The "Art of Procurement" podcast shares insights on developing powerful Category Management within a large organization. Stephane Morel, a Global Process Owner within Strategic Procurement at Novartis, shares his knowledge on the future business requirements needed for implementing a Category Strategy solution.

Will Category Managers be ready to invest more than 3 minutes into preparing a category strategy in the future? According to a recent Financial Times article, Spotify identifies a 3-minute song as a perfect match.

Price increases and volatility are a big concern for many Procurement organizations, and a lot of resources and effort go into mitigating the negative impact of suppliers pushing increased pricing onto their buyers. Still, for many, it's also about ensuring materials are ready and available for the continuous production of goods.

There are mixed feelings about category management in the procurement community. How it is understood and applied today often does not justify the existence of category management. The ultimate goal of category management is to be a true partner to the business and add value. Most Category Managers have never really lived up to that role. Try them!

This year, the most popular “masterclass” at ProcureCon EU was Cirtuo’s “From myth to reality: Cracking the code on category strategy automation.” AI-based systems were a hot topic of discussion, with many attendees excited about how AI can augment and transform category management.

Procurement Reframed is a procurement transformation guideline developed to help organizations become strategic in procurement. Over years and thousands of workshops with Category Managers, Cirtuo has jointly identified with the client which rules and activities are required to transform procurement into a strategic function.

Over the course of thousands of category strategy developments we hear often; "Short term we need to e.g. perform some sourcing, resolve supply chain disruptions, sort out our quality issues. What do we need a strategy for - isn't that something more mid or long-term?!"

For years now, company buyers and their suppliers end every business year with a traditional dance.

People say riding a bike is something you never forget. But what if you learned to ride a bike in such a way that you keep trying to go backwards while braking all the time?