David Sinclair

ABSTRACT

Accenture, in partnership with Professor David Simchi-Levi of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), recently completed a global study focused on procurement risk. The study’s conclusions support our view that procurement organizations are often ill-equipped to cope with rises in procurement-related risk, and that most should be working harder and more cross functionally to assess supply risks and construct formal mitigation plans. However, there are other findings that may also speak to procurement issues. These include rankings of chief procurement officers’ procurement-related concerns; discussions about price volatility in raw materials (segmented by industry and the potential for passing price increases through to customers), and accounts of what procurement’s “high performers” are doing to manage risk.