Numbers are numbers, but what do they mean?

Recently, I had occasion to sit in on a meeting with a C-level executive of my employer. I’ve only been here about four months, so I fully understood that this was a rare and welcome introduction.

My role was to sit there in the meeting and listen. It was also a show of solidarity for the person presenting, a senior member of the procurement team and a rising star at the company.

The topic was supplier diversity, always a sticky program to manage.

The person presenting had spent considerable time formulating a tight slide deck to outline the problem and give conclusions.

The C-level exec, a numbers minded guy, skipped right over the first slide with a well rendered graphic and zeroed right in on the column of numbers on slide 2.

The numbers showed procurement spend and the percent of spend that goes to the various HUB or historically under utilized businesses.

It was a great slide. Really well done, in my opinion.

But here’s where it got tense.

The C-level pointed to a number and asked “so this is complete procurement spend?”

The presenter said yes, that was correct.

“What’s the breakdown of commodities that make up that spend?”

I expected the presenter to rattle off the answer. The presenter did not. The reply was, “Um…I’m not sure.”

That’s where I got a little surprised. I could probably make a guess at it and be close.

What’s the top indirect spend items for just about any large corporation?

Off the cuff: 1) Marketing 2) Consulting and 3) Telecom

Betcha I’m right and that is the top commodities for my new procurement organization. I may not be able to guess the order they fall in terms of top spend, but I’m reasonably sure those are the top three.

If pressed for top five, I would add facilities spend (assuming utilities are handled by indirect procurement, they are not always), and IT spend other than telecom (software, networking equipment, hardware, etc).

The presenter recovered well, said smoothly “I’ll get that data” and kept going.

This was a big lesson for me. Presenting numbers is great. It’s compelling. The drive for data and reporting is as large as it’s ever been within the Procurement Profession.

But before presenting a number, any number, ask yourself, what does it mean? Show it to someone outside of procurement and ask them what questions they would have. Put your C-level grumpy face on and be rough on yourself.

I bring this forward only because I’ve been that presenter. I’ve had questions rocket fired at me regarding a number I brought forward and I was helpless and unable to answer.

It’s not a good feeling. Watching this all go down with this particular executive was a good reminder for me, and also an amazing lesson in deft recovery from such an incident.

I’m taking notes like the good Procurement Hero I am. Twenty years at this profession is a lot, but there is always more to learn.

Image by typofi and used royalty free from stock.xchng.