Employing Smart Sourcing Right - From Strategic Principles to Practice

Length: 1 day

Leader: Tushar K. Hazra, PhD, Senior Consultant, Cutter Consortium

Overview: The practical concepts behind "smart sourcing", include using a straw man approach to define the roles and responsibilities of internal resources; and developing methods to integrate the organizational cultures associated with a diverse workforce of internal, offshore, on-site, and near-shore associates. Organizations that use a smart sourcing methodology conduct periodic evaluations, internally as well as by external entities, and surveys to determine the status of their smart sourcing initiative. In order to establish and manage "smart sourcing", practitioners must focus on all facets of sourcing and prepare internal resources to take the leadership in establishing and managing the initiatives.

This workshop offers insight into the practical challenges and complexities of "smart sourcing" and helps decisionmakers resolve the associated risks. Drawing from examples and case studies from the practice of smart sourcing, each of the interactive sessions in this workshop will prepare both executives and line-of-business managers to establish the right expectations; help them develop a set of checklists, based on relevant industry best practices; and formulate a blueprint to manage smart sourcing initiatives and their associated risks.

Workshop Goals:

As a result of attending this workshop, participants will be able to:

• Recognize the concepts behind smart sourcing
• Understand the practical challenges of smart sourcing
• Be prepared to leverage the benefits of smart sourcing, including checklists, risk management plans and a roadmap to successfully deliver business value
• Create a blueprint for the decision makers to manage and guide smart sourcing initiatives

Intended Audience: IT and Business Executives (CXO and VPs), Directors, Managers

Prerequisites: A basic understanding of strategic sourcing objectives, and primary knowledge about the internal challenges of their company

Outline:

This workshop consists of four discussion sessions, and requires participation of the attendees at an individual as well as at a group level.

1. Understanding the Concepts of Smart Sourcing. This session of the Smart Sourcing workshop focuses on the who, why, what, when, and where of smart sourcing. We'll discuss the practical concepts behind smart sourcing; smart sourcing's limitations and benefits, and define the roles and responsibilities as well as accountabilities of all resources involved.

2. Establishing the Strategy and a Roadmap. A sound strategy is critical to achieving business value from smart sourcing. A a result of a well-defined strategy your organization can create a roadmap to chart the course of your smart sourcing initiatives and to manage the relationships with associates and sourcing partners. In this part of the workshop you'll come to understand the challenges of creating a smart sourcing strategy and how to overcome them; begin developing a roadmap, with multiple "what-if" scenarios; learn the "do's and don'ts" in employing smart sourcing roadmap; and hear case studies that highlight the limitations and benefits of smart sourcing.

3. Preparing a Checklist to Recognize the State of Smart Sourcing Initiatives. Most practitioners experience difficulties in recognizing the current state of their smart sourcing initiative, primarily because they have not created a set of metrics to help them govern and measure the activities involved at any given point of the initiative. Most companies lack an organized process to support such governance. In this session, we delve into three major areas of focus to provide such a baseline for your organization: (1) a checklist to help you visualize the state of a current initiative; (2) a governance model for managing smart sourcing challenges and activities; and (3) a plan for setting the direction or corrective measures to be considered in case of an undesired situation.

The primary goal of this session is to your organization determine the complexities, challenges, and risks involved in smart sourcing and how a governance model can help improve the status of an initiative.

4. Managing Smart Sourcing - Realities in Practice. This final session of the workshop involves discussions and group interactions (including presentation by the team members to others) in defining the charter of the governance, as discussed in the previous session, and defining various ground rules for managing smart sourcing. The focus is directed towards delivering results while aligning IT solutions and services with business objectives. A number of case studies that share real-life experience of smart sourcing will be discussed to illustrate:

1. The seven steps involved in formulating the governance charter
2. How smart sourcing impacts business-IT alignment
3. What is working in smart sourcing and what needs improvement

For more information on bringing this workshop to your organization, contact Jack Wainwright by phone at +1 781 641 5122, by fax at +1 781 648 1950, or by e-mail at sales@cutter.com.