Supply Chain Transformation: A chat with Andrew Brennan on what it means for employees
By Harrison Moreno, University Communications
Supply Chain Services oversees the university's Surplus Storefront, which repurposes university equipment that has been phased-out and offers sells it to the general public at a reduced cost, creating a additional revenue source that comes back to the university.
The University of Arizona is modernizing its supply chain operations to improve efficiency, increase visibility and deliver greater value across campus. Chief Procurement Officer Andrew Brennan explains what's changing, why it matters to all of campus and what to expect moving forward.
Why is the university updating its supply chain operations now?
Transaction volume and spending have increased significantly over the last 10 years, but many processes still rely on outdated systems, creating more manual work for employees.
Andrew Brennan
The transformation is designed to introduce updated technology to help solve that problem, creating more bandwidth for employees and an environment where people aren't having to do unnecessary, tedious tasks and can focus on value-added work.
To address this, Supply Chain Services is rolling out new tools and processes to improve how the university manages expenses, negotiates contracts and purchases goods. This includes expanding the Travel and Expense system and introducing a new supply chain platform.
What is the Travel and Expense Transformation project, and why is it included in this overarching change?
The Travel and Expense Transformation project will make it easier to manage expenses and purchasing card reconciliation by bringing these activities into the expanded Travel and Expense system in Concur. It will speed up processing, improve visibility into transactions and reduce manual work, providing a more complete view of university spending.
The university will be able to review every transaction, reducing risk while giving departments greater confidence in how funds are used. With the new University Card structure, we will be able to review every transaction that goes through, which will reduce risk and lead to greater fiscal responsibility and spending compliance.
What was introduced in phase one of the supply chain management project? What will be in phase two?
In phase one, we introduced two key components through our new software partner.
First, we implemented supplier management software, shifting the responsibility to suppliers to maintain their own information and a compliance vetting process to make sure we have a clear idea of who we're doing business with.
We've introduced a full sourcing environment where suppliers participate in online sourcing events, rather than over email threads with university employees, allowing us to manage the university’s procurement process more consistently. We're also relaunching the Supplier Showcase on May 18, where employees can engage with approved university suppliers.
Andrew Brennan (second from left) with members of his team (from left) Bruce MacLaren, Rocio Torres, Emily Perry and Celeste Kanzig, help lead the efforts to modernize purchasing, contracting and supplier management processes across the university.
And finally, we launched a contract management system for submitting, reviewing, and approving agreements with suppliers, creating a consistent process across campus that is managed by a unit or department’s senior finance officer.
In phase two, the focus will shift to the transactional side, connecting requests, purchase orders and invoices to contracts in one system.
What does this mean for employees across campus?
At the end of the day, we're streamlining the buying process, from requests through payment. But importantly, we're not changing what the university is buying. We're just transforming how we buy it to be more strategic.
Right now, units negotiate their own contracts, often with the same suppliers, only leveraging their individual purchasing power. By aggregating the university's total spend, we can negotiate with the full buying power of the university.
That means fewer contracts, more consistent terms and pricing, and greater value for the university. This helps us be as fiscally and strategically responsible as possible in how we spend university funds.
What should departments and employees be doing now to prepare for these changes?
We know that this is a lot of change, but this will help improve efficiency and fiscal responsibility across campus.
For Travel and Expense, I highly encourage departments and employees to review the resources created by the project team. This includes background on the project and training resources. The project team has been working with business offices across campus to help the campus prepare for the system to go live on July 1.
For the supply chain management system, we have new processes in place. Senior finance officers across campus have been designated to submit large purchase and contract requests on behalf of their unit or college. Departments should work with their business office to understand the new process.
How will the university measure success?
We're creating clear metrics for each step so we can track how long things take, from registering a supplier to completing a contract or processing a request from start to finish.
Those will help us identify where the pain points are so we can refine and improve the process over time. The goal is not just to track performance, but to provide clear expectations. One of the biggest challenges is lack of visibility. By defining how long different types of requests should take, departments will have better visibility into timelines and can plan accordingly.