- the Procurement Blueprint
- Posts
- I quit procurement
I quit procurement
(The story I never told anyone)
Hi everyone! You’re reading The Procurement Blueprint, now trusted by over 6,000 procurement professionals around the world. In a world drowning in recycled AI takes, you will find original thought leadership here, shaped by real procurement experience.
🎓 If you’re building capability or influence in procurement, here’s how I can help you:
Explore my practical Procurement Templates (built from 20+ years experience)
Join the waiting list for my live AI for Procurement course
Book me to deliver AI for Procurement training to your team
Sponsor this newsletter and reach 6,500+ engaged procurement professionals
Buy my book to build the judgement AI cannot replace
HI THERE
In life, and most importantly, in our careers, I feel we spend so much time asking “Can I get there?” when the better question might be “Do I want to live there?”
My mind has been chewing these thoughts for a while as if they were actual bubble gum, so I made them the main theme in today’s piece under Procurement by Design.
First, a quick note on the new weekly format. After last week’s edition, a few of you messaged me to say it felt easier to read. That was exactly the goal I had in mind with the change so I’m keeping it that way!
Today’s article is a very personal one (don’t get used to it! 😋) because I have told very few people in my life this story. It’s about a point in my career when the obvious next step in front of me felt visible and within reach yet I chose something different because I questioned whether I wanted the long-term lifestyle that came with it.
If you’re aiming for a top role in procurement, or in any field, you may also relate.
Alongside the article, I’ve also published a new top quality freebie: How to Buy AI from a Procurement Perspective. If you’re planning to join my AI for Procurement course in late spring, we’ll go deeper there. If not, this guide stands on its own and will give you a solid commercial foundation. You’ll find it in the usual freebie section, but since I know this is going to be a very requested guide, only for 2 days.
Now, let’s get into it…
Procurement by Design
The Cost of the CPO Seat
For most of my twenties and early thirties, I assumed my career had a fairly obvious direction.
You move from building procurement capability to leading procurement teams. From leading teams to owning a region. From owning a region to eventually owning the function.
When I was Head of Indirects for Northern Europe at adidas, that path to me felt very tangible and achievable - I was only two seats down from being CPO. Before that, I had spent nearly four years building a large indirect procurement department from scratch and only one seat away. I was designing the operating model, hiring the team, setting governance, introducing systems where none existed before and managing the change. It was without a shadow of a doubt one of the most formative experiences of my career. It taught me how fragile procurement is if the foundations are wrong, and how powerful it becomes when they align.
At adidas (this is how you spell it correctly btw, not “Adidas”) the next step was clear. Promotion was possible, but not from Manchester where I lived. If I wanted to progress, I would have had to relocate to HQ in Germany.
I lived and breathed the adidas brand while heading Indirect Procurement for the Norther European markets
On paper, that is a small detail but my personal reality forced it to be a much bigger question.
Because by that point I had worked closely enough with CPOs to understand what their job actually involved. Not the external narrative that is more visible of strategy and influence, but the structural reality of their day-to-day.
Hopefully you understand that a CPO, an actual CPO (not VP, not Head-of) role is not primarily about sourcing excellence but their focus is more around institutional accountability.
It is being the name attached to a savings number that gets reported to the board. It is managing large-scale change across functions that may not really want to change. It is making decisions that affect people’s roles and sometimes their livelihoods. It is balancing the expectations of a CFO focused on margin, a CEO focused on growth, and a business that wants speed.
It is travel, visibility and a permanent exposure to scrutiny.
This choice was given to me on a silver plate: stay at adidas in hope of becoming CPO one day (with its consequent relocation), leave to do the same thing somewhere else or do something else entirely. At that point is when I realised something that surprised me.
I really, REALLY, did not want that version of leadership as a lifestyle. At all.
I enjoy complexity. In my current consulting role I have led large public tenders under heavy governance scrutiny. I have been part of major internal IT Procurement programmes with twenty people trying to align systems, process and politics. I do not shy away from difficult projects, quite the opposite.
What I do not want is permanent political exposure.
There is a difference between enjoying high-stakes projects and wanting to live inside high-stakes accountability indefinitely.
So I made a decision that, at the time, looked like a sidestep. I moved into procurement transformation rather than continuing directly towards a CPO trajectory.
From the outside, I know that to some friends and ex-colleagues it might have looked as though I had quit procurement.
In reality, I had quit the assumption that the only credible form of ambition ends in the CPO seat.
Transformation allowed me to focus on architecture rather than permanent defence. On designing operating models, governance structures and capability rather than carrying long-term board expectations. It gave me intensity without the constant internal judgement and scrutiny a CPO might have faced.
Over time, I have come to believe that we talk about procurement careers far too narrowly. We present progression as linear, when in reality it is about alignment between your own temperament and exposure.
The CPO role is not simply a more senior version of what you are already doing. It requires a particular appetite for stress, visibility and political complexity.
If you are aiming for it, I would suggest asking yourself a few uncomfortable questions:
Am I comfortable having my name permanently attached to a number that others influence?
Can I make restructuring decisions and carry their consequences calmly?
Do I gain energy from organisational politics, or does it drain me?
Am I willing to relocate, if geography becomes the gatekeeper to progression?
Do I want accountability that does not switch off when the project ends?
There is no virtue in answering yes if the honest answer is no.
I did (kinda) quit procurement, at least in its purest form.
But I would rather say that I chose the version of it that aligns with who I really am.
And in my experience, that clarity is far more sustainable than chasing a title you are not sure you want to live with.
Want to get the most out of ChatGPT?
ChatGPT is a superpower if you know how to use it correctly.
Discover how HubSpot's guide to AI can elevate both your productivity and creativity to get more things done.
Learn to automate tasks, enhance decision-making, and foster innovation with the power of AI.
Freebie(s) of the week

HOW TO BUY AI - GUIDE FOR PROCUREMENT PROFESSIONALS
In the early 2010s I used to download every Econsultancy buyer’s guide I could find.
I loved how structured they were and how commercially helpful for Marketing Procurement Consultants (which I was!). Funnily enough, they were aimed at Marketing teams!
At the time I remember thinking that if you really wanted to understand how to buy something properly, that was the benchmark. So creating my own enterprise-level AI Buyer’s Guide has felt slightly surreal.
This one took me a few solid weeks to write because, sorry to state the obvious, buying AI well is far more complex than most teams realise. I’ve seen how underlying models can change mid-contract before procurement can even act upon it.
AI doesn’t behave like traditional SaaS, and most of us were never trained to buy something that evolves this quickly.
I’ll be teaching much of this thinking inside my upcoming AI for Procurement course (out this spring), but I wanted the buying discipline documented properly as a standalone resource.
I’ve also included two high-definition frameworks taken from some of my most engaged AI posts over the past year, because some of you asked me for printable versions to use internally.
I genuinely hope this helps procurement teams buy better.
You can access the FREE guide here (only available for 2 days)
Do you want access to other great templates from previous newsletters? Have a look at the full store below:
That’s it for this week.
I’ll leave you with a thought that has shaped more of my career decisions than any of my consulting frameworks ever did:
“Not every door you can open is one you should walk through.
Capability gives you options and when you get it, experience gives you more access. But access alone isn’t a reason.
The higher you climb, the narrower the air can feel. More visibility requires more accountability. Less room to be anonymous. That suits some people, it really energises them.
For others like me, it slowly erodes something inside that is more important.
Chasing the top is easy to justify. Choosing your own internal happiness over a title takes more discipline.
And in the long run, I’ve found discipline far more sustainable than momentum.
Until next time

Procurement worth reading.
