Name: SC 1st Dec 2025
Uploaded: 2025-11-28T15:42:18.486Z
Duration: 30 min 30 s
Description: SC 1st Dec 2025

Transcript for "SC 1st Dec 2025": Hello, everyone, and welcome to our webinar in partnership with Amazon Business. My name is Tom Chapman. I am the editor in chief of Supply Chain Digital, Procurement Magazine, and Manufacturing Digital. Today's webinar is part of an ongoing series with Amazon Business where we explore the big issues keeping supply chain, procurement, and manufacturing leaders up at night. Make sure you visit the webinar section on the supply chain digital website for plenty more insights, expertise, and success stories. I'd also just like to mention our procurement and supply chain live event series, which promises to be bigger and better than ever in 2026. We'll be having plenty more conversations relatively similar to this one along the lines of procurement, supply chain, and, of course, manufacturing. And, we're gonna be, visiting cities including Chicago, London, and, many more. But back to today's session, we're gonna be discussing compliance sourcing strategies for the health care industry. Now health care procurement is one of the most challenging arenas in supply chain management. On the one hand, procurement teams must navigate a highly regulated environment dealing with stringent accreditation standards, traceability requirements, and strict auditability. On the other hand, they're under constant pressure, of course, to drive efficiency, reduce costs, and ensure resilience in their supplier networks. That's why today's conversation is so timely. We hope over the next thirty five, forty minutes, we'll explore compliance sourcing approaches specifically tailored to health care, helping you balance the imperatives of regulatory compliance and operational agility. Now we've got lots to cover and not too much time to do it in, so let's dive right in. I'm very pleased to be joined today by Hugh Amiel, senior director of procurement and supply chain at University Health Network. Hugh brings a wealth of hands on experience in managing procurement frameworks in a highly regulated health care system. Hugh, it's, fantastic to have you with us today. Would you mind just starting, please, just by introducing yourself? Tell us a little bit about you and your role. Sure. Glad to be here. Happy happy and excited to be to be a part of the the the podcast today. So, as you noted, so I'm the senior director of procurement supply chain at University Health Network. University Health Network is a is a, a network of of hospitals in in Toronto, Canada. Canada's biggest hospital network as well as ranked number number three in the world and the top publicly funded hospital in the world. So very big. We have about forty forty four thousand employees at our hospital with with, four different main hospitals, but nine different hospital sites with with within our within our hospital. And for me, I manage end to end procurement and supply chain for for for the full network. I've been at UHF now for about fourteen I'll be fourteen years in in January. So we were very exciting times, lots of changes, lots of movement. Absolutely. Yeah. I can certainly imagine in in fourteen, fifteen years, there's been plenty of change from a a procurement and supply chain perspective. Now, Hugh, let's let's dive right in. I wanna kinda start with a a real sort of over overview, really, I suppose, of of the compliance landscape in in health care health care procurement. How can procurement teams, you know, from from your experience, really stay ahead at the moment of those evolving regulatory and accreditation requirements? Yeah. I mean, I I think that the big the big key is agility. As as you know, the the world that we live in today, you know, those requirements change almost on a daily, weekly business. Like, the geopolitical situations, you know, you hear the talk of tariffs all over the place, supply shortages. You know? We're we're not not immune to to, weather disruptions depending on where things are manufactured and and shipping. So it's it's it's a it's a it's a real, complex world, I'd say, we live in today. The other thing that I I would say is there's a lot of, you know, globalization. So, you know, what the pandemic taught us is that we truly are in a global marketplace. So there's no longer, hey. Sort of circle the wagons around yourself here in in Canada, to protect yourself. But you truly are in the global marketplace when you talk about supplies, manufacturing, logistics, and how how things work. So the ability to stay agile, is is huge. You gotta be able to shift with with with the market. It's very hard now these days to turn on your your TV or not hear a politician talking about supply chain and procurement, whereas before we were sort of like like the hidden hidden entity. When you go to the amusement park, you know, we were the back end of the amusement park, with doing all the work where people enjoyed the rides. Now now it's Absolutely. Absolutely. No. It's it's a great way of of, putting it in a and illustrating the point. Now just honing in that little bit more then on compliance, are you able to give us maybe some of those common compliance pitfalls that that health care organizations face at the at the present time? And maybe, you know, of course, there might be some unique ones that that can in the Canada and the in the Canadian and North American market. And how can how can those pitfalls be avoided perhaps? Well, I I think changing rules. Right? One I think one of the biggest pitfalls you see today, and it's more historical procurement. It's always been looked at as, you know, about saving money and getting the cheapest price. Right? So the the it's one of the key things that that is never off the table for us. We always wanna get the best price. But in today's marketplace, it's very you know, given, you know, most of the regulations are on procurement in every country. You know, we there's a requirement to to go out to market. The requirement for fair, open, transparent procurement is universal no matter what you do when you when you're in a competitive situation. But if you link that to a lot of the push to, hey. We wanna save money. We wanna get the cheapest price. We wanna get the cheapest price. Nowadays, when you go to market, in all likelihood in the marketplace, your price is not coming down. A lot of times, your price is going up these days. And so, you know, one of the biggest pitfalls is the things that, you know, building your strategy around, hey. Let's combine as much volume as we can. Let's get as many many people, as many hospitals together. Let's go out to market together, and we're gonna get the cheapest price ever. And sometimes that works for certain things, but sometimes it doesn't work anymore. And I think that's one of the biggest pitfalls that people have. I I think we have to change the way we look at procurement, change the way we we look at value in in procurement. So I I'll give you an example. So if I have my procurement dollar to spend, as a hospital, the way we are starting to look at procurement right now is like, hey. What's the best patient impact? What's the best patient outcome I can get for my procurement dollar? Not necessarily what's the cheapest thing I'm gonna get for my procurement dollar because the cheapest thing may not provide the the best patient outcome. Mhmm. Absolutely. It's a good point. And, obviously, we can't can't neglect those patient outcomes, of course, being that, you know, they're all fundamental of of, of the industry. So expanding expanding the conversation, I suppose, to to the supplier network as as naturally we would do in a a procurement and supply chain conversation. What best practices and hopefully, you can give us some real sort of, insider insight here. What best practices can be implemented to ensure supplier qualification and and audit readiness, I suppose, in in that real regulated environment? Yeah. So I mean, we we deploy a few things these days. So one of the key things that that we do is is from a from an internal perspective is understanding your spend. So where is your money being spent? What what what, and and data becomes the new oil when we talk about procurement and that understanding. So in order for you to go to market and to be successful in this marketplace, you truly have to know and understand your spend. What am I spending it on? Where am I spending? Who am I spending it on? Is one of the key things. The second key thing I would say is you have to understand your mark the marketplace that you're going out to. So that that may involve different vendor consultations that you it may involve putting things out like request for a supplier information to understand the marketplace. Is the thing I'm asking for even even available out there, and what does it look like? One of the the the things that we've done traditionally in in procurement is to you know, we we have a need, but we identify a need. We take that need and then we look internally and say, okay. What do we need? What do we want? What's our then we put together the scope of work. This is what we want. This is what we need. And then we go out to the marketplace. We say, here, marketplace. This is what we need, and here's how you're gonna score it. We're gonna put so many points on experience. We're gonna put so many points on you meeting the scope. We're gonna put so many points on pricing. So as a vendor now, you come out and you take a look at that that RFP or or or that document that I sent out to you or or tenders I sent out to you, and you look through it, you look at the score, and you say, okay. In order for me to be successful, I have to meet this criteria. But you also look at it and say, hey. I see what they're asking for here, and I know that I could probably deliver a better solution if I did it this way, this way, but I'm afraid to to do that because I may not win because I'm not gonna hit what they're asking for to get these points. Right? And so you see a lot of times where vendors do that and they say, okay. Well, let me just give them what they want, even though I know that there could be a better solution out there. So for us, what we've done, we we've changed the way that we we do a lot of our procurements around that, around that possibility. We started to do things like competitive dialogues where instead of dictating a detailed scope, we go up to market with a with a with a our problem statement. Hey. This is the problem that we're having, or this is this is the thing that is going on that we're that we're looking to do. And then we invite the market and just tell us, hey. You know, we we we may shortlist and depending on on what that that thing is, we we may have about three or four vendors that meet our shortlist that we bring in and say, okay. Let's sit down and have a discussion now. This is our problem. And we may have four or five different different, dialogue sessions with different vendors, and information doesn't go from room to room. How how do we confidential process? So the vendors feel very comfortable, and we do sign confidentiality agreements within the the dialogue sessions to make sure that that vendors know that their information is not going from room to room. And so we're able to have these discussions about our problem and get the feedback from the vendors. And at the end of that that dialogue session, we we get an outcome based solution from each of those vendors. We take those solutions, now we can put them together and say, hey. Based on our conversations with the marketplace, we now know that this is what we need to go to market for, and then we issue the final RFP. Instead of doing the guessing work at the front and say, you know, here here's what we we want, guys. Go give it to us even though you as a vendor has the expertise and even know that there's a better solution. So, I mean, those are the types of things that we're doing now. A little bit nontraditional in Canada. I I know there's definitely different parts of the world that this stuff has been going on for quite some time. But for us in Canada, it's a relatively new way to look at procurement and and how we engage the vendor community to solve solve our our issues. Great. That's Hugh, that's fantastic. Really sort of eye opening insight. You've you've mentioned already, the the changing priorities, I suppose, you know, from a procurement perspective that that you've seen over the past, you know, fifteen or so years. So then today, in terms of striking, you know, with with that word balance, it comes up a lot. But how from your perspective can procurement leaders really strike that right balance between due diligence and the need for agility and speed? Yeah. I no. I I agree. And and I think that a lot of it is is commodity based. Right? Depending on what you're going to market for and and and, you know, service. Right? And so, you know, there's two sides to what I'd say health care procurement. There's the clinical side and the and the nonclinical side. And, you know, we sort of want research in with with the clinical side, because people tell you there's probably five sides to it, but but clinical and nonclinical. One of the things that that's interesting is we we spend probably more money on the nonclinical side than we actually spend on the clinical side. So keeping the the things going, keeping the lights on, keeping the building up to date, and and doing that work. Right? A lot of that stuff and and you think about IT, and, and and the role that IT plays in in procurement even on the clinical side today is huge. Almost every piece of equipment we buy has some sort of IT technology related to it. So when you think about those things on that side of the house, a lot of procurement that we do is is very straightforward, what I what I would call meat and meat and potato procurement. Right? So where, you know, you're going out to buy buy hardware and and things like like like that where traditional procurement works works great, and you can do some of that. Hey. Let's put the volume together, and let's try to get the lowest price. I'm gonna buy an iPhone or whatsoever. So an iPhone is an iPhone. So what's the lowest price I'm gonna get on on on that iPhone? On the clinical side of the house, it's it's a it's a lot lot different. So as again, so the intent is to make sure that we're providing the best service, the best outcome for for our patients. And in doing so, we we are more creative with our with our procurements. We we, you know, we we do procure from all over the world. We have to worry about sustainability. We have to worry about the the environment as as well too. So these are all things that factor into our our our decision making as to how do we go to market? How do how do we balance, you know, cost versus these these other things, you know, equity sustainability? We we talk a lot about that in the in environment, and sometimes there's a cost related to it. Things like using recyclable, reusable products versus onetime disposable products, things like that factor in, in in terms of how we go to market and things that we judge. So there there is that delicate balance because at the end of the day, we're a public hospital, and we have to be stoop stewards of the public's money. But we also want the best outcome for our patients and balancing that quality. Right? It's what we call, for my team, the rights of procurement. Right? So you want the right product, the right quality, right place, right time, right cost. Right? And so how do you how do you balance those those those five rights to to to get the right outcome? Absolutely. I can't imagine that straightforward. That's a lot of a lot of factors to to consider there. Inevitably then, I suppose, technology comes into it. It's, you know, it wouldn't be a a proper conversation, on our topic today without discussing technology and really how to leverage technology to drive transparency and efficiency. And I'm sure you mentioned sustainability there. I'm sure that comes into this as well. From your experience, what digital tools or platforms are really supporting documentation, that traceability, and and compliance reporting in in, in modern day procurement. Huge. Right? So so so, you know, one thing that we say to people all the time, we like, it's it's probably about a fifty fifty. We spend as much time documenting and improving what we did as opposed as well as doing it. So it's probably a fifty fifty. So technology plays a a huge role. You know, just like most other industries, there's a lot of automation that's being built into procurement supply chain now, especially on on the data side. As I mentioned a little bit earlier, like, data is a new oil. So the the better understanding I have of my spend, the the the quicker I can get to that understanding, the quicker I can go through and and run data and see what's happening in my organization, have my thumb on it, the better I'm able to respond, the better I'm able to strategize around around procurement. How do I go how do I go to market? But, also, as as you can imagine, there's a lot of reporting that goes back to different areas. So our funders, you know, we have a lot of, government funding in our organization. So there's accountability to that to that funding. So being able to understand the pool reporting and everything else that goes right up from my executive team right into the the government levels, is highly important. So the quicker I can get that done, the the the faster that we can put tools in place to get that done, I could spend more time on the strategic part of the work and and getting procurements and getting those outcomes. So we we deploy a lot of tools. We we use a lot of AI. One of the things that we're working on now, we're literally just in the middle of implementing a new, invoice ingestion, app application that will allow us to move from a place where, you know, from our invoice ingestion, we're about 80% manual today in this day and age. At the end of this this process that that we're going through, this implementation that we're going through, we'll we'll only be about 15% manual and and we'll be we'll, again, we'll be 8085%, you know, automated with with with an AI tool. So that's a huge change for us. It's about a a a six month, implementation, but by fusion. And so that allows to be streamlined quicker and then take those those resources and redeploy them in the organization to be more strategic and and and use them to to get better outcomes. So, I mean, AI plays a huge role in in what we're doing today. Automation plays a huge role, even when we go to market. The tools that we use to go to market, the tools that we use to evaluate are are all online tools now and evaluate it and evaluate it in that way. Gone are the days where you used to put this this paper document out there, and then everybody you know, all the bidders would send you back these binders, and then you'd have to have a binder for everybody evaluating. So you get these boxes of binders, that come back, and then you gotta distribute them. There's costs associated with that, the printing, the paper. Everything is online and electronic these days. Absolutely. Yeah. You can just picture the the stacks of paper and folders and binders. Yeah. It's quite the, quite the task to to, to deal with all of that. I wonder then, sticking with, you know, really the technological side of things, and and, again, that word that word balance, I suppose, how can technology, just summarizing, really help procurement teams achieve achieve the balance or or strike the balance between compliance efficiency on the one side and commercial efficiency on the other? Yeah. I think what how technology helps is is some of the things, especially when you talk about compliance. With with the new tools that we have, a lot of the the the things that we need to do to be compliance are actually built into the tools. So some of it is you don't necessarily have to think from, procurement to procurement. Oh my gosh. I gotta remember this. I gotta remember that. So it's it's already built into a lot of the automated tools that we have, especially around bidding, and and and and evaluation. And you're right. It is it is striking that balance because you just there's still even though there's a lot of automation, there's still that touch and feel that is required, especially on on the clinical side of the house. So it's great to have that automation and to be able to speed up the process. But we still do the things like a lot of things like clinical trials, bring product in, where it's actually the the touch and feel of the clinician or physician that is doing the work that that and and there's kinda there's no way to really speed that up. Speed that part of it up. And so we we definitely can can make the roads smoother in terms of getting to that point. And then when we hit that point, you you want people to be very comfortable. I mean, I always say to my my, my, end users that, listen. I want my physicians to be very comfortable with whatever there is that that they're using to to do their their jobs because one day I may be a patient. So it's it's it's it's that's always the forefront of what of of what we do, even with all the automation. It it does definitely help us to speed up the process, but but it it also allows us to take more time in the areas that that need more time. Absolutely. Yeah. It's a good point. I suppose that reminded them that one day they could be a patient is, yeah, it's probably a bit of a bit of a motivator, I suppose. It sounds like a a useful way to to go about it. So we've covered we've covered so much already, Hugh. I just wanna sidestep slightly to a couple of our, presubmitted, audience questions. I'm gonna grab this one out, which may sort of cover some some of some of the bits we've already looked at. But it goes along the lines of, in a fast paced health care environment like yours, how do you balance the need for strict supplier qualification and audit processes with pressure to act quickly, especially when clinical teams have urgent needs? Quite a long on that, Hugh, but, can you can you tackle that for us? I I think you have to. I I think it's it's it's it's mandatory. Right? And and so and to your point, like, the the the questioner's point, you do have to have that that that that balance. You you do have to be able to turn things over quickly, but you wanna do it in a way that's safe and that you're getting the best qualified. So one of the tools that we use is is shortlisting. Right? So when you have some shortlisting, stuff in in the beginning of organization. So as an example, you go to market, and you could get 20 bids. You can get 30 bids. But you don't necessarily have time to to do thirty thirty trials, especially on the clinical side of the house. And so you're building your shortlisting criteria that you know, you know, your mandatory requirements if if you wanna say that says, hey. We're we're gonna judge you on on these things that we know are are essential for for us to get to where we wanna go, and and we're gonna take the the top three scores out of those things. And so for the first part of our process, you know, we'll we'll look at all 20, but we'll only judge them on a specific level of criteria that would take them into our our top three. Once we get to our our our top three, now we have a more streamlined look where we we get to dig deeper into into the outcome. So one of the things we use is is that gating process that allows us to, a, quickly break down who are who are the top people in the marketplace and then get to the next stage where where where we where we get to really dig into the scope and who's capable of delivering what we need. I I see a lot more organizations are are are are doing that. And, again, it's it's striking that balance between speed and I need this thing now, but I also want the best outcome. And you can't negate quality. Quality is always gonna be number one because at the end of everything we do, there's there's a person, there's a patient. Hugh, I'm gonna go to one of our our other, presubmitted questions, which reads along the lines of, is there a digital tool or platform you've implemented in your procurement function that significantly improved compliance, transparency, or traceability? I'm not sure if there's anyone you can you can name drop there. And and they've also asked, was it life changing? I don't know if they mean for procurement or has it saved lives, but I'll I'll I'll let you, answer that one. So so I think the answer is yes. So, like, we we actually just went through an ERP a a new ERP implementation. And, I mean, I'm not ashamed to say we we did go with SAP s four HANA with with with Ariba, which is, again, not not foreign to anybody that's in procurement. The one of the world leaders in this space. What I could tell you is it greatly enhanced our our ability to to pull data, to to go through data. It's a really good system. It automated a a ton of stuff. It's like I I tell people, you know, we had this fishnet before, and there was holes in it, so you didn't necessarily catch everything. But now we have we built this way better fish net, through SAP that catches everything, and so we're able to understand our spend better. We're able to understand our spend quicker. We're able to take that and use that to be more strategic. So I think that's one of the key things that we're doing right now. Now we're building enhancements and automation into what we bought with SAP, Sfour 100, with Ariba. So so that's that has been very, very beneficial for us. The other software I would say that we use and that has been hugely beneficial to us is our our evaluation tool. We use a tool called Bonfire for our our our internal evaluations. I'm not sure if everybody is aware of what Bonfire is, but you wanna go look them up. It's greatly you know, I talked about the automation that we do in evaluation. This is our tool that allows us to do it, and the the ability of that within the tool and the traceability, within the tool to to view evaluations as they're going along to segregate different things is is just amazing. I would say those are the two tools that we currently have deployed in our system that's gone a long way into making us agile and and, and quick quick out the box and and quick while we're in the box as well too. Yeah. Absolutely great. No. Thank you. We appreciate you you sharing that. And then just one final, a question from our from our audience, which, is for someone just starting out in hospital procurement, and I think health care procurement as well, What skills or best practices would you would you recommend focusing on, in those in those early days? And I suppose this this might differ a bit slightly from when you from when you were starting out in the field. Yeah. I I think one of the one of the key skills is is, again, is is, is the ability to be agile and and the ability to to almost project manage because each procurement is is is like a a project management. You you have to listen to your end user. You have to understand their their need. And then, you know, we're not the the clinical expert, but we're the design experts when it comes to procurement. And so the ability to sort of listen and understand the the the need, and then take that and and to build the the best the best vehicle to to look for the outcome that that they they want is huge. I'd say good business acumen is good. So a good understanding of business and how how how things work. You don't necessarily need to be a a CA or or a CPA in terms of the numbers, but it having a good business understanding is is is helpful. Also, I would say, people that have been successful in our industry are are good people people. Right? So you're able to sit down and have these conversations. You're able to influence where influence needs need to be. Because one of the things that we're as part of our work, we're we're the regulators as well too of of of all these different laws, rules, policies, and trade agreements that are around the world. So, you know, lots of times people wanna go out and say, q. I just wanna go buy this. Can I just go get it? Like, I I know what I want. I said, okay. Well, you know, there's a process that we have to follow to make sure that, that we're not doing anything around to work, that we're not compromising the organization or anybody else, and we're getting value for money. So being able to to sit with your end users, being a people person to understand them and to lead them, as as well as being a a good listener. And then being agile. The ability to be agile is is huge in our business. The environment we work in is in is agile, so you have to be able to to to switch in in with the environment. And you're constantly learning. It it's a constant, it's a situation where you're constantly learning. There's new things happening all the time. There's new trade agreements. There's new policies. There's new ways of doing procurement. We share a lot with our with our our, counterparts all over Canada, all over the world in different industries, not just health care, to understand what's going on in that industry. What have you guys learned? What have you done? And and we share trade secrets. That's what I'd say. So, you know, podcasts like this where where you could sit down and talk to people, and you could spread get information and make these connections is hugely important in our industry as well too. So I would say those are the things that you wanna focus on as well too. We believe to to be agile, good business acumen, good PMing. Networking is always huge. What's everybody else doing? What's going on out there in the world to educate yourself and stay on top of what's going on? Absolutely. Absolutely. Now I wanna end you in a in a way that I, I always do, which is is by looking ahead, really. And, you know, seems seems even more natural to do that as we sort of approach the end of 2025 and look ahead to 2026. So what's really on the on the horizon for you? What's on the agenda in in 2026 from a from a procurement perspective, you know, working in health care? I I think it's all I mean, the the big things that are going on is, again, supply. Right? Being able to to work in this global market of of of constant change and and trade and making sure that we have supplies secured for for our organizations, our patients, and our and our country. So I think that's huge. Also, managing the the economic situation where where, you know, more and more we're being asked to do more with with less. And I don't I don't think that's different from any industry out there, definitely in health care, and always to focus on doing so in a way that provides the best patient outcome. So, you know, as as I said, Julie, for it's the rights of procurement. Right? Right product, right or service, right place, right type, right quality, right price. And then balancing that with with everything that's going on around us in terms of the environmental needs and sustainability and be willing to keep that supply chain open and flowing. Great stuff. Hugh, that's wonderful. It's been it's been a fascinating conversation. However, I'm afraid that is all we've got time for for today. Hugh, thanks so much again for for you to you for for sparing your time. We'll speak again soon. No doubt, perhaps bump into each other at one of our events next year, I hope, in, in be it in London or or Chicago. Sounds like a pen, Tom. Thanks for having me. Really appreciate you and the work that you do. Great. No. It's been a pleasure. Now the the recording of the webinar will be available shortly. So if you so desire, you can come back and watch it all over again. You can also catch more webinars over on the Supply Chain Digital website. Just head to supplychaindigital.com. Thanks again to you all for watching. Bye for now.