Another benefit of obtaining procurement certification for your team is a better return on investments. Oftentimes the higher-ups within a company evaluate the success of their procurement department in terms of the perceived return on investment. That means that your team is lauded if you can garner excellent returns on investments made and that your team may be chastised if that is not the case. If you are curious, a return on investment for a procurement department is basically calculated like this: for each dollar that is spent within the budget that is allocated to the procurement team for qualified expenses such as benefits, salaries, equipment, software, facilities, technologies and more, how much money is then returned to the company via a cost savings, additional funds or revenue gained?
Taking that into account, you need to ask yourself “how can my team work to save money in order to achieve better return on investments?” The answer is as simple as it is complicated: with many different tactics, strategies and techniques. In order to successfully conceive, develop and implement these specific tactics, strategies and techniques you need to ensure that all of the members of your team are well educated and that they actually know how to do their jobs properly. So how do you make sure that your team really does know how to do their jobs properly? That is where procurement certification comes into play.
Procurement professionals that hold procurement certifications are well trained to do their jobs more than adequately and it shows in the work product that they produce and the results that they achieve. The return on investment for such individuals is sure to be higher than the return on investment for procurement professionals who are uncertified. Certified procurement professionals are better able to establish ways to cut costs annually.
As a leader in your procurement department, you can get the members of senior management to trust your skills, your expertise and your ability to perform even under high pressure situations. You need the members of senior management to trust your decisions when you request that they invest capital towards your department for new personnel, new technology, new software or other important resources that can help your department to operate more smoothly. If your team is saving the company money, you will have a much better chance of having your funding requests approved in the future.
The phrase ‘return on investment’ can be your friend rather than your enemy. Position yourself and your procurement team so that whenever you hear those words it will be to describe something positive that your team has achieved. At the end of the day, a certified procurement team is better trained and better qualified to come up with ways that your company can save money. When you save your company money, your company recognizes the true value of your procurement department and good things flow your way. In other words, you can’t afford not to get your procurement team certified.
