Sustainability, digitalization and cost management – these are the topics that move all companies, whether SMEs or corporations, in today’s times.  The shoe pinches at all corners and ends and the legal requirements and changing customer requirements as well as the increasing cost pressure can no longer be ignored and force companies to act. Is your company positioned for the future in these fields – sustainability, digitalization and cost management?

Implementing legal and customer requirements for sustainability in a targeted manner

What are we talking about when we talk about sustainability? Everyone has heard about it, but few people really understand what is involved and how extensive and, in other places, how simple it can be.

First of all, it is important to communicate the basics to employees, such as the importance of the Supply Chain Act, ESG and CSR? However, procurement alone cannot make a company sustainable, so it is essential to show which interfaces in the company are necessary for a successful identification of options for action, in order to create the structures and processes that provide the required transparency in the company.

Change management is important, you don’t want to lose your employees on the way to more sustainability but motivate them to stand up for the common cause and get involved. Set goals and communicate them!

A measurable follow-up of the implementation will bring you to the goal.

Increase process efficiency with digitization

Digitization, digitization, digitization… many can’t hear it anymore and are rather annoyed when it comes to the fact that processes in their own company should be digitized. But why?

Often, digitization projects are approached incorrectly and not planned properly. The two most important questions „Where does digitization really make sense? Where can our processes be streamlined?“ are either not asked at all or are asked far too late.

Processes that are only semi-optimal are digitized and in the end everyone wonders why errors occur and everything is suddenly so complicated. Shit in – Shit out: No software can solve this problem. Therefore, optimize processes in advance, determine at which points exactly a digitization solution makes sense and then identify the appropriate software solution.

And what else have you forgotten? Your employees! Without involving your employees from the first step of process optimization, the new „super great digital solution“ will receive very little encouragement and acceptance.

Efficient and transparent cost management secures the future

The layman wonders where the problem lies in reducing costs. Simply match requirements with expenditures and push down prices, digitize a few processes, and you’re done. Many a procurement and supply chain manager would jump for joy if it were that simple. As soon as the next new cost-cutting program is pushed through from the upper echelons, hands are thrown up in the air and employees are driven to the brink of despair.

The quick savings from short-term product group optimizations, e.g. from a new tender, have already been reaped. The task now is to reduce costs in the long term and, above all, to manage them. This requires a corresponding transparency in the data to be analyzed. Already at this point, the project is often doomed to failure.

Let’s assume that the necessary data and the corresponding data quality is available. For a detailed analysis, the employees need time, and time is scarce in the day-to-day business, where everyone is constantly struggling to extinguish acute fires.

Once the hurdle of time has been overcome, the question of the right analysis method arises. Which methods are known to the employees? Have you only heard about them or are you familiar with the details? Which analysis fits to which topic and which potential can be lifted by one employee alone and where is the assistance of other employees from the organization needed who are busy putting out fires?

ADCONIA’s added value for your organization

Do you see a need for action in your organization? Do not hesitate to contact us, we will be happy to advise you!

 

Sinja Krauskopf

Consultant. ADCONIA GmbH