Deal governance for purchasing

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I'm Bob rossback and this is global sourcing insights from sips Our Guest today is Darren Gibb he is vice president for Global procurement at National Grid it's an energy and electric utility with its home office in the United Kingdom but a significant operation serving New England in the United States Gibb comes to us with extensive supply chain experience within public and private sectors he's known for driving change within complex program and stakeholder environments and for delivering measurable results and enhancing business benefits so welcome Darren how are you today I'm grateful thank you so much for having me yep so Darren you gave us the title for this episode of global sourcing insights category management the Cornerstone of procurement success that is a pretty lofty claim so let's start with the basics how do you define category management if it's the Cornerstone we'd better know what we're talking about yeah Bob so so I thought I would start with let's start with the basics so handily handily there is a definition in sips actually um that category management is a strategic approach to procurement where organizations segment the spend into similar related products and allows focus on those categies or services and we can dissect and when we can look at the value the supplier the type and the volume and generally it's broken out by direct costs and by indirect costs um but for me I think I my thinking which is key to D and never has category management been more important it's it's only taken a pandemic volatile Supply chains Port closures shortages um which a higher focusing ERG to really yes to really essentiate the importance of good categy management they approach a category margin goes deeper and further than that typical bind and it creates the right environment for solutions to these issues and the categies and suppliers that you represent during the use of a sustainable source of competitive advantage and value and I think the creation of a category strategy enables us as buyers to set a long-term vision and a direction of a category and allows us to convert that into business needs to ensure that the market can be of that and for me um for me that really goes to the heart of what category management is about it's longer term it's much more strategic it's deeper in its thinking than just buying and it keeps a whole range of benefits as you go through that does that help Bob I think so so let's start by how do you sort categories to identify strategies do you use some sort of a sourcing Matrix I've seen that used by some organizations you know put difficulty to Source along one axis importance to the business on the other and then you sort of figure out what quadrant you're in and uh if you just say well if it's hard to source and critical to the business then it's we treat it strategically and if it's not then we treat it transactionally and we leave it at that so how do you sort your suppliers uh do you use a matrix approach or is there some other process that's a little more rigorous or or different from that yeah but so I think I'd probably take that one step back and yes we do I do absolutely as part of category management we saw in a matrix simply we do it but I'd go one step back and say at first point I would look at the data um and I talked about it I think I talked about that but I think I mentioned data earlier on it's the foundation of the conversation and the basic first principles of the creation of a spin Cube or analysis of the span base which identifies the categories and the suppliers where you're buying which suppliers you're buying from which categories of Supply is there and the descriptions of what's purchased um and that firstly creates that Spain Cube that says look which areas are you spending and are you spending in travel or consultancy or materials and mro and then I'd probably take that span Cube and the data that it gives me and I'd and you're right Bob I put it on like the standard kind of Boston four box uh and I'd put it on across probably a multitude of accesses that can be used um but I think value and importance to the company generally works and I and it comes out as the four basics which is non-clitical items it's your bottleneck uh items it's the leverage and it's the Strategic items uh and I think we all probably know those I'm not going to lecture everyone on how to use those and there's a multitude there's a multitude of those Boston four boxes about um so I think if you use that basic algex Matrix I would that would start the conversation on which categories which suppliers and where you want to focus your effort but you're saying that you really start you really should do a full analysis of your spend before you start sorting I think uh the mistake or the Trap that some people fall into is that uh they have an opportunity to to to create a contract or let a contract or buy something and they just say oh well this is this goes here and they're only treating that category or that item as uh like one at a time and so you are treating your categories sort of serially not holistically am I is that generally what you're talking about yeah that's that's an absolute perfect description I and I think it starts with that analyzing your spin to understand what are the categories that are in your spend base and how to look across those span thresholds not just the contract but where are you spending your money how do those things align how does it align with the market and I think I I think that's probably a mistake that I have made it myself lots of buyers make which is you just jump straight into the purchase instead of thinking and looking at your spend base yep yep so what are some of the different approaches you use for different categories so we've gotten we've looked at your whole spend you've kind of identified your categories you figured out which which ones are critical or as you said bottleneck you know they may not be uh strategically important in the big sense but it but if uh but they could be bottleneck items something that shuts shuts down the Plant shuts down the grid shuts down what something or other uh so they're important in that respect so how do you once you've gone through that exercise then what are the different some of the different approaches you use for your different categories they're a good question so it's a hard one um so without breaking any kind of confidence of the people I work with or people I've worked for um I'll try and give some genetic examples in The Illustrated something of a category and how to apply value levers so let's start with those non-critical items for me that's these are the goods and services for that old adage of Stack high and sell it low for example like stationary so um most buyers shouldn't really care about the cost of a pen it's not where the value is the approach is about efficiency it's about the ordering and the movement and the payment and I generally wouldn't spend a lot of time here in that non-critical items I would look at the process optimization I may bundle it but in essence I'm trying to move it through a company as efficiently and effectively as possible um if I was to look at something like a leverage um so service companies Consultants people like people of that nature and there's a lot of buying power out there in the market and those leverage items the markets flush with competition so I would probably Target my pricing I would bundle and leverage I think about demand management I'd probably use e-auctions and there's a host of broader demand levers once that's completed and it's continuous so so you could start thinking about cost unbundling you could look at product teardowns if it was a product in leverage so I think it's that goes to the heart of category management the first set of value leaders might not be the second set of values or the third application um bottleneck for me is as you're right it'd be an engineering solution or a consumable or something for a specific machine I've come across that in my career where you buy the machine and the only product you can buy to run that machine comes from the same company so so for me that would be you would cozy up to that supplier you would create a long-term partnership with them you would eventually try and get into engineering the product or substitution of the product to try and get out of that place you don't never want to be in a bottleneck category and I think all of the all of the standard documentation says if you're there try and get out as quickly as you possibly can get it to leverage get it to strategic get it to non-critical they'll never have it there um for me strategic items are those those are the things that are critical to your company it's uh and I'm sure there's lots of buyers on this phone could think of those straight out in this call could think of those straight away um those are the items that really at the heart of you as an organization those are the things that they're part of your competitive advantage or the other the heart of the product or service you sell you would look at long-term Partnerships you would share your Revenue you would think about risk partnership you would develop the companies together along with a category and you would protect that partnership ownership and not showed that relationship um I I and I think in all four of those examples I you could use software in some of those as well and different software it has different examples across them um but the one thing I'd say is that it's question probably picks at the heart of the category approaches continual it's never static and the approach will change and it can change over the life cycle of a of a category and it never stops so we should be really careful about pigeonholing something and just saying that that's that's where it goes and that's where it's going to stay uh absolutely I think I think that's the one watch out is that if you're thinking about category management it's a continual cycle it's an evolution and it's a constant Evolution these are live conversations and you've got to keep thinking about that commodity a category how are you going to approach it what does the market look like today how what does the business need from in the future so so have you run across situations and what do we do in a situation where you didn't realize if this was a bottleneck or a critical part until all of a sudden it's not there um luckily in my career very often um I can only think of a few examples and actually it was well understood that this I can think way back in my career where we knew certain products there was only one place to buy in the world or there was only one manufacturer and we knew it at the time it was always well known and I dodged anyone to have a look at the supply chain today and think of those questions straight away if you you must you've got to identify where they are yes we've we've talked a lot about mapping your supply chain and not and going past the first tier to see where uh who their buyers are because sometimes the bottlenecks in the supply chain are not in the first or second ET or even they're they're deep into it when where you haven't really been paying that much attention yeah that's that's something and I think that's probably an advancing thought process and procurement and I think probably the pandemic got out for lots of buyers across many sectors which was I know who my primary is but who's my second who's the third how far how far back does the problem go and I and I think my personal experience I think food manufacturers do that extremely well um so there's anyone under your Kudos do you do extremely well excellent so when what does it mean to you just to say you're strategically sourcing what is the difference between strategically sourcing and category management are aren't they two sides of the same coin or just different ways of describing the same thing how do you what's how do you describe the difference a really really good question so so let me have a call with this one um because that's a common question um so you've mentioned the two most common approaches in procurement and they both can drive efficiencies in the supply chain um but for me category management is broader and longer term well the sourcing is a short-term in nature and I also think the level of business change for category management is much more intrusive it's broader in its application of value levers and actually is a broader set of changes across a business um it's not just about the supply it's how the business operates and how they work um and I think for me that I think even I think there's even definitions of it um so I think category management I think we talked about it involves segmenting you're spending the groups and products and services you examine the entire category spend in the marketplace and suppliers well sourcing is about um tendering finding and evaluating The Chosen suppliers that meets your needs that you can create a contract with um and I probably in all of my career have always ascertain I've always um given the opinion that I think category management is the coverall and actually strategic sourcing is part of category management it's a value lever to be used as part of category management and it's one of the strongest levers and one we use the most of um but I I think I keep advocating here for category management against strategic sourcing and I think the hand and glove and I think one is subservient to the other the good category management for me um requires a deeper skill set in the people and it doesn't come without its own weaknesses it relies on fantastic communication and collaboration across your business that's really difficult to do um it requires active participation from a whole host of individuals across your business and departments it's not just the people who are buying it's it's wider spread um and I think there's many articles at the moment that talk about finding the right Talent um it's a mindset and behavior and it's really hard to train um and those people who are really good are really in demand um and like I said a few times as a continual cycle of wax or you can't just start and stop it so it does have its weaknesses um and and does that make sounds like it sounds like well it sounds like as you said you start with category management yes and strategically sourcing falls under that as one of your as is one of the tools in a sense that you are using in your category your overall category management approach yeah no I I absolutely I absolutely I stick to that point and always stick to it I think it's just one of the most used value levers it's ever it's a let's be honest we're all buyers I'm star buyer um it results in a results in a contract it results in a strategic sourcing exercise but I think unless you've done the thinking and the categorization and the thought then then you can go to the Strategic sourcing and I think it adds more value more weight to the conversation because what you thought you were going to buy might not be what you go to Source if you apply broader value levers does that help I think so but um so how does good category management add value from a sourcing contract I guess it depends on how you Define value so you talk about value levers but uh at one time I think value equaled cost maybe cost and quality but now we have reliability reliability we've seen you know Supply chains that have gone under uh Innovation people are looking for Innovation from their supply chains uh contributions to ESG or CSR corporate social responsibility initiatives so do you have metrics for these non-cost values that you might be using to to uh put into your category strategies so so I think that's a that's a really that's a really hard question so so let me try and let me try and walk you through response to that so I think at the heart heart of the category strategy is the business drivers and the market analysis in essence what do we values a business and what will the market be um I I and you can change the market deliver on your priorities or you can influence it but let's just keep it really simple and this is where you can Define more than just a race to the bottom the bottom and I think that's an old thing that's that's probably kept with procurement which is we're just out there trying to hammer cost and that's not what we're trying to do and I think in the past few years we've really developed an enforced broader definitions of value which is a good thing so what we value today in procurement is more than just that race to the bottom one price we value security of Supply if anything the last few years I've taught us that um and we we we value those social economic elements of what we buy on the impacts of the communities we look after what's the impact in the environment is it about continuity of supplies about quality so I think we value a whole range of other things today that we didn't as procurement previously um and I think you're right that probably requires a bit of a repositioning and how we demonstrate value with their colleagues in finance who think about the the dollars and the pounds and we've really got to think about how we value that and I haven't seen I'll be honest I don't have a fantastic answer for how you measure those things um it generally comes down to measurement and captively and how you define the value you want to see and it can change in every category constantly yes uh so that's an open question then in a way because we're we're we we know that we don't want to be just looking at cost uh now but uh but measuring some of these other things is very difficult we don't although there are some tools and some suppliers who are trying to create indexes and and things of that nature yeah I just think it's a developing it's a developing thought process in procurement I don't think anyone's gonna perfect answer for it and I do know that there's lots of companies and digital platforms out there who are creating metrics and ranking tables Etc I haven't seen anything that brings it all together and that's where I think it comes down to having the right Talent looking after your category for your organization who can work with them to understand what they truly value and that that feeds through into whatever we get at the end whether that's cost whether that's we've secured the supply whether that's there's an impact the suppliers investing in the community or something there's lots of different ways to measure it so I think it's going to be very hard for someone to come up with uh one size fits all I think it's gonna be really hard so it sounds like category managers really have to change or adapt their Thinking Beyond negotiating a good price from a reliable source or set of sources so uh yeah so so how do they do that uh so how do they do that um great question so how would you do that um so the question is how do they go beyond negotiating a good price yeah yeah I mean is this come from just uh your deep dives into the categories themselves your spend analysis uh does it come from communication with other stakeholders throughout the organization to find out you know what's what's important to other people what's important to your stakeholders I mean in procurement you're you're not in operations you are in procurement and supply chain so are you looking at your is it a matter of really good collaboration really good connections with your engineers or your operations people or or Finance or whoever yes it's a these are great questions today Paul these are fantastic um so I think I'd answer that two e's so I think firstly the age of pushing the supply market for a specific price point as a singular strategy is long gone uh and don't get me wrong for the right Market is probably the right approach and I've used it myself in my career from The Fairly outset and it's an applicable approach but it's not for every market and every event and we talked I talked earlier about how you treat markets based on their importance to yourself whether it's a leverage Market um but I believe the application of these value leave us for each category um is dependent on the value you're trying to deliver which is the sustainability the the risk of resilience and you've got to do that in conjunction with your stakeholders which is why I say engagement and communication is probably one of the strongest um software skills we need now in buying and and category managers and buyers across the industry which is they've got to engage they've got to communicate because what they're asking the business to do is to consider value levers which are far beyond what they've talked about before they're talking about things where are they leveraging are they running the auctions are they thinking about buying with others do they do they want to look at the supply base do they want to look at offshoring and near-shorting and alternative countries that you want to create those long-term Partnerships with strategic vendors that you want to think about revenue or developing products together or do they want to get all the way into the product and say look let's look at the specification let's use product teardowns let's look at the the engineering of it all the way through to how do you determine the total ownership cost which is do you make it yourself do you Outsource it do you look at how much you buy over how much you consume um all the way through and I think I talked in stationary about process effect and this um and I talked about in certain markets you want to look at how you're using how you're making a product and money flow through your system quicker and faster to get the efficiencies in there and the second way I'd answer that question is and I think I've said it now a few times which is we talk about adapting their thinking and I think it calls for the real upskilling and procurement it requires a wider range of skills and capabilities to drive today's category manager I think they've got to demonstrate those really wide set of skills and capabilities they've got to be inquisitive they've got to understand their business they've got to be agile in their thinking um they've got to be commercially minded you want to be engaging you've got to be able to communicate and they've got to be able to sell an idea in a concept um because what you're selling here is ideas and Concepts based on the market so I think they've got to be well versed in all of those skills plus all of the standard skills which has got to be good you've got to understand the tools and techniques and category management they've got to understand strategic sourcing they've got to think about vendor management and contract management and SRM and they've got to understand purchase to pay so it's a big ask it's a big ask for us all does that help answer yes I think you've actually described the sips global standard okay you know I mean ships does have the grid for that you know the Matrix of if you're at this category if you're this level of procurement uh in your career then these are the things that you should know and uh you you just went through a pretty good list of them so wow that's fantastic because because I'll be honest I couldn't I didn't read it so so fantastic they've hit it spot on so I have got a couple of questions here uh so uh how many categories do you suggest a buyer should be responsible for how how do you do you base it on a spend value uh is it a number does it how do you how do you define the you know sort of the responsibilities of a of a category manager what's uh is there a rule of thumb or what do you use to to assign work um so a rule of thumb and it's it's probably more of a it's more of experience driven than anything else I think I would answer that's why it's experience driven over many years is um I think good category managers could handle about three three categories at any one time um but that really does depend on the complexity the ebb and flow of the category and it also depends on the scale of that category um so I I don't think it's a hard rule um but I think the maximum I see the maximum any one category manager can do with his three with before they start getting roughed around the edges and making mistakes yeah excellent so uh in some areas uh this question is with a lean Central function we do not have the luxury of specializing in specific sectors generally we have to be more generalist that said are there any categories where you specifically say you ought to have a procurement specialist in other words somebody who really is D with deep knowledge I.T maybe or HR or accounting uh are there certain categories where you think that you should have a specialist in that category I think there's two so there's two ones more of a generalist and it's probably a question back um I'd say it it's always got complexity um in terms of the software as a service in terms of software deals in terms of Hardware it's it's so fast paced at the moment I suggest you always need someone in that area and it's quite a specialist skill set um so that's one the other one I would probably push back on which is is back to those strategically important parties so whatever your business is I'd suggest that's you'd probably need Specialists and you need to have a category manager dedicated to whatever the court of the business is and I think it would probably be more General around the edges excellent um so what advice would you give a professional who hold on I lost the question oh would like to gain experience and move into a category management but actually uh their current place of employment isn't really sold on this idea yet how do you convince your bosses that uh you really ought to adopt uh this more category management Deep dive strategic approach um I'll try and give you a journalist answers um that's a really good question though um I think you've got to I think for me I would probably start to set out for my leader if I was doing it with Miley that I would sit out here's the value that we could obtain for the business by adopting this type of car to be in fact you might want to just ask them to test one and run through a category and say look I want to apply more broader value levers and let's just test how far the value goes in terms of this approach so I would try and trial one in your business first yep okay uh start start slow and see if you can move them prove your prove your case yes I would try and prove the case if you if there's no needs the organization doesn't want to transform into this deeper thinking then I think you've got to try and lead your organization that path by starting small on one category okay good so how does the implementation of category Management in the public sector differ from that in the private sector uh for one thing in the public sector you have fewer direct costs it's there's an uh bigger part of your spend is indirect of course uh so you've you've been in both worlds what are the different approaches um actually I see yeah I've worked probably in every sector possible and I would say category Management's been the heart of every sector I've worked at and actually the approach hasn't been very different um the techniques tools and the capabilities you need are consistent across any industry it's probably the one the greatest thing about procurement is that you're highly transferable um and mobile and actually I'd say that I'd see the approach hasn't really ever changed from sector to sector I'd say the only way it's changed is in probably my experience in public sector in the UK is a strategic Source in the element where the specific rules for how you spend your money um but that affects the sourcing rather than the thinking on the category okay so there there's different when you get down to the actually uh tendering uh or issuing an RFP the rules are a little different that way but still the overall thinking of analyze your spend figure out where your money is going uh what are you expecting you know depending on what your the you know what is what is the purpose of that public sector organization that you're working for and how how does your categories fit into that overall goal right yeah and I think you've had on it there um the purpose of the organization so if you're in the public sector they probably you'd want to save money or actually they want to do more with the money they have but I think that goes back to that's the value they determine at the category rather than the approach they're just saying we wanted to stretch our money further we want to do some more for the public so I think your approach is still consistent I think how did how do you think about values probably slightly different than the private sector uh I'm not sure I understand these questions but I'm going to go ahead and throw it at you anyway so what influence can procurement Leverage uh what influence in what influence can procure leverage to make it easy for a procurement to operate globally wow that's a that's a really I'm hoping that's not one of my category managers coming on to ask me hard questions actually um so I think it comes back to the basics when you analyze your spend are you buying from the same markets are you buying from the same suppliers um and is there a global leverage point back to the principles of category management is there a leverage point that allows you to think in a global basis and that's a hard transition though and that takes time because because you're yeah I think the question goes to if you are operating globally uh your leverage may be different in different markets or your ability to Leverage yes but I I think the question was also how do you hopefully the question was how do you move from Regional to Global yes and I think if you're in a regional basis I think you've got to go back to the heart of the conversation which is where is your spend are you spending across your organization with the same suppliers in the same markets and the same categories if there is that crossover an alignment then that's a case for you to have a conversation about e-global category rather than keeping it Regional yep okay we're gonna go back to public procurement for a minute here with this question from Alan uh is there a limitation in public procurement considering that uh there are often segregation of Duties there's very clear classifications of rules between requesters buyers technical specialists so uh how how do we work through the specializations and these little in a sense you might have Specialists or silos within a procurement organization so how do you does that limit you in some way or do you do you have to just figure out how to work through that with collaboration and communication yeah I think I think you're probably answering that one for me actually and I think it goes to the start of the conversation when I said here is a skill set so you need to hear some of the ones you need to develop it's collaboration it's being able to sell a concept is being able to engage and communicate those are the softer skills now that I think buyers have to really adopt um and I think it's how do you network across that group of people to bring out the best result for the company or the public sector um it's a hard that's a really hard question though um it feels as if that's very specific yep yep uh well we're looking for some more questions in the meantime uh I have another one for you and that is uh have these big things like climate change initiatives significantly changed uh what you're sourcing or how you are doing it uh things climate can't change huge disruptions uh how how have you adapted and what are you thinking about new things in your in your analysis of your categories if you did say that you have a it's a constant updating process but how specifically have you know I mean you're in an industry that is obviously very sensitive to climate change initiatives so how has that changed your thinking so I I think I think that's changed the thinking for every buyer every buyer globally um so Supply so buyers are much more astute now thinking about the impact of the products they buy or the services they buy and actually looking at the companies to make sure they are responsible and ethical and to ensure those suppliers are actually living the values that we would expect from partners and and I think that's I think that's an industry wide change from buyers um we're now looking for buyers We're Alone looking for companies who much more in tune with our ethos that are our own companies ethos um and I'd see things like I'm now beginning to see things from peers across different Industries or other other people in the field they're now beginning to assess things like what's the carbon intensity of their supply chain or um how much how do they move that from the suppliers um there's no great answer to that at the moment it's something everyone's feeling their way through um I would think the one of the things that's clearly changing is that if you go to wind and solar those are capital intensive you're not buying fuel anymore the fuel is free so I mean there's some really some fundamental changes coming uh in in your sector yes yes definitely is um definitely some changes we don't generate in the UK we don't generate at all in the UK but yeah I can imagine that the the entire industry is now thinking about uh renewable energy and how to Electrify the goods and how to think about the new EVS Etc so it's definitely a definitely a time of change yes yeah well we're going to uh you know people are generating their own electricity too with their own solar panels you know so well I'm not getting much solar here where I am but can you talk a little bit about logistics is there any specific thing about logistics about getting your goods either inbound or outbound that uh you have learned in the last couple of years from kobit kovid and the disruptions uh is there is there have you changed your thinking about Logistics in any way and and is this is it in a in a private versus a public sector is there a different should we have different strategies in terms of logistics no it's a really good question um I think it goes back to the heart of the conversation that we had there later on which we we talked about people are now thinking about the second and third tier and I think Logistics has always been something that categy managers have overlooked and it's a really it's a value label that can be used but I think they've always looked at well the logistics the product just moves and that's fine I think it's forced them I think the last few years have forced every category manager and buyer to think about how does the product travel which ports does it go through what's the supply chain behind it um and that's and that's something that I've seen more and more of um and more than those public forums more than procurement forums people talking about logistics and how do they move their goods and services I think there was a port closure in the us as well and then there was a Suez Canal at the same time um that caused everyone pain yes well when the when the container ship Evergreen was it that went sideways in the Suez Canal that shut down an amazing amazing number of people found out for the first time that that their supply chain relied on the Suez Canal yeah yeah that was an amazing amount of people whoops yeah it was amazing that people who walk up to the fact that Supply chains were Global yeah what yeah how does that affect me well it does okay well I think you only expected most people in that Amazon eBay deliveries or whatever shopping they've done personally um yes so um do you have a specific strategies for categories for parts that are specific to customers uh looking to a question here we try not to purchase more stock than we need when something is made to order however keeping control of this can be difficult even on an MRP system especially when minimum stock level is not set so uh this is a this is a supply chain that is really directed to a specific customer is there a different strategy you use yeah that's a it's a really strong question and I think I'm going to take it a very practical sense and I think some of the answers were in there so if you're on an MRP if you're within an MRP system my suggestion is there should be a Min and max level based on the lead time of that product and there should be a buffer within that min max to allow you to order within the time frame um that's some of the that's some of the techniques I've used a long time ago in my career when I was in fast moving Goods um to ensure that we were buying the right amount of products but we could we would never stock out of anything um that's a really difficult thing the one I think it was to that's a really practical question and one I would I would go back to setting the time fence for order plus them in max levels really quickly this sounds to me like uh we talk a lot about supplier Communications and supplier relation manager management but this seems like one where you need a really tight coordination Upstream as well and downstream as well so you are really close uh discussions Communications with your your customer as well you know so you so if the customer spots some you know uh up or down in their demand that you are able to respond to that yeah I probably even go I would probably even build on that point as well so obviously custom or driven product I imagine you've got sales people um out there and selling that product and I think you've got to really connect internally as well to see what are you selling how fast are you selling the product what does this mean for our stock levels and how much should we maintain um that's a real they're in fast-paced consumer goods that's a really hard thing yeah uh do you have any recommendations for a certification that is category manager should have is there a is there a level what do you look for sip something I hope well I was going to see two things one of them was you froze for a moment there Darren and we lost you and it was very important because you were promoting uh my organization sips you could repeat your answer that would be great uh no problem so so I think I talked about hard one experience across multiple categories in different sectors and I'd see the second part of that was I always look for um sips as a qualification and because it gives a lot of the it gives a lot of the foundational hard um kind of education and procurement and category management and teaches a lot of the softer skills as well so I think definitely sex is the one I look for and definitely hard one experience in different categories yep uh we have one more question here do you think that low value non-strategic but recurrent consumables should they be outsourced to a 4pl at what point do you draw the line and say that this this uh these transactions this sourcing is uh we don't even have to do it in-house yeah I think you've got I think I think there's a there's a there's a large piece of analysis on that conversation about do and I think it comes down to a few key questions number one do you do it well and does it cause you any pain today uh and number two so and link to number one is that your core skill set is it your core skill and your core strength if it's not then when we're in a buying industry we get someone else to do it for us but it's also going to add up to the economics of getting someone else to do it um so I think you've got to think about it in those two axis um but I wouldn't Outsource anything without doing some really deep thinking and a lot of business cases on it yep so is there anything we missed do you have a do you have one or two key things that you think we should remember as a as a takeaway as takeaways from this conversation um so a few key things for me just to take away from the conversation I I number one I think category management is is a fantastic discipline uh and I think it's something that procurement really needs to wake up to um in terms of how it applies that skill set because it drives most sustainable and longer term value um number two I think procurement as an industry's probably got it upskill itself to start adopting those value levers um and the last thing I'd say is it's a continuous cycle so if you're going to embark on the category management Journey it is not it's not like a tender you don't just start it and stop it's something you've got to continually do continually refresh it's a living thing and you've got to keep going over it to get the best value for your organization excellent well thank you Darren Gibb from National Grid you gave us a lot to think about here and thank you to our attendees for listening and asking questions they were good ones you know we made them think we will be posting this interview on the sips America's home page and our YouTube playlist I encourage you to continue the discussion uh in our LinkedIn ships America's group so we do have a group on LinkedIn and if you want to search groups uh on LinkedIn for ships Americas and then ask to join and if you're on a member already you can do that and we'll we'll certainly let you in on the conversation it's a very good forum to interact with your colleagues it's a peer-to-peer discussion and their uh your colleagues are off from all across the Americas and we can talk about issues like the ones we've been discussing today or other things that are on your mind we also expect to have a face group uh Facebook group up and running soon if that's your preferred platform for social media so I'll be looking for you in both of those places thanks again have a great day I'm Bob Ross back