A little over a week ago, Procurement Leaders hosted a community conversation with Amanda Davies, chief R&D, procurement and sustainability officer at Mars Snacking (pictured above), during which we explored the growing scope of the CPO role.
Given the nature of procurement and its interfaces with suppliers, internal stakeholders and, increasingly, customers, there are some natural adjacencies that CPOs can bring value to.
One of the most obvious is sustainability. Given many organisations’ Scope 3 footprint lies predominantly in the supply base, it’s a natural and necessary part of the procurement leadership role to drive progress with suppliers.
But Amanda’s responsibility for R&D is, for me, the more fascinating part because it’s rarer and provides the final piece of the jigsaw for a company such as Mars in its drive for long-term, sustainable success. In her words: “Building generational resilience matters just as much as managing today’s volatility; short‑term fixes that erode long‑term resilience simply shift the problem down the road.”
Amanda adds that “real value” is created at functional interfaces and that her role isn’t to be an expert across each of the three pillars she’s responsible for, but to create clarity and alignment where priorities meet. In other words, bringing all necessary stakeholders together – internal and external – to create the innovation required to build longer-term sustainable success.
And few would argue with how exciting a prospect that is.
Most readers will be familiar with the concept of the Triple Bottom Line, a business management framework coined by John Elkington in the 1990s, which played a huge role in furthering the debate on how the private sector must develop more sustainable business models.
Elkington subsequently went on to recall his theory, arguing it has become little more than an accounting tool. But in setting up the advisory firm Volans, the focus of which is to work with forward-thinking business leaders “at the intersection of innovation and sustainability” he continues to be an influential voice.
In a recent study among more than 800 sustainability experts published by Volans, the highest-impact, most feasible lever available to corporates to deliver significant positive sustainability outcomes over the coming five years is technology innovation/R&D for sustainability solutions.
CPOs have a responsibility to ensure suppliers are also playing their part.
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