Direct Procurement Teams Can Learn from Indirect Procurement’ with SIG and GEP on June 18th at 1pm ET.

BTW: If you haven’t already, sign up for our mailing list to be sure you get my weekly recommendations in your Inbox each Monday.

If you have a tendency to look ahead to Friday every week, just a warning: Friday is the start of February. (What?) On the bright side, industry webinar hosts seem to have gotten back into the swing of things after the holidays, as I added 7 new webinars to the calendar this week.

If you are planning further in advance, I recommend 'The Psychology & Business Case for Workplace Organization' on Feb. 15th from Supply Chain Now Radio, Talent Stream, APICS Atlanta, and Beau Groover, Founder & President of The Effective Syndicate.

BTW: If you haven’t already, sign up for our mailing list to be sure you get my weekly recommendations in your Inbox each Monday.

This week and next are slow in terms of virtual events, maybe because we’re changing the calendar to August on Wednesday? There is a live event though – ProcureCon Contingent Staffing taking place in Minneapolis, MN on Tuesday and Wednesday. I’ll also be releasing the July ISM-New York Report on Business results and commentary on Thursday, so the week isn’t going to be completely quiet.

If you’re planning a little further out, I recommend “Fundamental Philosophies in Negotiation for Buyer and Seller”, being hosted by SCN Radio, TalentStream, and APICS Atlanta and presented by my good friend Mark Bilgin on August 24th. Sign up now while you’re thinking of it!

BTW: If you haven’t already, sign up for our mailing list to be sure you get my weekly recommendations in your Inbox each Monday.