The world didn’t arrive at procurement fragility by accident. The pressures of 2025 are not
anomalies — they are the predictable outcomes of decades-long decisions. To
understand where procurement must go, we must first confront the strategic blind spots
that led us here.
In the 1990s and 2000s, globalization wasn’t just a trend — it was an ideology. Corporations
across sectors rushed to offshore production, seduced by the promise of cheap labor,
relaxed regulations, and efficiency gains. Global sourcing became the procurement mantra.
But behind the celebration of cost savings was a silent erosion of supply chain resilience.
As long as goods arrived on time and P&Ls looked healthy, few questioned the long-term
exposure:
Overdependence on single-source geographies
Supplier ecosystems hollowed out at home
Near-zero investment in supply continuity or redundancy
Tariffs, pandemics, and wars didn’t break the system — they merely exposed how brittle it
had become.
Strategic Missteps of the Past —
How We Got Here
The Legacy of Global Sourcing Without Strategic Depth
Procurement Is on the Line: How Tariffs Are Exposing Strategy Gaps in 2025
The CFO and CPO Cost-Fixation Trap
One of the most pervasive errors was cultural: procurement was largely
measured by its ability to cut cost — not create value. CFOs and CPOs
prioritized quarterly savings, incentivized supplier churn, and viewed risk
mitigation as overhead.