The ins and outs of creating a professional purchasing organization.
Remember when the corporate procurement function used to mean just buying stuff? Today procurement has evolved into purchasing and supply management, or sourcing, a complex dance across the globe that requires deep commitments and information sharing with suppliers and customers to create competitive advantage for all involved. Developing Sourcing Capabilities, edited by three sourcing experts, focuses on how to make it happen.
After a survey of trends and an IBM case study, the book explains the gritty particulars of how to introduce change into your organization. The expected topics are all here: building supplier relationships and networks, remaking organizational structure and overcoming resistance to change, leveraging communications technology, measuring success, and the role of individuals in the strategic change process.
Bringing the lessons to life are case studies of European companies operating worldwide: Nordic Construction Company, Thomson ESG, and Ericsson. Ericsson's example should be particularly beneficial to anyone with plans to source in China.
Axelsson is a tenured professor at Stockholm School of Economics; Wynstra is NEVI Professor of Purchasing and Supply Management at RSM Erasmus University, Netherlands; and Rozemeijer is a consultant and teacher. The contributors include practitioners, consultants, and teachers.
- Sean Silverthorne