New CIPS president tells buyers to consider the 'three Rs'

Buyers must do something every day to work on relationships and reputation - key elements that help them do their job and succeed in their careers.

The advice comes from new CIPS president, Shirley Cooper, whose 12-month tenure officially began yesterday.

In an interview with Supply Management magazine, Cooper said leadership was about "reputation, relationships, right now".

"It is core to everything I do and everything that everybody should be doing," she said. "There's nothing fluffy about relationship management.

"It can be the difference between strategic success or failure. The ability to engage and persuade others is vital."

The procurement and supply chain services director at Computacenter plans to work with CIPS over the coming year around this theme. "I want to pull it together under one banner. What is a relationship and what should it look like? What is a toxic relationship and how do you achieve good ones? Have you mapped out the relationships that are most important to you and checked if the ones you spend most time on correlate to those?"

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