Interim procurement director for a sale, acquisition or cost programme

Every engagement is managed by the founder, Matt Buckley, who spent 16 years leading procurement at bp and General Motors in six regions. We do not keep a bench of interim resources or place other people under the Caventis name. Each assignment starts with objectives, measurable goals and a strategy agreed with you, and nothing is signed or switched without your approval.

Interim procurement through a sale or acquisition

Transactions put procurement under pressure at exactly the moment nobody has time for it. A buyer wants to see the supplier base, the contracts and the risks. A seller wants the cost base to look as strong as it can. After completion, two sets of suppliers and contracts need to become one.

An interim procurement director can lead that work: preparing the supplier and contract picture for procurement due diligence, identifying change-of-control clauses and supplier concentration, and planning the integration of the supplier base once the deal closes. The role ends when the transaction does, with a clear handover to the people who will run the function afterwards.

Running a cost programme

A cost programme needs one person who owns the plan, the supplier conversations and the evidence that savings are real. Without that person, programmes stall in the gap between finance setting a target and the business changing what it buys.

As interim lead, we run the programme from spend review to signed contracts: choosing the categories worth tackling, re-tendering and renegotiating, and reporting progress to the CFO or board. Savings are evidenced and signed off by your finance team. For a programme scoped as a project rather than an interim role, see our cost reduction consultants service.

Interim cover often starts with the price analysis nobody has had time to do. We break the price into materials, labour, overhead and margin so the negotiation is about cost drivers, not goodwill. See how we build a should-cost model.

Building a procurement function

Some businesses have grown past the point where buying can be left to each department, but have never had a procurement function. Others have a function that lost its direction when its leader left. In both cases the interim's job is to stabilise what exists, set policies and approval routes, decide which categories need active management, and hand over a working operating model to the permanent hire.

For the sequence a new procurement leader typically follows, see our guide to a new procurement director's first 90 days. For a longer-term redesign of the function, see procurement transformation.

Category management for spend without an owner

In most businesses some spend areas have no owner. Facilities, fleet, IT, marketing or professional services contracts renew each year because nobody is responsible for checking them. We take on category management for those areas for a defined period: building a view of the spend, setting a sourcing plan and running the tenders, then handing the categories back to named owners inside your business.

Fractional CPO and part-time procurement leadership

Not every business needs a full-time procurement leader. A fractional CPO works with you part of the week, giving procurement a seat in leadership discussions, setting priorities and making the decisions that a buyer or finance team cannot make alone.

A fractional procurement director suits businesses that have outgrown ad hoc buying but do not yet need a full-time chief procurement officer, or that want senior oversight of an existing team. The time commitment is agreed at the start and reviewed as the needs of the business change. Read our fractional CPO guide.

Outsourced procurement

Outsourced procurement means handing some or all procurement activity to an outside party instead of building an in-house team. It can cover a few categories or the whole function, and it suits businesses that want procurement discipline without adding permanent headcount.

Procurement outsourcing works best when the business keeps control of decisions and owns every supplier relationship. Where the need is project-based advice rather than ongoing leadership, our procurement consultancy service may be a better fit.

Interim or permanent hire

A permanent procurement hire takes months to find and longer to become effective. When a deal, a programme or a leadership gap cannot wait that long, interim procurement closes the gap: an experienced procurement director for a defined period, with knowledge transfer built in for when the permanent hire arrives.

Interim is not always the answer. If the need is permanent and the timetable allows, a permanent hire is usually the better choice, and we will say so in the introductory call.

How we work

• Objectives, scope and the period agreed in a short call and a one-page brief
• Scope and commercial terms agreed with you before the assignment starts
• Weekly reporting into the CFO, CEO or investor sponsor
• Handover pack and playbook at the end of the assignment

Frequently asked questions