Original article published on Linkedin by Dustin Lanier, CPPO
At the excellent 2023 CAPPO conference kick off, we had a lively panel discussion with three leaders in public procurement for the Golden State - Jennifer Alford, M.A., CPPO from Delta College, Theresa Harris, Ed.D, CPCM from the University of San Diego and Angelic Davis, MPA, CPPO, NIGP-CPP from Mount San Antonio College.
I've captured highlights in the podcast episode for the week, and below are some of the topics these panelists covered in the discussion:
- Reclassifying job descriptions and incorporating training to bring up the resources
- Cross-training across multiple spend categories and expanding team collaboration
- Adding new operating procedures to maximize the value of each touch
- Utilizing employees in other divisions who are interested in procurement
- Tapping into student workers and professors in a higher education setting
- Creating shared resources in concert with specialized skills for departments such as IT
- Issues related to incorporating hybrid and its impact on hiring
- Using technology to reduce manual processes and have better access to data
- Being as efficient as possible with the staff they already have to ensure that new staff requests are successful
- Changing the "hamster wheel" instead of simply running more quickly
- Asking "why" multiple times in the review and redesign of processes
- Leveraging temp resources
- Incorporating "Procurement as a Service" of a pool of highly qualified staff as a new delivery mechanism
It is worth your listen!
