When the CFO states that your organization needs to save money, you listen! When your supervisor makes a “suggestion,” you listen! When your spouse tells you what he/she wants for an anniversary gift, you listen! When your favorite song plays on the radio, you listen!
When data speaks; DO YOU LISTEN?
An earlier blog posting, “Finding Opportunities in Spend Analysis” (May 24, 2016), focused on the mechanics of spend analysis in detail. As you go through these mechanics and perform the activities associated with sound spend data analysis, ask yourself the question, “What is the data saying?” or “Am I letting the data speak?” All too often, we don’t ask those questions and drive toward a pre-fixed solution regardless of what the data is actually telling us. Or worse, we force the data to fit a pre-determined sourcing strategy. Strategic Sourcing approaches are guided by the data and our ability to interpret the data, not the other way around. Remember, the key is to turn data into useful information.
