How Can a Chief Procurement Officer Channel Grit (Passion and Perseverance) Successfully?
Many organizations are increasingly seeking out high-octane change agents to successfully lead their procurement transformations.
Organizational psychologist Angela Duckworth has written extensively about the importance of grit in the workplace. So what is grit?
Well, a leader doesn’t have to lead a nation during a world war like the UK’s former Prime Minister Winston Churchill or fly solo across the Atlantic like Amelia Earhart to demonstrate grit. Duckworth defines grit as demonstrating passion and perseverance in achieving long-term goals. She believes that an individual’s grit is an excellent predictor of a person’s success.
Why do certain chief procurement officers (CPOs) succeed and even thrive in leading certain transformations while others stall out? Is it the way they are wired?
The answer may lie in the degree to which a CPO is able to successfully channel their grit based on using his or her emotional intelligence to navigate through an organization’s deep waters.
To lead a successful procurement transformation, a CPO needs a number of characteristics and winning strategies.
1. Have passion, but do not be a proselytizer.
Most successful CPOs bring a high degree of passion to the world of procurement. Many of these leaders may have different paths that led to them to their particular passion—and perhaps different ways of exhibiting it—but passion is something they all possess.
CPOs must however be self-aware enough to understand when they are potentially straying into the territory of proselytization—by overselling to get buy-in. The solution often lies in initially conveying excitement about what a best-in-class procurement function will bring, rather than lecturing internal customers on changing their purchasing behavior.
2. Do not become easily discouraged by resistance.
A seasoned procurement executive knows to expect a degree of resistance from internal customers—it’s inevitable. Some stakeholders may opt for the status quo rather than choose to walk an unchartered path.
An adept CPO uses resistance as a challenge but not an obstacle. Challenges become opportunities to build relationships by solving problems, delivering value, and offering trusted expertise. The staunchest opponents can often become a CPO’s greatest proponents later on.
3. Take a consistent and incremental approach.
An astute CPO understands that consistency of effort will deliver sustainable outcomes rather than bursts of quick initiatives that focus solely on short-term gains.
4. Know when to push through and when to pull back.
A CPO has to know when to push through to enact changes and when to let the organization or stakeholders catch up. A CPO without a sense of balance may find himself or herself in constant battles or skirmishes that unfortunately tarnish their credibility.
5. Embrace adaptability over rigidity.
A wise CPO understands that there may be some switchbacks as they journey the path through a transformation. The path may not be a straight line. There are multiple ways to get to the destination of best practices in procurement, and a sense of rigidity with using just one approach is likely to derail the leader as they lead a transformation.
6. Realize the organization comes first.
It’s important for a CPO to understand that the organization’s needs come ahead of the desires of the leader’s ego. Sometimes what’s in the best interest of the organization may be a process that doesn’t create unnecessary turbulence. A leader who ignores the turbulence that his or her internal customers experience will frequently be asleep to the need for pacing.
7. Do not strive for perfection during a transformation.
Perfection may be the biggest enemy of progress for a CPO. There will never be perfect data or flawless analytics. The CPO needs to assemble the best data and analytics available with a solid analytics tool, and act based on that information. If he or she waits until perfection is achieved with quantitative data, they may get stuck in inaction.
8. Create impactful leaders on your team.
It takes a cohesive team to implement a successful procurement transformation. A CPO who tries to do everything by himself or herself, without taking the time to develop leadership talent on their team, may be more likely to burn out.
A CPO who can integrate stick-to-itiveness with flexibility, emotional intelligence, problem-solving, and team collaboration will be on the right path to leading a successful transformation.
About the Author: Steven Lutzer is the president of Lutzer Global Inc., an executive search firm that specializes in procurement, strategic sourcing and supply chain management. Lutzer had a 20-plus year career in supply chain management and global sourcing before founding Lutzer Global. For more information, please visit www.lutzerglobal.com.