Editor’s Note: It’s been a busy few months here at Ardent Partners, and the Memorial Day Weekend has given us a chance to pause and reflect on the ground that we’ve covered since March. In the span of three months, the Ardent analyst team has attended nearly a dozen events and has produced some valuable and insightful content from our travels. And so, today, we bring you a curated selection of content from some of the supply management industry’s biggest events. Enjoy and be safe out there.
CPO Rising 2016 is History!
In many ways, our CPO Rising 2016 Summit was the culmination the past two decades that my team has spent working in and researching procurement. When I founded Ardent Partners, I knew that I wanted to host an annual CPO summit, but I also knew that we should wait until we could pull it off on our own and without event partners so that we could clearly establish our level of engagement and influence in the market. To read more from this article, click here.
Coupa, Inspired!
Three years after Coupa hosted its impressive first event in 2013, Coupa Inspire has become a major procurement industry event from a size, attendee, and content perspective. This year’s event in San Francisco brought in an estimated 1,500-1,800 attendees, including many prominent CPOs and procurement executives and 30 sponsors and/or partner companies. The event agenda blends together main stage keynotes and panel discussions with deep dive customer and best practice presentations across a full spectrum of supply management topics. The event also offers numerous sessions led by the Coupa team and has dedicated the third full day of the agenda to “Technical Classes” and “Leading Practices.” To read more from this article, click here.
A CPO and a Diplomat’s View of Supply Risk Management
One of the realities of the modern business environment is that Chief Procurement Officers (“CPOs”) and their teams increasingly must dive into the murky and ever expanding waters of supply risk and get their hands dirty. The further they dive, the dirtier their hands can get; but this is not only their job in 2016, it is also their opportunity to position their companies as market leaders in corporate social responsibility (“CSR”), human rights, and sustainability and find and retain the best talent in the marketplace. These were the main themes during a panel discussion at SAP Ariba Live 2016, co-chaired by Stan Brown, Vice President of Global Supply Chain and Chief Procurement Officer at CA Technologies, and Michael Posner, former diplomat and current Jerome Kohlberg Professor of Ethics and Finance and Professor of Business and Society at New York University’s Stern School of Business. To read more from this article, click here.
Reimagining VMS, the Role of Innovation, and a Few Days in D.C. With IQNavigator
Vendor Management System (“VMS”) technology is a critical piece of today’s ever-complex contingent workforce puzzle (and, as found in Ardent’s new CWM: 2016 Technology and Innovation Outlook Report, is at the center of the technology ecosystem within this industry). Centennial, Colorado-based VMS provider IQNavigator held their annual “IQNsiders” event last week in the nation’s capital, drawing over 200 customers, partners, and practitioners from the procurement and HR functions. To read more from this article, click here.
Connecting, Learning, and Succeeding with Beeline
Last week, Vendor Management System (“VMS”) solution provider Beeline held their annual customer event at The W Hotel in downtown Fort Lauderdale, Florida. For the solution, which has a history of embracing innovation in this industry as a way to move the space forward, it was no surprise that the very notion of the “future” and innovation were key themes throughout the conference. “We have some serious changes coming ahead for our industry,” said Beeline President and CEO Doug Leeby, during the event’s opening address, stating that he believes the non-employee workforce world is moving in a direction that will see the elimination of some key aspects of today’s contingent workforce management structure. To read more from this article, click here.
ISM 2016: eISM Goes Live
At the 101st annual Institute for Supply Management (“ISM”) conference in Indianapolis last week, ISM debuted a new e-Learning initiative, eISM, that is designed to meet the needs of today’s busy procurement and supply management professionals wherever, whenever, and however they need it. eISM follows last year’s release of the ISM Mastery Model, which seeks to offer industry professionals with an online resource for industry-standard terms, definitions, concepts, best practices, and skills, and allow users to take courses and work towards professional development. To read more from this article, click here.
