Structured purchasing planning and the establishment of strategic supplier management are rarely given sufficient consideration in practice in companies. This is a big mistake, as meticulous planning, and structure help to better identify risks in purchasing, to lower purchasing prices and to recognize potential for expanding supplier relationships. In addition, structured purchasing planning creates transparency for strategic decisions such as make-or-buy or global sourcing.
Our approach
Situation
If companies are faced with the question of which product groups can save costs or which purchasing processes can be made more efficient through digitization, there are numerous options for uncovering potential. These must be identified, prioritized, and exploited accordingly.
Target
The target of our consulting projects in purchasing and supply chain is to establish a strategic supplier management that identifies potentials and risks through supplier qualifications and thus contributes to future decision-making. In addition, it is important to digitalize purchasing and the supply chain and to implement the vision of “networked purchasing” and efficient resource allocation.
Solution
ensign advisory’s consultants support clients in the context of supplier evaluation and qualification and, during this, develop a holistic process for the selection and evaluation of suppliers. Together with our clients, we select uniform criteria for the registration, qualification, and evaluation of potential suppliers in workshops and can create a fixed pool of potential contractual partners based on this. In addition, we work on the supplier management of our clients. Based on detailed data analyses, we develop more efficient planning scenarios, identify potential savings in direct commodity groups and implement methods such as supplier dashboards or SCOR. By optimizing supplier management, our clients can subsequently better map potential risk factors and supplier information. In addition, our consultants can digitize the purchasing organization and supply chain management by introducing appropriate IT systems and thereby achieving increased connectivity with suppliers. Holistic supply chain performance management solutions and the definition of relevant KPIs and their interdependencies support our clients in acting strategically in the long term.
Result
ensign advisory supports and advises in the identification of optimization potentials in the areas of purchasing as well as supply chain and helps to successfully implement decisive measures, concepts, and systems. In addition, we provide support in strategic cooperation with suppliers, in optimizing the supply chain and in implementing the latest technologies in logistics. We position, network, and integrate the purchasing function and were able, for example, to reduce the purchasing costs for direct materials by more than 5% for one of our clients in the past. Supply chain costs were also significantly reduced by optimizing order-to-cash cycles.
Our core competencies
Supply Chain 4.0
ensign advisory advises clients on versatile supply chain challenges, especially against the background of Industry 4.0. Our continuously growing industry knowledge as well as regular market analyses provide the decisive clues to digitalize our clients´ logistics processes. Together with our clients, we rise to the challenge of meeting increasing customer demands for price and product availability.
Supplier Evaluation and Qualification
Over the years, our consultants have developed special tools and approaches for supplier evaluation and qualification. We teach our clients the relevant criteria for selecting and evaluating suppliers in workshops. This enables them to carry out supplier evaluation and qualification by themselves in the future. The combination of expertise and industry knowledge are the pillars of our consulting services and the satisfaction of our clients.
Purchasing Optimization and Supplier Management
The trade-off between cost reduction and quality optimization is omnipresent. With the help of detailed data analyses, we develop more efficient planning scenarios and identify potential savings in direct commodity groups. With the help of our tools, we can better map risk factors and supplier information and sustainably improve and strategically align our clients´ supplier management.
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