Agenda - KonnectHouse

TECH SOURCING 2024 AGENDA

Women in Procurement Network

Pre-event welcome drinks

Join us for an informal welcome reception at The Westin, Copley Place Hotel

Main Event Days

TECH SOURCING DAY 1

Tuesday May 14

Day 2 Agenda

TECH LEADERS Morning Briefing

Closed-door, invitation-only briefing for technology sourcing leaders

Main Event Registration & coffee

Pick up your badge and join your peers for a coffee and a chat prior to kick-off!

Welcome to FORGE: Technology Sourcing

Welcome to FORGE: Technology Sourcing 2024 – let’s get started!

Choice of morning peer groups

Choose one of the interactive working groups to kick start your collaboration and learning. Be sure to fuel up on caffeine and come brimming with ideas!

peer groups

PEER GROUP A

This session dives into how Procurement and Finance can join forces to elevate purchasing strategies, making sure deals do more than just meet goals—they exceed them. We will discuss key ways to blend financial know-how into procurement choices, ensuring deals align with our organization’s financial health and ambitions. We will explore tactics to boost your negotiation skills, see how teamwork between Procurement and Finance can lead to better terms, make smart use of data, and handle risks well. This is your chance to explore how to bring Procurement and Finance together for top-notch negotiation results. It’s a must-attend for procurement pros looking to up their game with financial insight.

PEER GROUP B

Artificial intelligence contracts raise new concerns, as well as familiar ones. They’re software agreements and so call for terms many software contract managers and lawyers know well. But certain AI systems raise unique issues, particularly generative AI and other forms of machine learning (ML). This session will look at those issues and explain the new terms they require.

PEER GROUP C

In today’s technology landscape, securing the best value, not just the lowest price, is crucial for enterprise software like Oracle. This session, hosted by Palisade Compliance, brings together IT and Procurement leaders to share their insights and strategies for achieving this critical goal.

Through real-world case studies, you’ll gain valuable insights into:

Collaborative strategies: Discover how IT and Procurement can effectively partner to optimize negotiations across contracts, pricing, and audits.
Expert guidance on Oracle licensing: Navigate the evolving licensing landscape and its impact on your organization.
Proven approaches to maximizing value: Learn from the experiences of IT and Procurement executives who have successfully secured optimal terms with Oracle.

Join us and gain the knowledge and tools to unlock the full potential of your Oracle investment, ensuring it aligns with your business objectives and delivers lasting value.

Palisade Compliance

Changeover

Head to your next peer group discussion

peer groups

PEER GROUP D

In this interactive session we will discuss:

How can procurement become more of a partner to the business?
Move to become more proactive, and an enabler of change
Understand the roles of technology as drivers for competitive advantage
Go beyond a cost reduction mindset, to an investment orientation
Keep your options open, and recognize how to remain an agile, flexible business through technology choice and contract construction
Understand risk vectors, and how to mitigate them vis-à-vis technology and vendor selection

PEER GROUP E

IT spend management is a rapidly evolving discipline and no two procurement organizations approach it the same. As we navigate a new IT innovation cycle, the need for new best practices and taxonomies has emerged. Jamie Martino, Tech Sourcing Chapter Leader and SVP at IT Diversity Advisors, will guide a compelling panel discussion with preeminent spend analytic experts from Spend Matters $ NPI to explore these questions:

Current Trends: What are the dominant trends shaping IT spending today?
Growth Areas: Which sectors are seeing significant investment and expansion?
Innovative Practices: What are the latest best practices for managing suppliers and expenditures?
Team Dynamics: How should organizations structure their teams to optimize IT spend management?

PEER GROUP F

In this session we will discuss

The ideal relationship between procurement and legal in a procurement process
The objectives of the procurement team vs the objectives of the legal team in supporting a company
When to reach out to your legal team for support
How to support the legal team for a successful negotiation
Improving policy and governance of procurement processes

morning coffee

Grab a well-earned coffee and meet our awesome sponsors and partners in the Exhibition Hall

performance & Chair's introduction

Join us for an exciting stage performance guaranteed to perk you up and get your cognitive juices flowing! Followed by a welcome from the Chair and overview of what’s coming up over the next 1.5 days Chair: Pierre Mitchell, CRO and MD, Spend Matters

KEYNOTE

The biggest trends, risks, and opportunities for procurement in the years ahead

Join top-ranked economist and financial futurist Jason Schenker for this timely discussion of critical risks and opportunities facing procurement organizations, functions, and executives. Topics for this talk will include the economic outlook, financial market risks, energy prices and inflation, Fed policy and interest rates, labor market trends, AI workforce opportunities, sustainability challenges, Cold War Two, major growth opportunities, and more.

Jason has been ranked the #1 forecaster in the world in 26 different categories by Bloomberg since 2011.

Plenary

Elevating your IT procurement strategy: mastering the toolkit of tomorrow

The IT procurement toolbox is changing. With IT investments becoming increasingly frequent, substantial, and complex, it’s imperative for procurement professionals to evolve their strategies to stay ahead. The traditional toolkit is no longer sufficient to navigate the challenges of modern IT procurement and achieve optimal results against the sophisticated sales forces of leading enterprise IT vendors. Join this discussion to learn what must-have skills and tools will help IT procurement negotiate world-class deal outcomes in the next 1 to 3 years.

IT PROS TRACK

For IT professionals

What can IT learn from procurement? Procurement specializes in negotiation, contract management and if you don’t have a procurement person/department, knowing some of the tips and tricks procurement use can only better enable your organization. Jump into this session with Rob and hear the 5 key elements to contracting which procurement use.

LUNCH BREAK

Lunch break & Expo

Join all the attendees in the Expo area for lunch & networking. Hit the supplier booths to find out how they can support your goals and objectives.

VIP LUNCH

AI

Creating AI for Procurement: Business use cases and how to navigate the future

What exactly does a procurement person need to know?
How will it drive up my overall capability and efficiency?
Full exposure of risks in AI
How is it going to affect my job?
How to use AI and digital to augment the procurement team and not lose critical skills

Adam Towers, Senior AI Engineer, Productiv

Leah Hunter, Sr Procurement Manager, Zoominfo

changeover

Head to your peer group of choice!

PEER WORKING GROUPS

Sessions run concurrently. Choose one of the following topics and join these sessions which maximize opportunities to interact and learn from your peers.

A. Modern Travel Technology:

Travel is more than just making a booking. It’s one of the few, if not the only category that touches stakeholders all across your organization. From traveler experience, to cost savings, to duty of care, everyone has a stake in the success of the travel program you’re responsible for. Join Jake and Shana to discuss how to successfully leverage modern travel technology to create value for your organization’s executive stakeholders.

B. Software:

Licensing renewals, audits & compliance. Supplier feedback and sentiment

C. Cloud Services:

Lowering Cloud costs, hybrid environments, and multi-provider scenarios. Negotiating industry standard renewals etc

D. Using AI and GenAI for Autonomous Sourcing

This peer group will include education on GenAI for all skill levels and how it applies to various use cases in procurement—starting with Autonomous Sourcing and how to position a business case to get approval from finance, IT, and Legal. No marketing fluff or sales pitch, the more interactive, the better!

E. Marketing & Tech

TAKE A BREAK

Grab a coffee and hit the Expo

STORYTELLING

Plenary Session

Persuasive storytelling

This unique insight from Mark Raffan on improving your ability to ‘speak’ to the business and get deeper embedded in the narrative is unparalleled and not to be missed!

Wolf Pack Wisdom

Private seminar

The Lone Wolf Tech Survival Guide – how small teams can make a big impact

What do you pack in your survival kit when you land in a new organization with limited resources?

airbase white background

INFLUENCE & COLLABORATION

Plenary Session

Expanding influence & collaboration with key stakeholders

Join this fire-side discussion and unveil usable strategies which can drive greater collaboration and relationships with key stakeholders including Legal, Finance, IT. Hear how procurement can transform its approach to working with the business to drive greater results.

GUEST SPEAKER

Plenary Session – Conflict Management with Shami Anand

Mastering the Art of Conflict Management

Conflict is a natural part of any workplace. As customer solutions become increasingly more complex, collaboration amongst teams and key stakeholder groups is paramount. Participants will learn how to design strategies that minimize dysfunctional conflict, maximize constructive conflict…and work effectively for both men and women.

Don’t miss this closing address by Shami – a seasoned Executive with over 30-years experience developing, transforming, and leading high performing global teams in Procurement, Supply Chain, and Accounting.

wrap-up of day one

Chair’s summation of key learnings and take-aways from the day.

DRINKS in the expo

Join your peers for informal drinks and digest the best content of the day.

TECH SOURCING DAY 2

Tuesday May 14

Day 1 Agenda

welcome coffee

Join your peers for a coffee and a chat prior to Day 2 kick-off!

Welcome to day 2

Welcome to FORGE: Technology Sourcing Day 2!

Recap of Day 1 and what’s coming on Day 2.

PROCUREMENT AS ENABLER

Plenary Session

Making procurement the superhero in the enterprise

In this 30 -minute session, you will hear from an IT executive as to how Procurement professionals can work with IT to create business value.

To be an enabler of change, procurement needs to become more proactive, strategic and insightful. They also must accomplish the following:

Understand the roles of technology as drivers for competitive advantage
Evolve from a cost reduction mindset to an investment orientation
Keep options open, and recognize how to remain an agile, flexible business through technology choice and contract construction
Understand risk vectors, and how to mitigate them vis-à-vis technology and vendor selection

PROFITABILITY

Plenary Panel

4 ways to increase profitability while reducing expenses and maintain leverage with your suppliers

How are you maximising profitability within your organization / how is procurement affecting profitability across the organization?
Are you talking to your CIO? How you can influence strategy, bring new strategic ideas to the team
Controlling costs, consumption, intelligence – impact on gross margins
Combatting the rate hikes of suppliers
Supplier relationship management – opening new opportunities

DATA INSIGHTS

Plenary

Procurement’s new playing field: how unlocking data and insights leads to better decision making and bigger wins

Whether you’re a team of 1 starting from scratch or a team of 10 looking to increase efficiencies, access to stronger data and insights needs to be top of mind. Because with the right intelligence, you can easily identify the most valuable opportunities to drive savings, have confidence that you know you’re getting a good deal, and deliver competitive insights and supplier trends that make you a more strategic partner to your organization. Access to unbiased benchmarks and insights elevate your procurement performance, for a finally level buyer-supplier playing field.

Join this session to hear from experienced procurement leaders on how they’re leveraging data and insights to make informed, strategic, and impactful purchasing decisions.

take a break

Hop into the Expo and catch up with the solution providers

PROGRAM SPLIT

Program splits into two tracks:

“BUY-TECH” PROGRAM The tech you need to operate your procurement organizations most effectively

Program Chair: Jeff Muscarella, EVP, Digital Products & Services, NPI

ENTERPRISE-WIDE TECH PROGRAM What and how you buy for the wider enterprise

Program Chair: Gala Lyne, GVP Global Strategy, Rimini Street

Orchestration

“BUY-TECH” – Main Stage

Scale your strategy: Mastering the six essentials of procurement orchestration

Keeping up with demand from the business is tough for any procurement team, but scaling procurement for a high-growth public company is a whole other challenge. That’s why Ed Petrush, senior director of global procurement at Dynatrace, implemented a groundbreaking strategy: procurement orchestration.

Designed to drastically improve customer experience and simplify how Dynatrace scaled procurement from 0 to 1, procurement orchestration has enabled Ed’s team to deliver compliance, efficiency and savings wins that elevate his team’s standing in the business.

This session is a deep dive into understanding what Procurement Orchestration is, why it’s crucial for procurement success, and how it’s shaping the future for procurement professionals.

Attendees will:
• Learn the six fundamental elements of Procurement Orchestration, providing a blueprint for immediate and effective application in diverse procurement environments.
• Gain insights into the strategic importance of Procurement Orchestration and why it’s becoming a key success factor in procurement evolution.
• Discover through practical case studies the real-world applications and benefits of embracing Procurement Orchestration.

CHANGE MANAGEMENT

ENTERPRISE TECH – Main Stage

Mastering change with ALICE: a transformative approach to change management

Discover the ALICE methodology – a set of leadership principles. By understanding and implementing these principles, leaders can navigate change seamlessly, authentically communicate expectations, build supportive communities and effectively engage influencers to ensure successful change adoption. Whether you’re navigating technological shifts or organizational reforms, this session is a roadmap to transformative leadership.

Changeover

5 minutes to get to your next session!

SaaS

“BUY-TECH” – Main Stage

SaaS contracts- negotiation tips and tales from the trenches

As SaaS spend continues to grow and the software landscape becomes more complex, it is more important than ever for technology sourcing professionals be planful with their SaaS negotiations and management. How do we keep up with the changes in sales strategies? Join this session for negotiation tips and real-life examples to help you avoid pitfalls.

soft skills

ENTERPRISE TECH – Main Stage

Career orchestration: a conversation about your future in procurement

Procurement feels different. It looks different, too. Companies are calling on the function to deliver value quickly and efficiently, and they need professionals who can take on the challenge. Are you ready?

Join Mathew and Sonduren in this conversational tell all. Let’s talk about how you can meet AND exceed their expectations. From people tactics to technology, we’ll discuss how your impact and influence will shape the new way of doing business.

Changeover

p2p

“BUY-TECH” – Main Stage

Intake vs. Orchestration vs. P2P – where do you stand?

BUSINESS PARTNERS

ENTERPRISE TECH – Main Stage

Designing a skill-based team to ensure better alignment with business partners (Sourcing, Vendor Management, Procurement Operations)

How do you make sure your team understands tech from a business perspective, has the right knowledge for the business unit?
Are you giving/getting enough exposure to suppliers and stakeholders?
What current and future skills need enhancing?
How augment difference between what only computers and what only humans can do? How to maintain your talent pipeline

LUNCH BREAK

Lunch break & Expo

Join all the attendees in the supplier Expo for lunch & networking. This is your last chance to make those vital connections and follow-ups with the conference sponsors.

ANALYTICS

“BUY-TECH” – Main Stage

Case study on deploying an end-to-end procurement analytics program to maximize speed and agility of your data

Mapping out the entire procurement analytics and building the architecture around this, including governance, oversight
The talent deployed within our Centre of Excellence
Use cases; category specific

AGILE

ENTERPRISE TECH – Main Stage

Contracting for agile development

Have you had difficulty working with Agile development resources on anything other than a T&M basis? In this session, we’ll review strategies for applying a deliverable-based structure to agile development contracting. Incorporating both productivity & quality measures.

We’ll also discuss how utilizing these contract structures can improve performance and enable a leader/challenger model.

changeover

Hop to the next session!

CYBER

“BUY-TECH” – Main Stage

Procurement’s role in Cyber Security

The complexity around cyber security, compliance, governance and oversight and the role which falls to procurement on this is of increasing importance.

SAM

ENTERPRISE TECH – Main Stage

Is Software Asset Management now a procurement issue?

How much visibility and ownership does your procurement organization have over Software Asset Management. Are you involved, with full oversight of the software entitlements, licenses to ensure that they are being used effectively and efficiently? How much waste can be eliminated?

Align your experiences with others and find the best path for your organization to manage this essential process in the best possible way, and find the answer to how much Software Asset Management is / or should be a procurement issue?

changeover

Generative AI

“BUY-TECH” – Main Stage

Beyond the hype!
GenAI use cases: building to buy

Hop into this session and hear directly from Ed Mills as he talks us through the University’s building of a service desk use case. Ed will share the model tuning process and some of the lessons learned to help inform their make/buy decisions of GenerativeAI!

negotiation

ENTERPRISE TECH – Main Stage

Negotiation strategy – how to always be winning in your negotiations!

Best practice in renewals / contract management & negotiation
How are you renegotiating?
What tips and tricks can be deployed to ensure you get what you want out of the contract?

Coffee break

Quick refuel for the final sessions!

GUEST ADDRESS

Complex relationships: supply chain regulation + tech policy

Event Close

Thanks for coming!

Close of FORGE: Technology Sourcing & Prize Draw

Reassemble for a wrap up of Tech Sourcing 2024 from the Conference Chair & Mike Cadieux

Testimonials

WHAT DO PAST ATTENDEES THINK OF THE EVENT?

"The concentration of specialized expertise and experience was overwhelming, so much to learn from those in the room. I can’t wait to dive in again next year!"

"It was an awesome gathering. Never been around so many IT Procurement Professionals from the buy side that shared best practices."

"What a great opportunity to meet, engage, and learn both from and with Procurement colleagues from a wide range of backgrounds!"

"The concentration of specialized expertise and experience was overwhelming, so much to learn from those in the room. I can’t wait to dive in again next year!"