Diagnostics & Capability Assessment
Functional Benchmarking and Capability Assessment
Our structured approach to diagnostics rapidly identifies the issues, capability gaps and opportunities within your existing structures, processes, people and systems and this results in a costed, resourced and prioritised improvement plan which sets out the steps required to adopt best practices and improve performance.
Our assessment tool measures the capability and performance of procurement across 7 key areas of functional competence and more than 100 sub-elements to provide you with a clear view of where you are currently, and benchmark against.
A typical diagnostic and transformation program would be:
- Undertake diagnostic and capability gap assessment – 2-3 months duration
- Design detailed Target Operating Model, core processes and systems
- Deliver the transformation plan which may include:
- Support organisational changes including governance and structures
- Develop policy and core processes
- Develop people and skills
- Support systems procurement and implementation
- Initiate cost reduction program and provide accelerated savings support
- Implement category management and SRM processes
A typical diagnostic and transformation program would be:
- Procurement Policy
- Category management and sourcing processes
- Supplier Relationship Management and Contract Management
- Procure to Pay processes
- Skills assessment and talent management
In support of requirements to identify and prioritise sourcing effort, we routinely undertake spend analyses for clients. Using existing data sources such as a general ledger we are able to organise suppliers by category and expenditure to determine factors such as the level of concentration and risk to support basic category planning. We also make use of other data sources such as contract registers to understand the breadth and depth of procurement activity in particular categories and appreciate any contractual obligations which may impact upon the potential to realise opportunities in these categories. Where appropriate this information is supported with knowledge from semi-structured interviews which is used to understand what activity has taken place, the benefits already achieved and other constraints. Together this information forms the basis of the Spend and Opportunity Assessment, the benefits of which are:
- Supports resource planning and organisational design
- Prioritises sourcing effort to deliver benefits sooner
- Enables effective mapping and coding of categories
- Provides the information necessary to support compliance
Skills Assessment and Benchmarking
Over the last 15 years we have assessed the procurement knowledge and skills of more than 20,000 people from over 1,000 organisations in almost 100 countries. The tool enables individuals and organisations to baseline existing procurement knowledge levels, identify the skills they need to develop, target investment and measure improvement over time. The database we maintain offers a range of benchmark comparisons so that procurement teams and individuals can compare their own performance against others in the same sector, job function, role level and region, either internally or externally.
Our on-line pQ tool assesses individuals in 13 key procurement competencies (functional leadership, category management, procurement strategy, strategic sourcing, contract law, finance, negotiation, sustainability, risk management). The assessment takes around 90 minutes to complete and comprises a range of multiple-choice questions. This makes the assessment both quick and cost effective to deploy whilst also being completely objective.
The findings are used to inform capability development initiatives and individuals receive a report highlighting their results and recommendations. Group reports enable development plans to be developed at either a team, regional, role or functional level and these can be aligned to specific roles and the competencies required.