In this episode of the Smarter Sourcing podcast, John speaks with Miguel Gonzalez, Chief Procurement Officer at DuPont. They discuss how DuPont takes a centralized approach to its procurement strategy by integrating it across the business, and how they’re building supply chain resilience through redundancies and contingency plans. They also talk about their three priorities for procurement, the rising importance of ESG, and how DuPont is prioritizing employee health and wellness.

Topics discussed:

• How DuPont builds supply chain resilience through redundancy and contingency plans.
• The three priorities in their procurement strategy: compliance, supply security, and creating value.
• Why DuPont prioritizes employee health and wellness, and how Miguel leads by example.
• How they model for what’s happening worldwide to anticipate changes or disruptions.
• How they’ve structured a centralized procurement approach that integrates procurement across the business.
• The rising importance of ESG and why it should be part of everyone’s job.
• Why procurement leaders need to think about managing indirect costs as well.

Guest Quotes: 

“When I took over, I had one of the most best-in-class procurement professional teams. But it was too much procurement, too much price-oriented. And in this journey, we needed to think outside of the price box. We need to think cost. We need to think value. All the things, mostly in a company like DuPont, that is focused on innovation, on growth.”

“It’s more about the ‘What if..?’ How can we prepare? And the big theme for all of us has been this supply chain resilience. How do you build redundancy, contingency plans?”

“Every buyer has to have ESG as part of their category management playbooks — as they negotiate, as they talk to suppliers, as they identify new opportunities.”

“There is a tendency in procurement organizations to focus on raw materials, direct materials, without realizing that in indirects, if you don’t take care of that area, you can leak a lot of money.”

Get in touch with Miguel Gonzalez:  

LinkedIn

Website

Get in touch with your host, John Pavia: 

LinkedIn