Marketers split on role of procurement amid UM CEO’s call to ‘put them back in their box’
The role of procurement in agency negotiations has split a panel of top marketers, with their involvement branded damaging by one expert but described as beneficial by Visa’s local marketing chief.
The debate at Tuesday’s Secrets of Agency Excellence forum in Sydney followed remarks by UM chief executive Mat Baxter who said powerful marketers with influence in their businesses could “put procurement back in their box where they belong”.
Caroline Dempsey, Visa’s head of marketing for Australia and New Zealand, said her recent first experience of working with procurement was a positive one, suggesting they can “add value” by asking pertinent questions.
Procurement is about efficiency, less about costs. There will always be a certain point where costs cannot be cut any further without causing damage. The role of procurement is to find ways of doing something better, to automate certain processes while also reducing costs in other processes. As a result procurement can have a lot of value for all parts of a business’ operations. Not to say all procurement operates efficiently as it can be a case by case basis, but good procurement processes can help a lot of departments operate better.
Given there are many procurement specialist consultancies, I would who decides which procurement consultant to use.
Could not be more wrong John.
Procurement is interested in value for money and value based relationships. Tarnishing a whole global profession with the far out of date “they are only interested in cost” is just an easy excuse.
Global brands and leading organisations globally employ, develop and insist of qualified marketing procurement skill sets. Perhaps, in this instance, it’s the marketeer who needs to broaden the horizon rather than the buyer.
Personally I would relish the challenge of making it work for agency, buyer and marketeer rather than disregard the value.