WORLD-CLASS ADVANTAGE

Complimentary research
November 2020

Transforming Procurement to
Prevail in the Next Normal
By Chris Sawchuk, Mélani Flores, Laura Gibbons and Erik Dorr
 World class matters now more than ever

As procurement continues to reinvent itself to deliver more value in new ways, the role of the chief procurement officer
(CPO) becomes ever more important. Procurement leaders already face tremendous pressure from inside and outside of the
organization to become more agile in order to adapt quickly to changing needs and demands. Now, the function must elevate
its contribution even further and enable the enterprise to compete effectively in the next normal.

World-class procurement organizations are better prepared for the challenges ahead. Our 2020 procurement performance
benchmark analysis found that world-class procurement functions deliver 85% higher cost reduction savings, operate at a
20% lower cost, and run with 28% fewer full-time equivalents (FTEs). As a result, they achieve a 2.2 times higher return
on investment than their peers and are five times more likely to be viewed as a valued business partner.

The Hackett Group has developed projections of world-class performance levels that companies can unlock through
accelerated digital transformation. We refer to this evolution of world class as “digital world class.” Digital world-class
procurement organizations will create greater value for the organization – in part due to a projected 9% cost advantage over
today’s world-class procurement organizations and a full 27% advantage over the typical procurement organization.

In addition, digital world-class performance drives effectiveness across the enterprise, resulting in greater enterprise value
creation. This effectiveness is evident across multiple dimensions, including enablement of revenue growth strategies,
increased customer intimacy, greater return on investment (ROI), speed to decision-making, and increased agility.

To achieve these performance levels, procurement can no longer rely on incremental improvement initiatives. It must take
bold, accelerated action on two fronts: adopt digital capabilities, and transform the procurement operating model to one that
propels the business to the next level and sustains digital world-class performance and agility.

© 2020 The Hackett Group, Inc. All Rights Reserved. The Hackett Group I World-Class Advantage I 2
 World-class procurement organizations demonstrate superior performance on
multiple metrics across three dimensions:

EFFICIENCY
20% 18% 12% 12%
2.2 X 67% 28% 22%

greater lower cost fewer FTEs lower lower cost higher fewer sourcing more sourcing
procurement return per order labor cost outsourcing and supply and supply
on investment cost base management base strategy
FTEs FTEs

EFFECTIVENESS
85% 66% 57% 24%
greater cost reduction fewer suppliers greater cost avoidance more spend influenced or managed
by the procurement organization

EXPERIENCE 5X 46%

more likely to be perceived shorter cycle time for requisition through purchase order
as a valued business partner transmission for items that do not require bidding

© 2020 The Hackett Group, Inc. All Rights Reserved. The Hackett Group I World-Class Advantage I 3
 World-class procurement organizations
create value for the enterprise

Companies with world-class procurement organizations also demonstrate superior performance on several financial
metrics. For example, when we compared the financial performance of such companies with their industry median, they
delivered a three-year average performance premium in net margin; earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation, and
amortization (EBITDA) margin; return on equity; and total shareholder return (Fig. 1).

In the figure, the index of 100 represents median performance level for each metric across all industries. The higher
index number is the average performance premium achieved by companies with world-class procurement organizations
over their industry median. The calculated value in the teal bar represents the actual percentage performance premium
for each metric.

For example, an automotive industry company with world-class procurement performance would be expected to deliver
a performance premium of a 43% – that is, an annual total shareholder return of 6.0%, compared to the industry median
of 4.2%.

© 2020 The Hackett Group, Inc. All Rights Reserved. The Hackett Group I World-Class Advantage I 4
FIG FIG.
1 Potential financial
1   Enterprise performance
financial premium
outperformance of companies
of companies with world-class
with world-class procurement
procurement organizations*
functions

143

116 120
108 3.7%
2.5% 2.1%
0.4%
100

5.3% 15.3% 10.4% 8.8%

Net margin EBITDA margin Return on equity Total shareholder return

BASELINE - 3 YEAR INDUSTRY MEDIAN 2019 PERFORMANCE PREMIUM (PERCENTAGE) x METRIC VALUE (INDEX)

*All industries
Source: The Hackett Group, 2020

Keep in mind that this financial outperformance is not the result of world-class procurement advantages in isolation.
Companies with world-class procurement performance display much greater innovative, operational, and commercial
capabilities, in part, because of their better alignment to the business, more advanced capabilities, and higher-caliber
talent. Furthermore, world-class procurement performance is typically correlated with process and organizational maturity
in other functions and parts of the organization, all contributing to financial outperformance.

© 2020 The Hackett Group, Inc. All Rights Reserved. The Hackett Group I World-Class Advantage I 5
 World-class procurement outperforms peers where it matters
AUTOMATION GOVERNANCE/CENTRALIZATION OUTSOURCING

more likely that direct material more likely to have highly

18X suppliers use advanced 2X centralized strategic sourcing
shipment notifications
18%
structure greater process
greater automated outsourcing
lower loss due to
43% dissemination of purchase 37% maverick buying
orders to suppliers

BUSINESS PARTNERING/STRATEGIC ADVISOR TALENT ACCELERATION/SPECIALIZATION

more likely to have formal review and
performance management meetings
2X more training hours per associate

3X between procurement and business

2X more likely to use succession
owners/functional partners planning for critical skills
more likely to have retention
more likely to be perceived as
22% a proactive partner 2.5X plans for high-potential
employees

Talent realignment and enhancement

To create value for the enterprise, procurement will need to transform its capabilities, technology expertise, competencies
and skills. Skills required for success in the new operating model (see page 15) include analysis to drive insight, technology
enablement to achieve operating efficiencies, and process mining and design to architect new capabilities. Other skills
essential to business partnering, such as agility and change orientation, require shifts in mindset, behaviors, and ways of
working as companies continue to support remote work in the post-COVID era. Procurement will need to amplify learning and
development in order to upskill and reskill its workforce. World-class procurement organizations understand and are acting on
this through their elevated investments in training and succession planning.

© 2020 The Hackett Group, Inc. All Rights Reserved. The Hackett Group I World-Class Advantage I 6
 Digital acceleration is now imperative –
and it sets a new bar for performance

The new measure for optimal general and administrative (G&A) performance is enterprise value – driven by new digital
capabilities funded through improved functional efficiency. In a digital operating model, G&A functions are integral to value
streams that also span operations and commercial processes. Therefore, digital world-class effectiveness cannot be quantified
based on the performance of a single function. Instead, the effectiveness value of digital world-class business functions is
measured across dimensions such as:

• Higher revenue growth: For example, the three year average growth rate for traditional retail channels is 3%. Digital
channels – which require seamless digital integration of front-, middle-, and back-office processes and the extended supply
chain – have grown by 20% over the same period.
• Greater return on investment: Companies that are leaders in digital transformation have three times more projects that
achieve or exceed ROI targets – in part because of superior analytics, leading to a more accurate understanding of the
enterprise-level financial return and risk.
• Better customer experience: Digital world-class functions have a direct impact on external customer experience. Thus,
key indicators of commercial success will include loyalty, customer intimacy and ease of doing business.
• Lower enterprise operating cost: The procurement organization for a typical $10 billion company delivers $144 million in
cost savings.1 We estimate that a digital world-class procurement function could deliver $371 million in savings.
• Faster time to market: Digital world-class companies are able to accelerate innovation and product development because
they are twice as effective in creating actionable analytics and insight.
• Greater agility: The 2020 crisis drove home the relationship between digital operating capability and agility. Even before
that, our research found that agility leaders are 3.6 times more effective in responding to disruptive events.
1
The Hackett Group’s 2020 benchmark data

© 2020 The Hackett Group, Inc. All Rights Reserved. The Hackett Group I World-Class Advantage I 7
Procurement The procurement organization must fast-track new capabilities that elevate its
stature and create value for the enterprise – with fewer resources. The Hackett
organizations will Group has developed a model for the next-generation procurement operating
be highly digitized model and a corresponding resource allocation. To achieve the digital world-class
and enabled for self- performance levels projected in this paper, procurement organizations must
develop and accelerate digital capabilities to enable this new operating model in
service beyond the the future. Procurement organizations will be highly digitized and enabled for self-
level of today’s service beyond the level of today’s world-class levels. They will offer new services
world-class levels. through technology-savvy procurement specialist roles or enterprise capability
centers. This will enable procurement to deliver enhanced value to the business in
an improved, responsible and agile approach.

To evolve from world class to digital world class, procurement will need to
accelerate development and adoption of new digital business capabilities (Fig. 2 on
page 9) that drive better analysis, business partnering, and other needs. Freeing up
the resources to do so, however, will require adopting advanced technologies and
updating the landscape architecture to deliver significant operational efficiencies
and productivity gains. This will include leveraging proven and mature procurement
technology; employing emerging smart automation technologies such as cognitive
tools, AI and robotic process automation; and implementing predictive analytics.

© 2020 The Hackett Group, Inc. All Rights Reserved. The Hackett Group I World-Class Advantage I 8
 FIG. 2 Digital transformation capabilities and enabling technologies
Capability Definition Enabling digital technologies
Digital engagement The ability to design and optimize stakeholder
experiences through digitization and
integration of interactions across channels
and leveraging data.
Digitally enabled workforce and organization Maximizing productivity, intellectual property
Digital business capabilities
creation, and value contribution of individual
workers and the (virtual) teams they operate in
through the use of digital tools and platforms.
Digital service optimization Maximizing efficiency and effectiveness of the
delivery of business services and execution
of underlying processes through the use of
digital tools and platforms.
Digital ecosystem The ability to create value through interactions
in a highly scalable, digitally interconnected
network of businesses, customers, service
providers, individuals and devices.
Analytics-driven business insight The support of business decisions with
advanced analytical capability, based on
real-time, high-quality data, which is managed
throughout the life cycle as a strategic asset. 
The digital architecture and capabilities of the
Digital information
internal information technology organization
technology capabilities that is needed to support and sustain digital
transformation of the enterprise, including
cybersecurity management, agile service
delivery advanced data stewardship, and
provisioning and technology innovation.
© 2020 The Hackett Group, Inc. All Rights Reserved.
• Chatbots/intelligent agents
• Intelligent devices
• Data visualization
• Customer relationship management systems
• Knowledge management systems
• Virtual collaboration tools
• Cloud-based applications and data
• Self-service analytics
• Cloud-based modern application platforms
• Robotic process automation
• Business process management/workflow/orchestration
• Smart automation technologies
• Digital platforms • Virtual collaboration tools
• Blockchain • Internet of things
• Vendor portals
• Smart data capture • Advanced analytics
• Machine learning •D  ata visualization
• Master data management tools
• Smart automation technologies
• Business process management/workflow
• Robotic process automation
• Chatbots/intelligent agents
• Cloud-based infrastructure, platform, security and data
services
• Intelligent cybersecurity technology
The Hackett Group I World-Class Advantage I 9
Over a three-year period, world-class procurement organizations can transition to an operating model with 16% fewer
full-time equivalents (FTEs) and run at an 9% lower cost than today’s world-class procurement organizations (Fig. 3), while
at the same time adding resources to develop new capabilities. This is enabled by productivity improvement of 23%.
FIG. 2   Projected digital world-class cost and resource (FTE) advantage
FIG. 3 Projected digital world-class resource (FTE) and cost advantage

FTEs Cost

-27%
-40% -20%
-28%

-9%

-16%

Peer World-class Projected digital Peer World-class Projected digital

procurement world-class procurement procurement world-class procurement

© 2020 The Hackett Group, Inc. All Rights Reserved. The Hackett Group I World-Class Advantage I 10
 FIG. 3   World-class and projected digital world-class transformation cost
Procurement must invest FIG. 4 Transformation cost index by cost component
index by cost component 
in technology.
Projected digital world-class transformation cost index
Our analysis found that digital
world-class transformation requires 100
91
substantial net new investment
100 71
in technology. A projection of the
100
breakdown of procurement costs 130
into four components – labor, 100

outsourcing, technology and 115

other (facilities, etc.) – indicates
that procurement must increase
technology spend by 30% in order
100
to realize the productivity gain of 85
digital world class (Fig. 4). Note
that while we project that the
future state – digital world class –
will have only a 15% lower labor
cost, this represents just the labor World class Projected digital world class
that is actually taken out of the
operating budget. LABOR OUTSOURCING TECHNOLOGY OTHER

© 2020 The Hackett Group, Inc. All Rights Reserved. The Hackett Group I World-Class Advantage I 11
The projected digital world-class cost advantage of 9% (Fig. 5) is based on 18% improvement in efficiency through
automation, but also substantial reinvestment of that gain in new capabilities that result in a broader and higher-value
services portfolio that supports the digital enterprise (adding 7% to the total cost) and in technology (adding 4% to the
total cost). The result of this labor-for-technology shift is an increase in the technology cost component of the operating
budget from 12% to 17% for digital world-class procurement organizations.
FIG. 4   Projected digital world-class transformation cost change drivers
FIG. 5 Projected digital world-class transformation cost change drivers

-18 4
7 -2

100
91

World class Automation New Technology Other cost Projected digital

efficiency capabilities cost world class
improvement

LOTO* COST INDEX DIGITAL TRANSFORMATION COST REDUCTION DIGITAL TRANSFORMATION INVESTMENT

*Labor, outsourcing, technology, other

*Labor, outsourcing, technology, other

© 2020 The Hackett Group, Inc. All Rights Reserved. The Hackett Group I World-Class Advantage I 12
 Enabling intelligent and agile decision making
Even before the COVID-19 crisis, analytics was top of mind for procurement executives. The coronavirus outbreak and
its business and economic repercussions have lent new urgency to the need to improve forecasting and analysis, as
organizations face the prospects of continued and extreme economic uncertainty. Our 2020 Key Issues Study highlighted
improvement of analytics and reporting as a critical area of development and focus for procurement.

Delivering informed options for sourcing, managing risk and spotting

INSIGHT AND ANALYTICS
areas of opportunity requires a solid foundation of clean, well-managed
greater use of comprehensive
data, along with the tools to properly leverage all types of data. Further, 2X analytical reporting tools to
perform spend analysis
in order to translate data into meaningful insights, procurement needs
greater ability to view spend data
staff with the ability to conduct sophisticated analysis using data from 51% by supplier on a global basis
internal and external sources. Our benchmarking reveals that world-
class procurement organizations have a significant head start.

Analytics capabilities Examples of procurement advanced analytics that provide intelligence to facilitate decisions
Spend analysis Look well beyond channel allocation to identify those most successful for optimizing tail spend.
Risk assessment Use predictive analytics to assess supplier vitality, compliance and likelihood of fulfilling future orders,
thereby improving supplier risk mitigation.
Market intelligence Use cognitive algorithms and analytics to predict geopolitical, weather-related or other supply chain
disruptions, thereby improving contingency planning and mitigating disruptions.
Sourcing savings Combine market category intelligence with predictive analytics to improve planning for market price
fluctuations, thus allowing the organization to take advantage of price lows.
Contract and policy compliance Search for potential threats in contracts using natural language processing and analyze practices used in
the company for selecting clauses.

© 2020 The Hackett Group, Inc. All Rights Reserved. The Hackett Group I World-Class Advantage I 13
 Reimagining procurement capabilities in the next-generation
operating model

Achieving digital world class is not just about shifting cost from labor to technology. Procurement must also enhance
service design, service partnering, talent, skills and competencies, as well as its overall interaction model. This will require a
fundamental overhaul to the procurement organization.

Procurement teams will have to change their ways of working and interacting, if they want to take full advantage of advanced
technologies. This will be particularly true for the remaining activities that are not fully automated. For example, the role of a
category manager will be fundamentally different. Technologies will enhance daily activities by expanding internal and external
insights, bringing a much broader range of new and untapped opportunities to be explored together with internal stakeholders.

Limitations in the traditional procurement operating model will continue to inhibit the function’s ability to enable the
changes needed to support the business in the next normal. Instead, procurement must shatter outdated operating
models and usher in innovative ways to deliver agile business services.

Procurement needs to accelerate transformational change to a new operating model that is capability-focused, digital-
driven, modular, agile, and enterprise-leveraged – one that supports and enables future business strategies. The Hackett
Group has defined a next-generation operating model (Fig. 6 on page 15) for procurement that:

• Is more fluid, with leaner teams and more agile ways of work
• Incorporates digitized stakeholder experiences and day-to-day operations
• Replaces human tasks with highly analytical, intelligent process automation
• Focuses on transformative business enablement
• Is highly connected, networked and specialized
• Integrates operational improvement and capability-building

© 2020 The Hackett Group, Inc. All Rights Reserved. The Hackett Group I World-Class Advantage I 14
FIG. 6 Next-generation procurement operating model
Next-Generation Operating Model

Procurement Aligned

• Procurement strategy • Procurement brand development

• Procurement talent management • Organizational design and development
• Procurement policy and controls

CPO
• Procurement leadership aligned to key • Spend category management
stakeholders and business delivery points • Sourcing and supply base management and
• Strategic procurement lead for enabling development
business value Business Specialized • Supply risk management
Enablement Functional
• Brand, expertise, insight, and relationship • Intelligence, insights and analytics
Leaders Teams
capabilities
• Operations and compliance
• Coordination of business support across 1 2
operating model nodes
Operating
• Enterprise analytics hubs
Model • Customer-centric digital services
• Enterprise risk management and compliance 5 3 • Enterprise architecture optimization
• Mergers and acquisitions excellence Enterprise • Analytics tools and master data management hub
Digital
• Enterprise talent acceleration
Capability
Centers 4 Operations • Smart automation services
• Enterprise learning and development academy • Transactional work execution
• Business development excellence • Business process outsourcing management

Transformative
Execution

• Enterprise transformation office • Value realization tracking

• Directed agile teams • Continuous improvement
• Portfolio management

Enterprise Aligned

© 2020 The Hackett Group, Inc. All Rights Reserved. The Hackett Group I World-Class Advantage I 15
This new operating Transforming the operating model will require procurement to look at its resource
allocation in a different way – moving from a functionally aligned (business unit,
model represents corporate) model with global business services (GBS) organizations and center of
a major shift from excellence (CoE) based service delivery to an approach that allocates resources
functional to across five service delivery nodes in the operating model that span enterprise
and functional-led services. Those service nodes include business enablement
enterprise alignment leaders, specialized procurement teams, enterprise capability centers,
of resources. transformative execution and digital operations. This new operating model
represents a major shift from functional to enterprise alignment of resources.

In this model, the role of the chief procurement officer (CPO) shifts from leading
a silo of protected resources to coordinating various teams that contribute to
business objectives. There is greater distribution of resources among roles
owned by procurement, roles managed by procurement, and shared roles
managed by the overall enterprise. This blurs functional boundaries and flattens
the hierarchy – in turn improving interactions among teams.

This shift toward enterprise alignment of procurement resources goes hand in

hand, with a move away from process-based resource alignment. For example,
within the five service delivery nodes, transformative execution and some digital
operations resources are not only procurement processes. Furthermore, because
operations and compliance activities are more conducive to automation, digital
world-class procurement organizations will have a lower percentage of resources
allocated to this. The projection of procurement process realignment resulting
from these two transitions is shown in Fig. 7 on page 17.

© 2020 The Hackett Group, Inc. All Rights Reserved. The Hackett Group I World-Class Advantage I 16
 FIG. 6   World-class and projected digital world-class resources (FTEs)
FIG. 7 Allocation of procurement resources (FTE) by process
process alignment profile 

5%
11%
11%
29%
11%
35%
Projected digital
World class
world class

49%

49%

OPERATIONS AND COMPLIANCE

SOURCING AND SUPPLIER MANAGEMENT
PLANNING AND STRATEGY
NONPROCESS ALIGNED

© 2020 The Hackett Group, Inc. All Rights Reserved. The Hackett Group I World-Class Advantage I 17
 Realigning capabilities, costs and resources
in the next-generation operating model

In order to achieve digital world-class performance, procurement must accelerate digital technologies, enhance analytical
know-how to improve decision-making, and transition to the next-generation operating model. To provide guidance for the
design of an operating model that sustains digital world-class performance levels, we modeled the reallocation of costs
(Fig. 8) from a traditional (GBS, CoE, business unit and corporate) alignment to one organized around the five future state
service delivery nodes depicted on page 15.
FIG. 7   Procurement cost allocation by service delivery node
FIG. 8 Procurement cost allocation by service delivery node

5% 5%
9% 11%

27%

43% Projected digital

World class
world class
36%
43%
21%

GLOBAL BUSINESS SERVICES DIGITAL OPERATIONS

CENTERS OF EXCELLENCE ENTERPRISE CAPABILITY CENTERS
CORPORATE SPECIALIZED FUNCTIONAL TEAMS
BUSINESS UNITS BUSINESS ENABLEMENT LEADERS
TRANSFORMATIVE EXECUTION

© 2020 The Hackett Group, Inc. All Rights Reserved. The Hackett Group I World-Class Advantage I 18
The transition to Our analysis indicates that today’s world-class procurement organizations have
just 14% of resources (GBS and CoE) that are enterprise aligned. For digital world-
digital world class will class, we project this percentage will rise to 53% of resources (digital operations,
be characterized by enterprise capability center and transformative execution). The shift can be
a dramatic shift from largely explained by the transition of procurement work out of business unit and
corporate roles into digital operations and enterprise capability centers.
functionally aligned
to enterprise-aligned In an optimal future state operating model, all procurement resources in
resources. the business units are business enablement leaders, with no operational or
procurement specialist work remaining in those entities, in alignment with the
supply market characteristics. Procurement services traditionally delivered from
the corporate center will be part of specialized procurement teams or move
into enterprise capability centers, with some supporting elements of the work
executed in digital operations centers.

This transition represents a major cultural change and a radical departure from
traditional procurement organization design and governance. It involves breaking
down functional and process siloes within the function. While most of the talent
in changing roles will be reskilled and reallocated, procurement will also need to
infuse new talent, either from outside or from other parts of the organization.

© 2020 The Hackett Group, Inc. All Rights Reserved. The Hackett Group I World-Class Advantage I 19
 An action plan for accelerating digital transformation
and advancing toward digital world class

The road ahead for procurement organizations is no longer about closing the gap to traditional world class. Instead, the goal
post has moved to digital world class. Current world-class procurement organizations that cannot transform to achieve this new
level of performance risk being leapfrogged. Rather than continuing to make changes on the fringe and seeking incremental
performance improvement, the focus should be on accelerating digital transformation and building the next-generation
procurement operating model that is designed specifically to perform at a digital world-class level. Here’s how:

Design future capabilities to advance Create the road map to achieve your
Start with value:
your digital agenda: digital world-class aspirations:

• Create a baseline to determine your efficiency,
effectiveness and experience key performance
indicators
• Assess the capabilities and maturity of your
current procurement operating model, resource
allocation, and technology effectiveness based
on leading and emerging best practices.
• Identify and prioritize performance gaps that
outline critical focus areas for accelerating
digital progress and future business needs.
• Develop future state key performance
indicators required to meet business and HR
strategic objectives.
• Define the capabilities needed within the
procurement organization to support the
business strategy.
• Create “best-fit” target procurement operating
model scenarios to accelerate digital strategies.
• Define the digital tools needed to enable
capabilities.
• Move beyond the data you have and define the
data you need to build your insight engine.
• Determine the talent and culture needed as a
source of digital advantage.
• Collaborate with other functions to design
enterprise-owned capabilities.
• Prioritize the desired capability bundles based
on performance gaps.
• Develop transformative initiatives required for
agile design and deployment of the next-
generation operating model, sequencing
technology-led execution.
• Define “conceptual design” of the
transformative execution and digital operations
nodes of the operating model to iteratively
design and execute priorities.
• Map high-level technology-enablement
adoption with the information technology
function.
• Develop the agile transformative road map,
outlining needed investments, benefits, teams/
resources and ways of working.

© 2020 The Hackett Group, Inc. All Rights Reserved. The Hackett Group I World-Class Advantage I 20
 About the Authors
CHRISTOPHER SAWCHUK
Principal and Global Procurement Advisory Practice Leader
Christopher Sawchuk leads The Hackett Group’s
Global Procurement Advisory practice. He
has over 20 years of experience in supply
management, working directly with Global
2000 and midsized companies around the world
and in a variety of industries to improve all aspects of supply
management, including process redesign, digital enablement,
operations strategy planning, organizational change and strategic
sourcing. Christopher specializes in working directly with chief
procurement officers to help define a long-term strategy. He
is a regular contributor to business publications, a frequent
presenter at industry events, and author of numerous reports
and books. His background includes engineering, operations and
sales roles with United Technologies and IBM.
© 2020 The Hackett Group, Inc. All Rights Reserved.
MÉLANI FLORES
Associate Principal, EMEA Procurement and Purchase-to-Pay
Advisory, The Hackett Group
Mélani Flores leads The Hackett Group
Procurement and P2P Advisory Practice in
EMEA. She is a diversified professional with
over 25 years of experience in management
consulting and benchmarking. Prior to joining
The Hackett Group, Mélani spent 13 years helping Fortune
500 companies in Europe and the United States with their
procurement transformation efforts, leading operating model
design engagements, process optimization, strategic sourcing
and operational strategies implementation. Today she advises
senior executives in procurement on proven and emerging
organisational and process best practices, from source to
settle. Mélani also supports our benchmarking operations and
contributes to the firm’s leading research in procurement.
The Hackett Group I World-Class Advantage I 21
 About the Authors
LAURA GIBBONS
Senior Research Director
Laura Gibbons has industry and consulting
experience in areas such as purchase-to-
pay, strategic sourcing, payment strategies,
manufacturing operations, economic impact
analysis, and organizational and process
design. She previously worked in The Hackett Group’s Strategy
and Operations consulting practice, where she specialized
in sourcing, procurement and supply chain. Before joining
The Hackett Group, Laura served as strategy and operations
associate at Groupon.
© 2020 The Hackett Group, Inc. All Rights Reserved.
ERIK DORR
Vice President, Research
Erik Dorr has over 20 years of experience in
consulting, research, and advisory roles in
information technology strategy, enterprise
application suites, and business process
reengineering. Before being named to his
current position, Erik was senior enterprise research director.
Prior to joining The Hackett Group, he held a number of senior
management positions, including vice president of information
technology at a global manufacturing company, where he was
also a member of the executive leadership team.
The Hackett Group I World-Class Advantage I 22
 Are you ready to start building your
world-class procurement function?
The Hackett Group Backed by our unparalleled benchmarking data and best practices
1000 Abernathy Road NE repository, as well as experience across the full transformation life
Suite 1400 cycle, The Hackett Group is ready to support:
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