Procurement Lab
Excellence in Procurement Management
Why Procurement LAB
- Procurement Lab is a research center for developing skills, streamlining operational models and mapping out future scenarios in purchase and supply relationship management.
- It is a place where academia, practitioners and innovators can meet and find ideas, tools and solutions for their own professional growth, that of their function and their company as well as for shared knowledge. A place to consolidate and share the Italian way of managing procurement relationships, with an eye to international models.
- It is a place of open, transparent and constructive debate.
- It is the place where SDA Bocconi School of Management governs, guides and develops projects and research aimed at supporting the growth of purchase directors and buyers as well as of procurement operational and decision-making models.
- Keywords: lab, university, research, professional development, networking, innovation, scientific knowledge, development, innovation
Our Value Model
Generating Know How
Every year, SDA Bocconi’s Procurement LAB promotes structured applied research on frontier areas of procurement and supply chain management. Our approach combines methodological rigor and managerial relevance to address the practical needs of companies.
Sharing
Continuous dialogue with companies is key both to developing and disseminating know-how. Participation in the Procurement LAB allows for the sharing of issues and best practices. SDA Bocconi designs and conducts events, panel meetings, workshops, and webinars to make both sharing activities and the time preceding and following events efficient and effective.
Dissemination and Reputation
Knowledge spreading and targeted sharing of research results create and disseminate a culture of excellence and professionalism across purchase structures and processes, with a positive impact on their reputation. Every Procurement LAB initiative and activity adds to building the reputation of a company and its professionals, while at the same time making them an attractive career choice for talents.
Who Is It For
Excellent results are achieved when starting from concrete needs. This is why SDA Bocconi invests a great deal of energy and resources in customized research: to develop useful projects and provide clients with hands-on solutions. The Procurement LAB is a stable resource that can produce ongoing knowledge on innovative topics of strategic importance for businesses and institutions at a national and international level.
It is governed by CPOs for CPOs, and designed to receive and provide knowledge, models and professional development. The planning horizon of the LAB is 3 years, with an annual plan shared with the sponsors.
Membership of the Procurement LAB is by invitation, so as to select the best experiences and professionalism in Italy, and minimize possible elements of conflict between participants. In addition to SDA Bocconi faculty members and researchers, the LAB is composed of:
Members:
- CPOs of companies with an annual revenue exceeding 1 billion euros
- Membership by invitation
- Annual membership fee: 6,000 euros
- Membership for 3 years (2+1)
Main Sponsors:
- Accenture and SAP participate in the LAB by contributing their skills and funding the overall investment
- New Main Sponsors will be evaluated from year to year.
- Membership as Main Sponsor for 3 years (2+1)
Activities
Procurement LAB partners with the sponsors to define different research topics and investigation methods. Starting from an annual work plan determined and shared with all participants, the LAB sets up a range of projects with various profiles and time spans.
Research
Research projects developed by SDA Bocconi with topics and goals determined by the Procurement LAB.
Development and Training
Training activities carried out by SDA Bocconi on topics of interest for the Procurement LAB’s sponsors and their partners.
Sharing
Sharing activities regarding practices and approaches, based on schemes structured by SDA Bocconi with the support of Procurement LAB’s sponsors.
Research Topics
The topics for research at the Procurement LAB are presented and shared annually together with the sponsors. Some examples of requests that have produced research are:
- Covid-19 impact on procurement and supply chains
- Contracts at the time of Covid-19
- Cost Breakdown structure. Assessing and managing suppliers’ cost structure
- OBA. Open Book Accounting and procurement relationships
- Dependency Ratio. When «dependent» suppliers become a source of risk for your company
- Sustainable Procurement. Governing your supply chain towards accountability
- Procurement KPIs. Building your balanced scorecards and reaching your goals
- Buyer 4.0. Skills and tasks of the modern buyer
- Artificial Intelligence in Procurement. Use cases and experiences compared
- RPA. Where, with what purpose, how to manage your RPA project
- Vertical software and Cloud for procurement. The role of vendors in product and process innovation
- Digital Procurement. How to start a digital transformation project, who guides it and with which partners
- Procurement and Start-Ups. Creating an «open» environment to integrate new cultures and new actors
- Global Supply Chain. International trade, government policies and purchase choices
- Procurement and Finance. Their roles, their tasks, their goals, where they converge or diverge
- Pricing. Building purchase agreements using «price» as a variable to guide the relationship.
- Global Commodity Buyers’ role and skills
- Commodities – Purchase choice, contracts and risk management
- Procurement organization. A matrix and the choice to centralize
- Managing indirect materials. Operational practices and models for calculating the TCO
- Innovating competition. Managing supplier selection with a «fixed budget» or specific «variable technique».
Output
Discover the Procurement Lab's analyses and insights on the topics of digitization and artificial intelligence in procurement processes.
Through research projects such as Digital Procurement and Procurement & Artificial Intelligence, the Lab provides useful data and tools to understand the evolution of procurement in Italian companies.
