Ensuring sustainability in the supply chain: embedding sustainability into our procurement practice

How would you describe your role at Diageo and what’s the most exciting thing about it? 

As a Procurement Manager, my role is to choose the right suppliers and build mutually beneficial strong working relationships with them. Our main priority in Procurement is finding suppliers that can fulfil our quality requirements and have reliable schedules. We then evaluate their proposal from a financial point of view and their alignment with Diageo's Spirit of Progress – such as our ambitions to provide all of our local sourcing communities with agricultural skills and resources, building economic and environmental resilience and our aim to achieve zero waste in our direct operations and in our supply chain. 

I love the pace and complexity of Procurement. Our team is ambitious and with there quite often being no obvious path, it is intellectually challenging to summarize all this complexity and make a recommendation to our leadership. 

Grain is particularly interesting. Linking commodity management, brand provenance and our sustainability is not straightforward at all.

Tell us about how this role works with farmers / the farming community? 

I negotiate on behalf of Diageo with farmers or traders, depending on the type of grain and location. Therefore, I need to make sure that our partners know the aspects we value such as high quality and sustainability. We are looking for opportunities to build and grow our business with diverse suppliers whilst also reducing our carbon footprint and water usage. 

The Farming Sustainability Assessment (FSA) programme helps in supporting farmers to become more sustainable – can you tell us more about this initiative? 

I am proud to work for a company that is committed to sustainability. We are working on scaling up the Farming Sustainability Assessment (FSA) programme, intending to engage farmers to apply best practices with the intention to reduce water usage, carbon emissions and the impact on biodiversity. Consumers are demanding that their favourite brands do the right thing. As a Diageo employee, I am proud to see that we are doing it.

What has been your involvement in this initiative and why does this matter to you?  

It is clear to us that 100% of grain must come from FSA certified farms; this is important to Diageo and its iconic brands but also to the communities we serve. Beyond that, these good practices will reduce our environmental impact.

It is my role to engage our partners in the program, build long-term relationships and monitor their progress. This initiative is also happening outside of North America, so we are working in partnership with Global Procurement. 

What is your career advice for someone looking to join Procurement? 

The Procurement function requires both hard and soft skills. The job is constantly changing, and these changes are accelerating, so its complexity is growing every day. When I started eight years ago, the focus was on margin enhancement through negotiations and projects while securing supply and quality. Nowadays, we are also working on reducing our environmental impact and driving spend with minority-owned businesses. All of it at the same time! Complexity has grown exponentially. 

Therefore, to adapt to an ever-changing environment, I recommend newcomers to focus on developing their leadership skills and learning new tricks. Coaching is a great way to develop these soft skills, while keeping an eye on how the industry is changing. During the pandemic, I learned to program in Python and I have been applying it to my daily work – it has been paying off well!

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