SPLC 2018 Summit: SPLC Benchmark Workshop: Measuring and Improving the Effectiveness of your Sustainable Purchasing Program

Editor's Notes

1. <As people are coming into the room and prior to session start.> As you walk in, please grab the first part (Step 1.) of the Quick Assessment Worksheet, and see how far you can get on Step 1. please!
2. Good morning and thank you for joining our SPLC BENCHMARK Workshop! My name is Kris Spriano, Program Manager for SPLC’s BENCHMARK Program. I am joined by Dr. Shirley-Ann Augustin Behravesh, SPLC Consultant for SPLC and one of our Benchmark Working Group members. Today, we’ll be giving you a chance to measure and benchmark your organization using our newly developed Quick Assessment Worksheet. By the end of this workshop, you should have an informed measure of your organization’s sustainable purchasing program, will have identified the area that you would like to prioritize moving forward, and possibly even get some tips on how to do that from your peers.
3. Let’s get started!
4. Benchmark is a process management-based set of programs and tools that drive leadership in sustainable purchasing. Benchmark sits towards the top of SPLC’s Service Offerings, and helps to answer the question of…<READ QUESTIONS>. At the end of this process, participants are provided with strategic next steps to move the needle on their organization’s maturity.
5. The Benchmark Approach begins with coaching an organization through identification of its current sustainable purchasing program. This is done by walking them through identifying that organization’s current purchasing-related environment, social and economic priorities; and that reflecting on the activities that the organizations is doing to address them. Once their program has been identified, those same actions are compared to SPLC’s Maturity Model. The Maturity Model is a rigorous set of questions organized around four operational levers: Operational Process & Policy, Employee Engagement, Supplier Engagement and Stakeholder Engagement. The final (optional) step is benchmarking the organization’s results from the Maturity Model comparison to those results obtained from others in their peer group. Once your program is defined, Benchmark uses SPLC’s Maturity Model to measure the extent to which specific best practices have been incorporated into your program. Those best practices are beneath four operational levers -> Organizational Process & Policy, <FINISH READING>. Benchmark additionally provides for an opportunity to compare obtained maturity levels between organizations facilitiating additional benefits.
6. As I mentioned, the SPLC Maturity Model is the underlying framework for all benchmarking activities. This model was built by the Benchmark Working Group who leveraged years of curated leading best practices obtained from a cross-sector of leaders in sustainable purchasing.
7. There are many benefits to taking advantage of the Benchmark Approach. However, one of the most notable is Benchmark’s ability to identify the path forward for building out your sustainable purchasing program. Here you see the actual results from two of our completed cohort programs. At first glance, you may focus on their obtained scores. However, what’s most notable isn’t where they are today as much as is that they are the first organizations to know the path forward to creating a truly sustainable economy through their purchasing. This is an exciting prospect as they leverage their Benchmark output to plan strategies for the future.
8. An additional benefit that we have seen is the ability of Benchmark to identify previously unknown sustainable purchasing activities, duplicative efforts and mis-aligned activities. Especially in large organizations, it can be difficult to know, develop and maintain alignment for all of the related activities.
9. By using Benchmark to “inventory” relevant strategies and activities, our participants have been able to identify previously unknown efforts which align and help to drive their sustainable purchasing program forward across independent purchasing organizations, setting the stage to maximize operational efficiencies. My personal favorite part of watching these discoveries occur is the appreciation of these previously unengaged teams getting excited to realize that they are part of a larger sustainability movement, providing new motivation and engagement into their roles, and making them champions to help the program succeed.
10. There are now four ways to utilize the Benchmark Approach and start taking advantage of its benefits. The first is our newly released self-directed Quick Assessment. This new tool allows teams to obtain an introduction to the Benchmark Approach in a consolidated 11-question format, while still getting a sampling of its benefits. We recommend this as a first step for anyone wanting to take advantage of any part of Benchmark. The second is the Maturity Model, which is the 38-question full assessment built into our 3rd and 4th options. Organizations may download the document for free, but are on their own to assess themselves against the criteria. We’re very excited to begin offering Guided Individual Assessments for those that are looking to benchmark to the Maturity Model, and want to take advantage of our online platform. In this option, SPLC staff uses an interview-based approach to walk your organization through the full 38-question assessment, and then provide a Maturity Report including strategic next steps tailored to your organization. And the final option is the Guided Cohort Assessment. This is great for organizations that wish to experience Benchmark together as an interactive workshop, further supporting sharing of results and best practices uncovered in the group.
11. Today we are going to give everyone a chance
12. Please grab each of these packets. <EXPLAIN that they are both the Quick Assessment, and have been separated only for ease of use.>
13. Our first step in identifying your sustainable purchasing program is identifying your purchasing organization’s current economic, social and environmental priorities. Take a look at Step 1. in the worksheet. Please review the list of priorities, and select the economic, social and environmental priorities that your purchasing organization is currently prioritizing. If you don’t know what your organization is prioritizing, that’s okay too. Just review the priorities and rejoin us in the next step. Also, don’t worry if you do not recognize some of the listed priorities. You want to focus on identifying your organization’s care abouts today. You can come back to learn about some of the others at another time.
14. Okay, let’s move to Step 2. In this step, we want you to review the priorities you’ve selected, and think about the actions that are being taken by your organization to address those same priorities. For example, if your organization is prioritizing Climate Change, you may have a formal GhG Reduction Program in place. If your organization is prioritizing Human Rights, you may be working on Conflict Minerals. Notice how these activities might go by several different names depending on your sector and maturity. You might have a Policy or Regulation that drive your activities. You may have Projects established for certain focus areas. Or, you may already have a comprehensive, formal sustainable purchasing program. In which case, this step is incredibly easy! Write down your sustainable purchasing activities in the spaces provided using names that you commonly use to represent them.
15. The next section will assess whether or not your sustainable program has integrated the best practices identified in SPLC BENCHMARK. Using your results from Steps 1. and 2. , select the response that best describes where your sustainable purchasing program is in terms of each area.
16. The next section will assess whether or not your sustainable program is integrating the leading best practices identified in SPLC BENCHMARK. Using your results from Steps 1. and 2. , select the response that best describes where your sustainable purchasing program is in terms of each area.
17. It should also be noted here that Leadership in SPLC’s Maturity Model sets a VERY HIGH BAR. We have already seen in its use that achieving a validated LEADING response is unique and sets apart those who are able to achieve it in even a handful of up to 38 prioritized leadership practices. And this is what we would expect. This is because our goal in doing sustainable purchasing is to transform our global economy into one that is genuinely sustainable, from an environmental, social, and economic perspective. Therefore, the “Leading” maturity level describes how purchasing organizations will be operating when we have achieved a genuinely sustainable global economy. This makes SPLC BENCHMARK a highly useful tool for measuring how well we are doing on achieving that goal.
18. In 2017, SPLC was fortunate to partner with NASPO, a state-focused procurement organization, to send 14 independent purchasing organizations through the SPLC BENCHMARK Process as part of its pilot launch. The cohort program was initiated to allow participants to obtain foundational knowledge on sustainable purchasing practices, give them access to the SPLC BENCHMARK full assessment tool and promoted live sharing of best practices encountered along the way. At the end of the process, each organization was asked to present the strategic priorities they planned to move forward on as a result of their participation.
19. “Quick Flash” slide (not to be read entirely through): This slide acknowledges how we are actively sharing the results of the pilot program in the government sector, encourages participants to attend CA’s session and to look for the coming whitepaper.
20. So first, a quick introduction to the Council…