The latest episode of the Digital Insight welcomes Sam Achampong, Head of CIPS MENA…

The latest episode of Digital Insight welcomes Sam Achampong, Head of CIPS MENA as we discuss procurement maturity and how the Middle East is on a journey towards being recognised as a procurement benchmark for the rest of the world.

“Procurement, in the Middle East was still a developing function and to some extent it still lagged behind other parts of the world in terms of overall maturity and recognition of the function itself. That’s where we were pre-COVID and I think everyone involved in the profession at any level recognizes that. Significant efforts were being made to improve that and they have been going on for many years to try and elevate procurement. The efforts to bring the full procurement supply chain really to the fore in the region had been going on for a while. COVID has accelerated those efforts significantly.

Can the Middle East become THE global benchmark for procurement? 

Undoubtedly. I think, it’s the old cliche of “it’s not a question of if, but when”. You have is organizations out here who are very ambitious, innovative and very keen to be at the forefront of business operations and not only maturity but performance.

When it comes to procurement, they’re very ambitious, very keen to have the best systems in place. Those that have that ambition, in this day and age, are very blessed that there is an abundance of technology that serves procurement and supply chain that they’re able to utilize, and there’s a huge adoption of technology relevant to procurement and supply chain, in this region. For that reason alone, I can really see the organizations out here really leapfrogging others around the world and fulfilling that ambition to be world-leading where it comes to procurement and supply chain.

You see a real adoption of all sorts of solutions, whether it’s dashboards, eSourcing systems, supplier relation management systems, or a whole gamut of solutions that allow practitioners to be a lot more strategic and less transactional.

The added benefit that organizations have here is that, at the point that they are fully versed and fully engaged with procurement at the very highest level, they already have these tools at their disposal. They don’t have to learn them. They don’t have to unlearn anything. So ,they’re perfectly placed to really be world-leading.”

LISTEN TO THE EPISODE BELOW:

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