The LAP Alliance
A global Movement
Our Mission
Needs instead of Wants
Adaptive instead of Fixed
Partnership instead of Relationship
FUN instead of PAIN
That is, while each element on the right is important, we find that emphasizing the elements on the left generally leads to better results.
Similar to the Agile Manifesto (fn), we came up with a more sticky mission statement with our 5 pair values. We are uncovering better ways of aligning procurement with agile collaboration by doing it and helping others to do it. Through our work we have come to value:
In a fast-changing world, time-to-market is one of the key metrics. LAP's approach promises to be fast. It challenges all existing rules & regulations to achieve maximum time-to-market.
“Speed is the new Currency of Business”
This also includes the principle of incremental value delivery. The approach champions the practice of breaking down huge sourcing projects into smaller, manageable increments, delivering most promising hypotheses and its tangible value first. This not only ensures that value is realized early and consistently, but it also enables the flexibility to adapt and adjust as new information emerges. By embracing experimentation and learning, Lean-Agile Procurement fosters a culture of continuous improvement, where lessons from each iteration inform and enhance subsequent cycles.
Central to the values of Lean-Agile Procurement is the principle of customer-centricity. This entails actively engaging with both internal customers and external vendors to co-create solutions that align with the ever-evolving requirements of the market. Requirements in a sense of a joint understanding about the customer/user needs. We don't want to just look for features and functions (wants), but surprise the customer/user by delivering business value earlier, with as little waste as possible, while providing room for unexpected evolutions and innovations. If we succeed earlier and stop or pause partnership we celebrate our success and do not continue with non-valuable nice-to-haves ('Wants‘)!-On the other hand we also respect the needs of the people, who will work together to deliver the solutions.
To cope with the complexity of strategic sourcing cases we accept uncertainty and don’t fix the scope (at least in the area’s of the sourcing case where we have unknowns). We keep it flexible and adapt from sourcing to delivery. Additional, we maintain a clear focus of always delivering best value for money. We solve customer/user needs, learn and adapt with each iteration/Sprint. In other words, we do not stick to initial plans and may not stick with initial partners. The evaluation approach dictates partner selection. If another partner is more valuable, we switch. We always define and measure success in terms of business value and make this transparent to everyone involved.
Changing partners is never considered a loss, rather, the partner interaction is always considered a learning. If we had good experiences within the partnership we may leverage that in the future. We always look for sustainability in partnerships, in conjunction with adaptability. We definitely don’t view the customer/vendor relationship as a win-lose, where one wins and the other loses. Instead the intent is to establish true partnerships, where we all meet at the same eye-level.
Looking for a new partner and working together as a team should be first of all fun for all participants. We always prefer honest and transparent collaboration, over painful win:lose negotiations. These collaborations are always held between the people, that will potentially work together in the future, therefore, it is critical to ensure strong trust, business, cultural and social fit.
FUN instead of PAIN