In this world, value-extraction is the new business driver, not growth, and at a recent pharma event, we found ourselves thinking about old dogs and new tricks.

Data protection is an international issue, but more and more it's coming on to procurement's radar. What kind of reaction should the NSA revelations provoke?

Procurement Leaders is currently collecting views from category managers and buyers in prices for indirect categories. Following from our Category Planning Guide 2013, that we published last year, we are trying to repeat the next round of forecasting for 2014.

For awhile, I've thought that procurement needs a few sound bites that capture the imperatives and aspirations of the function. Last week, the Procurement Leaders Next Decade event in New York City provided several possibilities.

Now, for my final blog in this series, we ask a bold and straightforward question: what if the function cannot generate significant additional performance?

New York starts early and means business – that was the first of many lessons from Procurement Leaders’ Next Decade Series.

Everyone from kids to adults loves games. Generation Y plays video and computer games, sometimes as a substitute for social interaction. Families play games around a table or computer screen as a bonding exercise. But, do computer and video games have a place in business? Sure they do.

We are currently in the midst of the analysis into the latest of our salary surveys. It seems as though opportunities for women are improving.