I am very pleased to announce that my annual CPO Rising report is now available for download by clicking here (registration required).

I began publishing an annual CPO-focused report in 2006 (when I was with another firm); the last six years have been at Ardent Partners using the “CPO Rising” title. The report reflects back on the changes in the profession, but it is also among the most forward-looking of these annual CPO reports that I have written. That said, it’s a market research report, so it also spends a great deal of time analyzing procurement and the Chief Procurement Officer in 2015.

We’ll be covering many of the key findings here on CPO Rising (the website) over the next few weeks and months. Here’s a quick overview:

In 2015, no business enterprise can afford to go it alone – the stakes are too high. The level of competition and innovation that exists in today’s market mandates that enterprises leverage their relationships to maximum effect. The decisions, operations, and performance of an enterprise’s suppliers can have a direct and, frequently, immediate and significant impact on its own results. Likewise, within the enterprise, no business function can afford to go it alone. Business leaders must harness the collective strength and ability of their organizations to optimize performance. All of this places procurement and its leader, the Chief Procurement Officer (“CPO”) in the crucible of business operations, relationships, and results. And, as the speed and complexity of business continue to accelerate, executives must adapt to new market conditions as they fight to retain market share and market relevance. Procurement departments, their operations, culture, and systems, the way in which they transform knowledge into strategies and those strategies into performance, must all keep pace. To do so, the CPO needs a new agenda – The Agility Agenda.

This report presents a comprehensive, industry-wide view into what is happening in the world of procurement and captures the experience, performance, perspective, and intentions of 318 Chief Procurement Officers and other procurement executives. The report also includes benchmarks, analysis, and recommendations that procurement leaders can use to better understand the state of procurement today, gain insight into best practices, benchmark their performance against the Best-in-Class, and ultimately improve their operations and performance.

I believe that our readers will find it an interesting, educational, and thought-provoking read. click here to access the report (reg. required).

P.S. For those of you that are interested in hearing a discussion of the report and can attend a webinar on EMEA time (8 am ET), click here to register for the CPO Rising 2015 webinar on April 22. 

Tagged in: Ardent Partners Research, Chief Procurement Officer, People, Process, Strategy, Technology