Proc-N-Roll : Your guide to practical procurement!

Graphite Connect and Candor Procurement

Welcome to Proc n Roll, where nearly 70 years of combined procurement expertise come together. Join Natasha, the PRO CPO with experience at IBM, McKesson, Salesforce, and Nike; Zach, the procurement guru from London; and Conrad, the visionary innovator behind transformational procurement at Intel and Adobe. We dive into the latest trends shaping the procurement landscape while breaking down the essential building blocks for success. Whether you’re new to procurement or a seasoned expert, our discussions will inspire you and keep you grounded in real-world value.

  1. Backstage Pass to M&A: Surviving the 5-Deal-a-Month World Tour

    6 DAYS AGO

    Backstage Pass to M&A: Surviving the 5-Deal-a-Month World Tour

    In this Jam Session, host Conrad Smith sits down with Jay Sklar from Hub International for a masterclass in high-velocity procurement. With Hub International acquiring an average of five companies every single month, Jay has developed a battle-tested playbook for rapid integration. He shares how he manages a massive portfolio of 700+ offices while leveraging his company's explosive growth to secure better deals with suppliers. In this episode, we cover: 🏢 Procurement Meets Real Estate: How Jay manages a dual role and drives "operating expense" savings by optimizing office density and design. 🚀 The M&A Engine: How to use your company's growth story to tell suppliers to "hitch their wagon" to you for better pricing. 🛑 The Nuclear Option: Jay’s strategy for fighting unjustified 2x software price hikes (and why you have to be willing to "rip and replace"). 🤖 AI Pragmatism: Why we need less theory and more "show and tell" in the procurement AI sandbox. 💡 Best Advice: Why "being a nice person" is the secret weapon of successful M&A integration. Whether you are dealing with software inflation or managing a complex real estate portfolio, this episode is packed with practical tips you can use today.

    54 min

  2. 22/12/2025

    I Love Proc 'n' Roll: The First Anniversary Special

    Happy 1st Birthday to Proc & Roll! 🎂🎸 Can you believe it has been a whole year? In this special anniversary episode, hosts Conrad Smith, Natasha Gurevich, and Zach Bachir put aside the interview scripts to reminisce on the journey from episode 1 to 35+. What started as a random lunch in London turned into a community of "operators in the trenches," and we wouldn't be here without you! In this episode, we cover: The Origin Story: How a cold email and a lunch sparked a deep friendship and a podcast. The AI Rewind: Conrad uses Google’s NotebookLM live on the show to analyze our entire year of transcripts, revealing our biggest themes (from Ethics to "Savings vs. Value"). Best Guest Moments: We look back at game-changing conversations with Dr. Elouise Epstein, Mark Raffan, Alyssa Harvey Dawson, Ana Erickson, Ash Hall, MVK (Michael Van Keulen), Josh Earley, Arnaud de Brux, and David Johnson, plus we preview upcoming episodes with Ted Baumuller and Jay Sklar. 2026 Teasers: A sneak peek at upcoming episodes featuring CHROs discussing layoffs and a deep dive into the CFO relationship. Whether you are a CPO or a new category manager, thank you for rocking with us this year. Here’s to many more! 🥂

    52 min
  3. The Industrial Mindset: How to Engineer Better Indirect Procurement

    17/12/2025

    The Industrial Mindset: How to Engineer Better Indirect Procurement

    "We jumped off a cliff and built the plane on the way down." ✈️ That is how Arnaud, Head of Indirect Procurement at BIC, describes the massive challenge of building a non-GMO supply chain from scratch in just 18 months. In this Jam Session, Arnaud joins Conrad to explore how an industrial engineering mindset can transform procurement from a transactional function into a strategic engine for growth. They discuss how to look beyond the price tag to see the total cost of ownership—whether you are buying machinery for a factory or software for HR. In this episode, you’ll learn: The Danone Case Study: The incredible story of how Arnaud helped build a non-GMO milk supply chain—changing everything from the cow feed to the factory production lines—in under two years to drive competitive advantage. Engineering the Indirects: How to apply "factory floor" logic (like continuous improvement and maintenance planning) to complex indirect categories like Marketing and IT. Escaping the "Busy Work": Why automating tail spend and tactical admin is the only way to free up your team for true Supplier Relationship Management (SRM). The 2-to-1 Rule: Arnaud’s golden rule for career growth: "We have two ears and one mouth, so we should listen twice as much as we speak. Taking Risks: Why you should always volunteer for the projects that scare you—because "if your goals don't scare you, they aren't big enough".If you want to learn how to break down silos and engineer value, this jam session is for you.

    42 min
  4. Start Me Up: MVK’s Guide to "Start Small, Fail Fast" with AI

    11/12/2025

    Start Me Up: MVK’s Guide to "Start Small, Fail Fast" with AI

    "Don't let IT select the technology." 🛑That is just one of the hard-hitting pieces of advice from Michael Van Keulen (MVK), Chief Customer Officer at Green Cabbage and former CPO at Coupa, Lululemon, and VF Corporation.In this jam session, MVK joins the Proc & Roll team to break down the explosion of the procurement tech market. With thousands of solutions now available, how do you choose the right stack? MVK argues that the days of the 500-question RFP are over and that tech selection must be treated as a business project, not a procurement one.In this episode, you’ll learn:The "Platform vs. Point Solution" Verdict: Why MVK believes you need a core "single source of truth" augmented by best-of-breed apps—and why trying to stitch together 10 different solutions is crazy.How NOT to Buy Tech: Why running a massive RFP is a mistake, and why you should focus on defining the business problem (like store visibility) rather than feature lists.The IT Trap: Why IT should be a partner, but never the decision-maker for your technology roadmap.AI Predictions: Why MVK and the team believe AI will eventually automate 50-80% of tactical procurement work, freeing us to finally focus on strategy.Implementation Secrets: The three top "Do's" for a successful rollout: Involve stakeholders early, prioritize people/process over tech, and treat it as a cross-functional business project.If you are navigating a digital transformation or struggling to get budget for new tools, this episode is your playbook.About Proc & RollProc & Roll is your guide to practical procurement, where we make procurement rock and roll. Hosted by industry veterans Natasha Gurevich, Conrad Smith, and Zachary Bachir, we tackle the biggest topics and trends to help you level up your procurement game.

    48 min

  5. 03/12/2025

    Better, Faster, Stronger: The Power of Agentic Workflows

    Can you build a fully functional AI procurement agent in just 50 hours? In this special "Show and Tell" episode, host Zachary Bachir rolls up his sleeves to demonstrate an AI intake agent he built from scratch using N8n, a low-code automation platform. Join Conrad, Natasha, and Zach for a hands-on look at the future of agentic workflows. Zach creates a live purchase requisition via email, and the agent parses the intent, checks it against procurement policy using RAG (Retrieval Augmented Generation), and drafts a perfect response, all without human intervention. You’ll learn: ✔️ How to Build Your Own Agent: A live demo of an orchestration agent that manages sub-agents (like a "Commercial Analyst" and "Compliance Analyst") to handle stakeholder requests. ✔️ Demystifying RAG: Zach explains how to use Retrieval Augmented Generation to turn unstructured data—like PDF contracts and policy documents—into a database your AI can actually read and use. ✔️ The "Buy vs. Build" Debate: Natasha challenges the risks of "Shadow AI." Should every procurement pro be building their own tools, or does this create chaos?. ✔️ The 50-Hour Investment: Why spending just one week learning these tools can make you a "dangerous" negotiator when buying tech from suppliers. ✔️ The Future of the Center of Excellence: Why procurement functions need to invest in internal technical teams to design these flows, even if the average buyer doesn't write code. If you’ve been waiting for a practical, under-the-hood look at how AI agents actually work, do not miss this episode.

    59 min
  6. The Age of Agents: Managing "Shadow AI" in Procurement

    26/11/2025

    The Age of Agents: Managing "Shadow AI" in Procurement

    "Just because you can build an AI agent in five minutes, doesn't mean you should use it for enterprise procurement." In this episode, Josh Earley joins the team for a deep dive into the often-overlooked but critical topic of AI governance. As employees start bringing their own AI tools to work, procurement faces a new wave of "shadow AI" risks—from unapproved contracts to broken workflows. Josh, Natasha, and Zach discuss how to build guardrails without stifling innovation and what the rise of autonomous agents means for the future of sourcing. You'll learn: ✔️ The "Shadow AI" Threat: Why "citizen developers" building unapproved workflows create massive risk for procurement . ✔️ The 150-Question RFP Problem: How suppliers will use AI to spam massive RFPs with unverified "AI slop" . ✔️ Governance 101: Josh's advice to "start small" by aligning Legal and Technology to build a policy framework . ✔️ Knowledge as a Commodity: A philosophical look at what happens when human expertise is uploaded into models .

    41 min
  7. I've Got the Power: Using AI to Even the Playing Field

    19/11/2025

    I've Got the Power: Using AI to Even the Playing Field

    What if you could automate the most painful parts of your procurement job right now? In this hands-on "jam session," Conrad is joined by David Johnson for a practical guide to using AI in procurement. David shares his incredible "origin story" of falling through a ceiling into a procurement career, and then dives into a live demo of how he uses Google's Notebook LM to revolutionize the RFP process. You’ll learn how to: ✔️ Automate RFP Analysis: Watch David demonstrate how he uses Notebook LM to instantly synthesize multiple vendor RFP responses, generate audio summaries, and query data with natural language. ✔️ Streamline Scoring: Learn how to use AI to build automated scorecards based on your requirements document and vendor responses. ✔️ Build Your Own AI Assistant: David explains the difference between Notebook LM and Gemini Gems, showing how to create a personalized AI "Gem" trained on your specific documents and tone. ✔️ Predict Outcomes: A look at the future of AI in strategic sourcing, where agents will model negotiation scenarios and analyze supplier financial reports to find leverage. ✔️ Embrace the Tools: Why AI isn't going to take your job, but it will take the "parts of your job you don't want to do," like auditing POs and redlining contracts. If you're ready to move beyond the hype and start using AI to solve real problems today, this episode is for you.

    55 min

  8. 05/11/2025

    I Won't Back Down: A Leader's Guide to Courage and Overcoming the Fear of AI Disruption

    As AI and automation change the procurement landscape, what skills will you actually need to stay relevant? Natasha, Conrad, and Zach break down how the profession is evolving from a narrow focus on savings to a strategic function centered on value, speed, and customer service. They provide a practical guide on the new critical skills required for CPOs, directors, and individual contributors to thrive in the age of AI. You’ll learn about the new skills for: ✔️ The CPO (Chief Procurement Officer): The CPO's role is shifting to that of an "inspirer" and a "catalyst of a change". Natasha argues CPOs will spend as much as 70% of their time on "sales"—selling their vision to the organization. They must be "knowledgeable enough to ask the right questions" about new tech and possess the "intuition" to "zoom in on the things that matter". ✔️ Directors & Mid-Level Leaders: This level needs an "absolute willingness and even enthusiasm around change". They must also be "bolder" in hiring to bring in diverse skill sets like data science and coding to build a more capable team. ✔️ Individual Contributors & Category Managers: As AI automates technical knowledge, "soft skills" like EQ are being prioritized. The hosts suggest hiring people with backgrounds in English and philosophy , warning that if 80% of your job is done by ChatGPT, "you're not going to have that position for a very long time". The key is to use AI to "elevate your thinking," not replace it. Ultimately, the hosts conclude that as technology takes over tactical work, the "human side of things" and skills like "influence, impact, and empowering" are "more important than ever" at every level of the organization.

    43 min
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About

Welcome to Proc n Roll, where nearly 70 years of combined procurement expertise come together. Join Natasha, the PRO CPO with experience at IBM, McKesson, Salesforce, and Nike; Zach, the procurement guru from London; and Conrad, the visionary innovator behind transformational procurement at Intel and Adobe. We dive into the latest trends shaping the procurement landscape while breaking down the essential building blocks for success. Whether you’re new to procurement or a seasoned expert, our discussions will inspire you and keep you grounded in real-world value.

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