PeopleImages // Shutterstock
Sometimes, it can feel like you’re the only sane voice in the room during a procurement deal.
Even if you know that the business is taking a big risk or making a purchase that the business can’t really afford to make, it can be hard to speak up in the moment.
You may be a negotiation pro with suppliers, but when it comes to stakeholder management, it’s challenging to get buy-in and remind your larger team why you’re there in the first place. Once the acronyms start flying and the conversation picks up, it can be easy to get lost and wonder, What am I even doing here?
Tom Mills, the founder of procurement newsletter Procure Bites, knows what that’s like. Ironclad sat down to talk with Mills about why a confidence gap persists for competent procurement professionals—and how to find your voice in stakeholder management moving forward.
Why procurement teams sometimes feel like they can’t speak up
Procurement professionals often fight an uphill battle to prove their value to the organization because everybody thinks they know how to buy. After all, people buy big-ticket items like houses and cars in their personal lives, so how could this be any different?
“Everyone thinks they’re an expert, and they question why procurement needs to be there in the first place, which makes it challenging right off the bat,” Mills says. “But the reality is, you’re there for a reason, and you do have expertise that matters.”
The second issue is that the buying decision-makers typically are experts in their field on subjects you may know nothing about. “You’re never going to know more about a given IT tool than the IT engineer or CIO in the room, for example,” explains Mills. “And when people start talking in acronyms, or it gets very technical, it can feel like you’re way out of your depth.”
Procurement professionals may think this feeling goes away with experience or seniority, but Mills has experienced it at every level of his career. “When I was looking after the marketing team at Clark’s as head of procurement, we were buying agency services, and of course, I attended the pitches as I was running the RFP,” he recalls. “But I realized immediately I had no idea what they were talking about in terms of creative, or asset management, or the value of these agencies in the first place. There’s a lot to learn, no matter where you’re at in your career, if you want to be of service to the business.”
Confidence starts with vulnerability
Many people mistake confidence for a sense of boldness, but it’s deeper than that. “The true definition of confidence is being willing to say, ‘I don’t understand,’ and not care how that is perceived,” says Mills.
Tom remembers a senior meeting as head of procurement where the CEO was in attendance. “We were talking about an epic, and I had no idea what that was,” he says. An epic is part of the project management process in Jira, which is often used by engineering teams. “I was nervous, but I put my hand up and asked to pause the meeting and clarify it. Funny thing happened, I wasn’t the only one in the room that had no idea what it was, and the relief was palpable. The conversation continued just fine after that.”
Whether or not you know what an epic is has nothing to do with your intelligence or your ability to be great at procurement. “You haven’t been brought in as an expert on creative agencies or cyber security,” Mills says. “That’s what the SMEs are for. You’ve been brought in for your specific expertise, which is how to make sure the organization buys effectively and safely.”
Being vulnerable in this way can feel really challenging, but as Mills’ story illustrates, you’re probably not the only one with a question.
“The more open you are, the more people want to work with you, because they trust you,” Mills says. “They can feel like, ‘Ah, here’s someone who is human,’ and that’s far more powerful than people who just BS their way through.”
What’s the worst that can happen? If you’re dismissed, rejected, or laughed at, then that’s not an organization you want to be a part of anyway.
Your confidence will build as you build relationships, not knowledge
Of course, it’s important to know as much as possible about your area of procurement. But it’s the relationships you build that are going to make it easier to stand up in a meeting and raise your hand.
This starts with really listening to your stakeholders and understanding their perspective as much as possible. “People mistake communication for how we talk, but it’s really how we listen that matters,” Mills advises. “In procurement, we need to approach our stakeholder interactions with a relationship mindset and how we can be of service to the organization.”
The stronger your relationships are with stakeholders from across the business, the easier it will be to speak your mind. This starts with effective communication—being willing to walk over and have a conversation with someone first, rather than always defaulting to email or Slack. “If there’s a real situation at hand, and you feel like the organization is taking a risk, that’s an in-person conversation about it to explain your point of view,” says Mills. “It’s also a great opportunity to listen to their side of the story. It’s about building a partnership and trust.”
Sometimes, when it feels like you’re trying to hold back a runaway train in the buying process, it’s a mismatch of information between what you know and what they know. The more you can articulate the risks that you’re seeing and listen carefully to their needs and assessment of the situation, the better you can respond, and the more confident you’ll be in the future.
Have the confidence to ask for help
Part of building your confidence is knowing when you need to handle something yourself and when to ask for help.
It’s easy to hit the panic button on a deal, but you need to be brave enough and bold enough to have those hard conversations yourself whenever possible. You don’t want a reputation for “tattling” every time your stakeholders move forward on something you disagree with.
“There is a time and place to escalate a situation to your manager, whether you’re the head of procurement or someone more junior,” says Mills. “You can’t involve them in every single situation, because then you’re really not doing your job. But it can be useful if you can get their perspective, or a little more information. It may give you what you need to better explain your point of view to the buying committee.”
Mills recalls meeting with the CFO—his manager—on a purchase he felt was going to be a mistake. He framed the conversation less as escalation and more as asking for advice. “What happened was the CFO turned around to me and gave me a completely different perspective, and why they were totally okay with moving forward,” he explains. “It was a great reminder that sometimes, you just need to look at a situation with a different lens.”
You won’t win every stakeholder battle
“Sometimes, you just have to let it go,” says Mills. “It’s happened to me a number of times. That doesn’t mean I’m bad at procurement, but that I know when the cutoff point is. Your role in procurement is to guide the organization to the right decision, but you can’t force it.”
If that happens, remember, it’s not personal. Instead, do your best to solicit feedback and reflect on the project:
- Did you clearly articulate and document the risks associated with this purchase?
- Were you able to offer alternative solutions?
- Were you able to connect with members of the buying committee as people, outside of this decision?
- Were there other factors at play here you may not be considering, like an effective sales rep, a market leader, or a personal connection from the key budget holder that impacted the decision?
- Did you speak up and defend your position or let it slide?
If you try your best, that’s all you can ask for. You may even be right, and the organization is making a mistake—but as the saying goes, “you can guide a horse to water, but you can’t make them drink.”
“I’ve had my fair share of ‘I told you so’ moments in procurement, but it’s best to focus on what your value is for the next deal, and how you can support the business, rather than stay mired in a bad situation,” Mills says.
Procurement matters, and you matter
If you’re feeling like you don’t belong, remember why you were invited into the discussion in the first place.
“The main value procurement offers is to ensure the business buys well,” says Mills. “Stand up and be counted in procurement, because you’re the guardian of the business’s future. It’s okay if your alignment isn’t to the stakeholders here and now; it’s to make sure the company’s money is being invested wisely. Remember that value, and that it matters.”
Stakeholder management is one of the most challenging areas of procurement. But beyond remembering what procurement’s value is, remember your value.
“The business hired you for a reason,” Mills says. “You went through a rigorous interview process. You beat hundreds of other candidates for this position. They’ve brought you in because you’ve got a specific skill set that will add value to the organization, and don’t forget to remind yourself of that.”
This story was produced by Ironclad and reviewed and distributed by Stacker.
