Five ways for procurement and HR to work better together

Posted on 18. May, 2009 by in Blog

To most organisations the cost of human capital – whether full time or interim employees, or the infrastructure needed to support them – is the biggest cost they have to bear, so it’s perhaps not  particularly ground breaking to suggest that procurement must work more closely with HR to reduce costs.

Whether this happens, however, is debatable. In many cases, temporary labour is still sourced by the business unit or, at best, HR, with little input from procurement. The recruitment of permanent staff is even more of a dark art.

So, an article in Human Resource Executive, written by Bernadette Kenny, chief career officer and senior VP of human resources for Adecco Group, North America, offers some food for thought by outlining five ways in which HR and procurement can work more closely with each other.

The full article can be found here, but here’s a roundup of what she wrote.

1 – Speak the same language
In other words, lose the buzzword bingo and the TLAs (three letter acronyms) and at least the two parties will understand each other.

2 – Trust and value each other’s expertise
Sometimes more difficult that it sounds (especially when it comes to HR…) but if both parties respect each other and acknowledge the common business goal, life will be much easier.

3 – Remember soft skills when establishing the partnership
Procurement  shouldn’t try and “take over” negotiations or vendor relationships.

4 – Create a consistent approach to vendor relationships
This will help working relationships between the company and its suppliers.

5 – Bring services procurement expertise
HR procurement is not the same as buying widgets, after all.

While the article isn’t particularly leading edge or ground breaking, it does provide further evidence of how other functions see working with procurement as an inevitable part of modern business.

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