The Pros to Know List
Supply and Demand Chain Executive just released their "Pros to Know" list for 2007. I'm pleased to report that a number of bloggers are on the list. Michael Lamoureux has the full scoop over on Sourcing Innovation on the news, so I won't rehash his post in detail. In summary, some of the better known bloggers who received the award include David Bush, Tim Minahan, Dave Stephens and Charles Dominick (Andy Reece also lowered his standards by including me with this illustrous RSS crowd). But guys, one piece of advice -- please limit the press releases on this, OK? So much virtual space is wasted on PR Newswire announcing the winners of this thing when we could all be discussing real topics and issues.
OK, I'll get down from the virtual soapbox. My congratulations go out to all the blogger winners (especially David, who started blogging when no one in the procurement and operations world knew what RSS was). On the analyst side of the house, the entire Aberdeen supply management team was honored. AMR was conspicuously absent, however, which is a shame. That's because Mickey North Rizza and Mark Hillman are probably the two most influential analysts in the sector over many supply chain, risk management and procurement deals at the moment. And both know their stuff inside and out. Alas, awards are just awards -- they represent a snap shot of who was nominated and the judges’ thinking at a point in time. But next year, let's hope they’re on the list, too.
- Jason Busch
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I was pleased to see Dr. Rob Handfield from NC State on the list along with this short writeup:
"Dr. Robert Handfield, Bank of America Distinguished Professor of Supply Chain Management at North Carolina State University, founded and directs the Supply Chain Resource Consortium at NCSU (scrc.ncsu.edu), offering a program that brings the industry into the classroom to involve students, faculty and member companies in the process of finding solutions to real industry problems, creating more enlightened corporate professionals and shaping the next generation of supply chain leaders."
You know my opinion of the SCRC from my guest piece a while back.
http://www.spendmatters.com/index.cfm/2007/1/11/Su...
I've just spent most of this morning re-reading some supply risk work Rob and his colleagues did with Debra Elkins of GM back in early 2004 and even today it's five years ahead of its time.
What I'd be interested in is your take on Tim, David, and Dave's inclusion on the list as bloggers rather than in the other categories. Representatives from Ketera, Ariba, Emptoris, etc. were honored in the Sourcing/Procurement/Spend Management category.
Do you read this as the bloggers' contributions to those other areas as secondary to their value as bloggers? Or is it just that none of those other companies don't have a resident blogger (which I'm not sure which of them do)?
What are the implications of being recognized in the blogger category rather than one of the other categories? Or are the categories really not that meaningful (personally, I thought I fit more into the Education category, but I'm not complaining)?
Once again, congratulations!
For this, I have no problem being in that category, even though it represents under 5% of my work week.
Thanks for all of your kind words on the award. Collectively, bloggers are taking the procurement and operations media and analyst worlds by storm. We are new media and new analysts -- not replacements for the old, but a critical new complement. And SDCEXEC has realized this (which says how much they understand how things are changing). Kudos to them.
I think the categories bloggers were placed in is not relevant. In my view, this was more of a bunch of editors sitting around and making sure they had representation across their buckets. Nothing by it, in my view.
Again, a final congrats to everyone. I might have been a small spark that started this thing, but the flame is burning because of everyone involved in blogging in our corner of the business world. Now, imagine the power we'll have once a mainstream procurement audience -- rather than just innovators -- starts reading our stuff!