Review

Review progress against your organisation’s sustainability goals

You should regularly assess procurement progress against your organisation's sustainability goals. This involves setting up mechanisms that will prompt category managers to evaluate how each contract's sustainability performance aligns with and contributes to your overall sustainable procurement objectives. Important factors to review include adherence to sustainability target areas and KPIs, the effectiveness of efforts to engage and support sustainability, and the robustness of supplier data and data management systems.

The review process will help identify areas of concern and reveal opportunities for improvement. For any sustainability concerns that are recurrent, systemic, or severe, consider undertaking a root cause analysis to understand where these issues occur in the value chain or procurement process and what could be done differently next time to avoid them.

EXAMPLE: Using data for performance review

The Public Procurement Office (PPO) of Lithuania launched a procurement scoreboard for public authorities, capturing all 30 product groups and including procurement information.¹ The PPO collects data on technical specifications, award criteria, and clauses. Then machine-readable green performance data is added by suppliers and verified by procurers. This enables procurement performance reviews and learning

Identify gaps and lessons learned

Use your post-review process to reflect on gaps in your approach to sustainable procurement and the lessons learned. This involves an inward examination of your procurement process and an assessment of external factors such as emerging trends and changing market conditions. As you uncover new insights, hotspots, and areas for improvement, updating things like your value chain map and reassessing product and service life cycles becomes an iterative process, furthering your understanding of the sustainability landscape.

A critical part of the reflection process is engaging diverse groups, including both your internal teams and suppliers. This is not only about gaining broader perspectives, but also build stronger relationships and wider buy-in to improvement plans.

Develop action plans to address gaps

Leverage the findings from your reviews to shape action plans that enhance future performance and capitalise on sustainability successes. Consider what led to successful outcomes and how these can be replicated or adapted to other sustainability issues or purchasing categories.

In cases where supplier sustainability performance falls short of expectations, your action plans should outline solutions. For instance, this could be the renegotiation of contracts to include expanded or altered sustainable deliverables. Or, in some cases, you may need a more fundamental change that requires restarting the procurement life cycle, beginning with fresh market testing.

Consistently engaging in this assessment, reflection, and action planning process at the end of the procurement cycle will ensure procurement processes evolve and improve, driving your organisation towards its sustainability objectives.

EXAMPLE: Starbucks bridges sustainability gaps through innovative procurement

After identifying gaps in their goal to make their cups 100% recyclable, Starbucks initiated the "NextGen Cup Challenge."³ Realising their current cup design was a significant sustainability gap, they looked for new, fully recyclable or compostable designs. Starbucks collaborated with closed-loop partners and suppliers to roll out pilot tests, altering its procurement cycle to introduce innovation in cup design.