Why come to DPW Amsterdam? What, in your mind, makes this event so special and such a popular meet in the procurement calendar?
Edzard Janssen, RBI: “For me, it’s a very good overview of procurement technology trends. It asks, ‘What are the business problems and the solutions to business problems?’ It’s two days where I invest in getting a good overview, talking to people, and networking.”
Jurriaan Lombaers: “From the beginning, it’s been authentic. It’s great to see all the startups and it triggers your innovation and entrepreneurial mindset to think ‘What else can we do?’ Instead of just doing more of the same. And likewise, it creates a super exciting platform for the startup to show what they can do and what they can deliver. DPW grows every year and it’s a great networking event to meet lots of old friends and make some new ones. It’s super special.”
Kristina Andric, Tetra Pak: “To me, what really describes this event is inclusiveness and collaboration because it brings startups and the corporate world together and shows what kind of amazing synergies that can yield. No one company has all the solutions in one place. However, together we can leverage the strengths and perspectives of each other and then amazing things can happen.”
Chris Platts, SSE: “It’s an amazing event. It’s obviously full of energy. We think it’s the best event for procurement tech, and I get a lot from being here and reflecting on what’s next, what people are doing, what best practice is, and how we can leverage some of that. And then hopefully we can work with some of the vendors and help some startups. I love this event.”
Sopan Shah, IHG Hotels & Resorts: “It’s been mind-blowing. It is so exciting to be in our industry, at a conference that is focused on procurement technology. We’re at the precipice of this dramatic change in digitalising everything we do and the way we run our supply chains, and the people that are building that future are here at DPW. And so it’s hugely exciting to see this kind of startup environment with new and established players that are engaging, showing use cases, building connections, building networks. It’s hugely empowering. My team is getting a long to-do list from me after this, but I know they’re excited.”
What are some of the strategies that leaders can adopt in order to achieve 10X thinking?
Iris van der Harst, Equans: “My main focus is to reflect my operating model every year. Is my team of procurement specialists still adding value and are we doing the right thing for our business and stakeholders both internally and externally? Also, are we bringing in the right innovations to drive 10X? It’s always really easy to blame it on the other departments but I think it’s important to look at what you can do within your own team and operating model. As a CPO, I set the vision and the strategy, but I don’t forget my team and I need to constantly train and educate them about what’s going on. I might lose some people along the way, but it must be their decision, not that I didn’t give them enough attention or opportunity to grow.”
Christophe Villain, Nestle: “You need to change the mindset of your people, and showcase the opportunities available to your colleagues. It’s also about your data maturity and foundations, because the next generation of procurement activity will be strongly data-based, and you’re relying on that data accuracy, availability, and accessibility. You’ll also need to challenge your processes and ways of working.”
Kristina Andric, Tetra Pak: “One of the key reasons is innovation. While it’s a huge competitive advantage, in terms of employee engagement striving for 10X gives teams a very strong sense of purpose as well as unity. I believe it is vital for companies to have a clear vision and ensure the right amount of emphasis on talent, a culture of innovation, and demonstrate adaptability to change.”
How would you describe the past few years in procurement as a result of advanced technology?
Edzard Janssen, RBI: “Software as a service (SaaS) was a big leap forward. We started rolling out our contract management service in 2017. Normally this would have been a multi-year exercise across the whole group, but we did it in 18 months. That would never have been possible with a traditional on-prem solution. Then there’s the cloud. One of our banks is located in Ukraine, and of course we had to think about what would happen if our data centres would be affected by the war. So we moved everything to the cloud in a couple of months. That would’ve been uns]thinkable in the past. The speed of how you can do things is completely different.”
Sebastien Bals, Merck: “GenAI will enable us to move faster. The whole topic around chatbots and automating certain types of interactions with your stakeholders is definitely something that, through GenAI, will be able to go quicker. What I do see is that we’re not leveraging it yet.
“And the reason why is because data is so crucial to the entire picture when leveraging GenAI. So it starts with how we translate everything that is articulate – meaning everything that we can speak or we can write down – and transfer that into data so that then it can be commoditised as a streaming service so we can start streaming knowledge. These large language models that GenAI is based on will enable us to transfer the knowledge that is in our heads more freely but secondly, also take away some of the time that people are spending on activities that no longer need to be spent on.”
Chris Platts, SSE: “Things are progressing, advancing, and innovating all the time. Obviously the big theme is AI; that’s front and centre of everything. When I started procurement, we had SAP and we did sourcing via email. It wasn’t any more sophisticated than that. And now, I don’t know how many digital tools we’ve got at our disposal. I’m pretty sure we’re not yet making the best use out of them yet.”
In your view, what is the best way procurement professionals can overcome data quality challenges when implementing advanced technology, like GenAI?
Alexander Pilsl, TeamViewer: “That’s the million dollar question. I think it’s always been a challenge. I’ve spent years in consulting and seen many, many different procurement departments, and I’ve never seen good data quality. It just doesn’t exist. It’s an illusion that we try to have. It’s something to aspire to. It’s about understanding the flaws, where your data lacks, and what you can improve in some select areas. Have a use case that you actually want to achieve with your data, and work your way back from there. What does the data have to provide you with so that you can actually solve that use case? Then you can start fixing those areas wherever you can.”
Christophe Villain, Nestle: “You need to rethink your data foundations, define which your key assets are, define how you govern and input your data, and make data as relevant as any other achievement on the people performance agenda. If there’s no component of data, you’re just a recipient and you are not owning the outcome. And that’s critical going forward.”
Sopan Shah, IHG Hotels & Resorts: “Data is complicated. I think first it starts with the industry you’re in and the types of data that you’re dealing with. Fundamentally, some of the new technologies are going to allow us to take either dirty, unstructured data, and very quickly leverage AI machine learning and other tools to help clean up that data. We are seeing that again already as we’ve moved into some of our new procurement technologies.
“We’ve historically had poor data and these systems have very quickly shown us how poor that data actually is. It really changed the concept of how we think about it, because it’s not necessarily people on our teams that need to be reviewing, understanding, and dissecting that data – it’s actually the systems and the tools that are analysing it and giving us recommendations that allow you to get the right information out of poor data. So I think data is a promise. Is it perfect? No. Is it going to take time to get there? Yes. But I think it’s a promising start.”
What are the biggest considerations that CPOs need to think about when seeking to implement tools like GenAI as a business strategy in procurement?
Alexander Pilsl, TeamViewer: “It’s really that element of procurement being an ecosystem function. A lot of the strings come together in procurement. For example, when I’m going out looking for a supplier, I check their client status. I want to know if they are customers of our company before I become a customer of their company. That’s two data bullets already that you need to check, and then you do all your external sources, your risk analysis, third party databases, check their risk status, check their financial information. There are millions of data points that come together in procurement when you make a decision. And I think getting all those right, but then also not getting distracted by the sheer numbers, is probably the single biggest challenge in business and data.”
Sebastien Bals, Merck: “I think the biggest obstacle is ourselves. Are we truly experimenting or adopting enough or are we being sceptical? GenAI hallucinates, but we’re also critical thinkers. We’re not robots. I believe that all of us who are currently working in procurement could see whether GenAI is hallucinating or not and could adjust.”
Michelle Baker, Virgin Money: “They talk about humans in the loop, which is interrogating what comes out of the black box. The hallucinations are that it’ll confidently make up garbage and confidently tell you where it came from. So essentially source the garbage. However, I believe that I have enough experience to be able to write 85% of a supplier relationship management strategy in ChatGPT to say, ‘Well, that is garbage’.
“I have experienced enough to know that it is incorrect. I don’t think that we should sacrifice our critical thought. For any of us who’ve been to university, the requirement not to plagiarise the requirement and to reference our source of data is important. If you’re going to be leaning on a tool like Copilot or ChatGPT, it doesn’t necessarily mean that you have to leave your brain at home. You can actually use your brain to question whether something makes sense and then poke a little further. But it certainly will help you get going in a way that starting with a blank piece of paper wouldn’t have.”
Is this the most exciting time to be in procurement and supply chain?
Iris van der Harst, Equans: “I think so. But it also was five or 10 years ago. I’ve been in procurement for about 15 years, and before that, I was in more commercial roles because in my time there weren’t many further education courses in procurement that you could do. Everyone just grew into procurement from different backgrounds. The reason why I still love being in procurement is that it evolves all the time. It’s always changing and it’s getting increasingly relevant. It is an exciting time and I think it still will be in 10 years.”
Jurriaan Lombaers: “It’s a great profession and I am a passionate procurement professional. I think coming out of COVID-19, we earned a lot of credibility as a procurement function, which should have enabled procurement organisations to have even more impact. I think it’s exciting because of all the technology enablement, but I think that’s just one part. The much bigger thing is all the change management. Scaling fast is all about adoption.
“There’s still a long way to go to get these things embedded into the organisation. That’s why you have to start small and take people by the hand. People might be a bit frightened about all the automation on offer because it is taking work away that they have done for many years. What we need to learn is that it’s taking some of the more administrative or repetitive work away. Secondly, as part of 10X, there’s so much more that the business is asking of procurement that needs to be done that can be utilised by the time you gain from further automation.”
Michelle Baker, Virgin Money: “Technology has always been an interesting thing and I’ve grown up with it. So when I started work, there were no PCs on desks. The only person who had a typewriter was the managing director and secretary. So technology for me has always been really interesting in terms of how it can augment our lives. If you look at DPW behind me, we’ve got 1,400 attendees excluding exhibitors. That is a massive number of people who are interested in technology now. If we’d had the same conference 10 years ago, we’d barely have filled a room of 100 people. I think there’s a sense now that data analytics, digital, all of these cool words actually have an impact upon your business and it’s an inescapable, unavoidable impact.”
