Having innovative education products for your learning spaces is key to the day-to-day success of students and teachers.Whether you’re a procurement leader in K-12 schools or higher education institutions, it’s imperative to have a purchasing plan that provides your schools with immediate access to top of the line supplies for each of your classroom or campus’ unique needs.
Organizations are experiencing the stress of navigating employment today with the ongoing talent shortage fueled by The Great Resignation and evolving work environments. In the current labor market, public agencies are pressed to find quality talent to quickly fill the constantly changing needs in their ongoing digital transformation. Specifically, the need for Information Technology (IT) temporary and professional services continues to grow as technology accelerates rapidly, impacting the different types of expertise required to run new programs.
In an evolving marketplace with several national challenges directly impacting procurement, supply chain and sourcing functions, more and more of these teams are being looped in to solve the largest organizational obstacles. Examples include assisting HR with talent shortage solutions and working with IT stakeholders on virtual course innovations at their colleges and universities.
It’s no secret that procurement professionals nationwide are struggling with budgets, bandwidth and staffing shortages. These roadblocks reveal opportunity though, as teams look towardcooperative purchasing for relief. With the help of a cooperative purchasing organization, you can increase savings at your organization by leveraging pre-awarded cooperative contracts and streamlining your purchasing process, resulting in a stronger overall strategy.
The majority of your furniture purchases throughout the year may be sporadic. Maybe you choose to use any extra money at the end of the fiscal year to buy furniture products that you need but haven’t made a priority. Unless your procurement team has a major building renovation or school project, you likely haven’t dedicated the time and resources to budgeting for furniture needs that eventually always pop up.
Rural communities continue to find ways to obtain high-speed, reliable broadband internet, and post-pandemic lifestyles have elevated the need. With virtual learning and remote work, government agencies and schools heavily rely on internet access, and broadband plays a key role. Your town may be exploring the cost and scope of facilitating a broadband project, and as a leader in procurement, you’ve been tasked with identifying the route with the best value.
Procurement teams can take the lead on emergency preparedness and severe weather safety purchasing plans through their attention to detail and visibility into cooperative purchasing solutions. Have you analyzed and made predictions about how your supply chain would weather the storm? It’s especially critical now as organizations face higher supply chain risk due to the ongoing delays, shortages and geopolitical conflict.
Organizations are reevaluating their workplace strategies as we acclimate to a post-pandemic future. Office interiors, outdoor furniture and classroom furniture designs continue to evolve to accommodate the changing needs of employees and students. Your agency or school may be embarking on a complex renovation or new project and as a procurement leader, you’re tasked with facilitating diverse requirements and working to source innovative design solutions and installation project management.
Procurement teams continue to be tasked with the need to focus on prominent IT issues like ransomware and other threats to cybersecurity, while recognizing the importance of bolstering cyber posture. As you work to meet the needs of IT stakeholders, it can be beneficial to leverage a cooperative purchasing organization for a direct route to robust solutions for your school district or agency.
Each time a new challenge emerges for some of your procurement peers, we see real-life examples of how they’re collaborating with a cooperative purchasing organization to solve the issue and exceed management’s expectations for the purchasing or sourcing functions. We’re hearing more and morefrom public procurement professionals that cooperative purchasing continues to be a best practice in their strategy. This growing trend is due to the countless benefits participants experience every day.
