Video Training Deadly Mistake #1.  Internal customers and management often view purchasing as just managing price, or worse yet, as managing the expediting of orders.

Cost savings are viewed with skepticism by senior management, as they are wondering, if purchasing is saving us all this money, then why isn’t that same amount of money left over in the corporate budget?

I’m going to show you how to follow a proven methodology to establish itself as a value added profit center to the organization, because that’s when purchasing employees will be recognized for – and compensated as – the difference makers they are in enabling best-in-class TCO for the company.

Establishing Purchasing Value for Management and Customers

• How recognition of purchasing value completely falls apart in the corporate structure and how to fix this
• The fatal mistake purchasing professionals are making with how they use their time
• What non-value added activities are chewing up 75% of your time or more and how to stop
• What tool you need to be using now that will move mountains with your customers
• How to market purchasing results in a revolutionary way that will turn the tide of perception and support in your entire company

Video Training Deadly Mistake #2.  Purchasing professionals everywhere are chasing down rogue internal customers that strike deals with suppliers, disclose budgets, and pre-cook deals before passing them onto purchasing as an emergency order.

Companies don’t help with policies prohibiting this behavior, so  your going to learn a 3-step strategic alignment process to follow with internal customers that is absolutely critical because rogue customers will make your supply base size mushroom while also making your cost savings opportunities disappear.

Rogue Internal Customers

You will learn:

• Why no company has an internal policy with consequences for failure to follow purchasing policy
• What the consequence is of “after the fact PO’s” and how to eliminate their occurrence
• What surprise internal group can be your greatest ally in chasing rogue customers and making their behavior grind to a halt
• What one powerful reverse psychology technique will turn rogue customer groups into ambassadors and allies of purchasing
• What the “Walk of Shame” means and how you can use it to prevent customer excursions

Video Training Deadly Mistake #3.  Manually reducing the supply base size in the corporate vendor database is one of the biggest waste- of-time activities that purchasing professionals everywhere are being forced to engage in.  

The focus is on the wrong metric.

You’re going to learn how to take a set of documented and proven steps to shift the focus to ensuring 95% of the dollars are going to 5% of the suppliers.

THAT is what where the biggest TCO influence comes about – and a dramatic reduction in the supply base will happen as a natural byproduct of this effort.

Making this shift is critical, and requires influencing management along the way. But the results that purchasing is able to generate with the freed up time as a result are priceless.

Meeting Supply Base Reduction Targets

• What underlying issue exists that makes supply base queries produce useless data in nearly all companies
• Why measuring the supply base is a complete and utter waste of time, and what you should be measuring instead
• How to sell management on this new approach, with powerful communications provided to enable your success
• What psychological motivation model is your absolute secret to success in getting customers on board with your supplier strategies

Video Training Deadly Mistake #4.  So many purchasing professionals are responsible for negotiating contracts AND placing purchase orders.

Having a trained purchasing professional that is fully capable of negotiating contracts also responsible for placing time-consuming purchase orders is like using a Ferrari to haul lumber.

It makes no sense.

There is a way out, and I’m going to show you a four step model that is used to influence management to make the shift.

Purchasing professionals trapped in these hybrid negotiator/PO-Expeditor roles need to make this shift because placing purchase orders is a morale killer that will stifle the purchasing professional’s performance review, salary, and ultimately career trajectory.

Nobody got on the fast track to being Director of Corporate Purchasing because they were so good at placing PO’s!

Finding Time to Both Place POs and Negotiate Contracts

• Why 95% of your time placing orders will only lead to career stagnation and frustration
• How to develop a data based proposal that will forever take you out of the PO placing function and put your career on the fast track – negotiating big deals for your company
• A step by step approach to have your boss come back and tell you that you are too valuable to have in an order placing function
• How to change the financial trajectory of your career and also the fulfillment you receive from what you do.

Video Training Deadly Mistake #5.  Purchasing cost savings targets are increased every year. Like clockwork, our suppliers know to expect us knocking for more savings from them.

How many times can they keep reducing profits so we can claim more savings?

It’s not sustainable. This purchasing model needs to go in a time capsule, right now!

The focus needs to shift to taking costs out of the supply chain, because there are real and proven methods to do this and that will result in dramatically better results for you and your career.

No special tools, systems, or ERP implementations are needed to do this; just the use of a documented and repeatable process that the pros use to change the TCO landscape completely.

The fact that you haven’t done it yet is great news – it means that there is a pearl in every oyster right now.

Trying to Meet Cost Savings Goals

• How to completely undo and rearchitect everything you’ve been taught to produce best in class cost savings results
• A game changing RFP/RFQ strategy that forces critical TCO reductions on the part of the supplier that you would have never achieved otherwise.
• What critical mistakes you are making with achieving and capturing indirect/soft cost savings and how to fix it to catapult your results
• A simple quarterly process to get your suppliers to be active participants in driving down your TCO – so they not only win your business, but have to keep on winning it!

Video Training Deadly Mistake #6. Scrambling to prepare for an internal audit is like cramming in a year’s worth of flossing right before  a dental checkup – Who does this benefit?

You’ll learn a risk assessment methodology needs to be implemented that measures risks and controls and puts the right measures in place to ensure a business that is in control but still agile and nimble.

This process document is then used to have internal audit measure compliance to your own processes – instead of to their ideas regarding what they *think* you should be doing… 

…which as we know is often completely disconnected with the realities of running a purchasing department. 

Shifting to this risk assessment process is critical because it saves you time and keeps you in compliance to your own processes instead of to somebody else’s.

Business Process Compliance and Internal Audit

• Why you are a lot smarter than internal audit and how to use this to your advantage
• How to never worry about preparing for or responding to another internal audit again – ever
• How to get internal audit to play by your rules and not theirs by using this revolutionary but simple strategy
• How to speak internal audit’s language and come out of every internal audit looking smelling like a rose and looking like a hero

Video Training Deadly Mistake #7.  The VAST majority of buyers are making fatal-flaw mistakes when it comes to negotiating contracts. 

From saving the terms and conditions for last to excluding critical lesser known clauses that guarantee the best price in the marketplace to allowing the supplier the opportunity to markup their purchasing contract with all their issues and concerns.

We are killing ourselves, and our suppliers are loving it.

You’re going to learn and leverage a set of powerful insider secrets regarding contract terms and conditions negotiations that are complete game changers.  

Doing so will increase supplier acceptance of our desired terms and will slash contract negotiation cycle time by 75% or more! 

Dealing With the Legal Department and Sticky Contracts

• • Why the legal department is where “contracts go to die” and what you can do about it
  • What game changing steps to take complete ownership of the contract review process and to slash legal review cycle time
  • What simple step will produce game changing results by almost eliminating supplier requests for contract language modifications
  • Why a legal department approved contract may still be a terrible contract for the business, and what steps you need to take to fix this – which will also prevent endless supplier excursions later