Why Procurement Now Sits at the Centre of Supply Chain Risk Artwork

Resilient Supply Chain — How Leaders Keep Business Moving

Resilient Supply Chain is for supply chain, operations, procurement and technology leaders who need practical ways to manage disruption, reduce risk and keep business moving.

Each Monday, former SAP Global VP and technology futurist Tom Raftery speaks with the executives, operators, founders and innovators redesigning how goods, information and decisions move through global supply chains.

These are candid conversations about what works in practice—not polished PR narratives or vague predictions. Guests explain how they are responding to supplier failures, geopolitical shocks, volatile costs, capacity constraints, changing regulations and rising pressure to improve both performance and sustainability.

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AI, automation, visibility and operational intelligence
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Scope 3 emissions, circularity and responsible sourcing
The systems, incentives and organisational changes needed to turn data into action

The central question is simple: what helps a supply chain withstand disruption, adapt quickly and continue serving the business?

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Resilient Supply Chain — How Leaders Keep Business Moving

Why Procurement Now Sits at the Centre of Supply Chain Risk

June 30, 2025 • Season 2 • Episode 74

0:00 | 38:33

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Procurement has come a long way, from back-office cost-cutting to a central role in driving sustainability, risk management, and supply chain resilience. In this episode of the Sustainable Supply Chain podcast, I sat down with Pierre Laprée, Chief Product Officer at SpendHQ, to unpack what that transformation looks like in practice.

Pierre shares sharp insights on how procurement teams can baseline and reduce scope 3 emissions, track supplier diversity, and manage supply chain risk, not with static spreadsheets, but with actionable, real-time data. We explored how supplier risk has expanded from purely financial to include cyber threats, ESG exposure, and geopolitical volatility, and how too many organisations are still flying blind.

He explains how SpendHQ’s performance management platform helps procurement leaders move from annual targets to rolling forecasts, enabling faster course correction and real impact, not just reporting.

We also discussed:

Why ESG issues like forced labour and deforestation are no longer just reputational risks, they’re operational liabilities
How procurement can help suppliers get better, not just cheaper
The critical role of data quality in turning AI from buzzword to business tool

If you’re in supply chain, procurement, or sustainability and trying to make sense of today’s risk landscape, this episode is for you.

🎧 Listen now and find out why procurement needs to think more like sales, and why data might be your most undervalued supply chain asset.

Could your supply chain take the hit? Download my free 15-minute resilience scorecard to uncover hidden vulnerabilities, calculate your score and turn the results into a practical 30-day action plan: tomraftery.com/scorecard

If disruption hit tomorrow, would you know where your supply chain was most exposed? In 15 minutes my free scorecard helps you assess 27 resilience statements, calculate your score, and turn the result into three priorities and a 30 day action plan. You can download the scorecard free at tomraftery.com/scorecard.

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