Don't let good crises go to waste
We know from our latest annual supplier management research that only 12% of organizations are considered leaders in supplier management. So for 2022, I’d like to see chief procurement officers or VP’s of procurement use the supply chain disruptions from the likes of Covid and Suez Canal as the catalyst for their business case for change in the way their organizations' approach and implement supplier management. They should be looking to make it an organizational change program led by procurement (not just a procurement change program) and introduce globally consistent approaches to supplier management, with it embedded in both procurement AND operational stakeholders' roles, underpinned with supplier management technology and training. I have an extra wish that goes along with this one, which is the recognition that the audience for supplier management technology is different from procurement technology. The audience for supplier management technology is the operational stakeholder and the supplier (not procurement, we own it, but aren’t the main audience), and that this technology requires alignment within the organization's stakeholders (Procurement, Operational, Executive and Suppliers) to make it work.
Using supply chains for good
As organizations look at value that they get from their suppliers and supply chains, my wish for 2022 is that they are using this to drive social change and sustainability standards down their supply chain. That is, not just looking at the best price from their suppliers for a particular good or service, rather how can they use the money they spend to help local businesses, small or medium-sized enterprises, or diverse and inclusive organizations. This will also require them to re-think their sourcing and supplier management models, improve their processes and retrain their teams to deal with these types of suppliers. Finally, it will be more of a focus on how their organization can be a customer of choice for these suppliers, so for example: what are they offering these suppliers to be attractive for them to work with them, easier on-boarding, better more flexible payment terms, and supplier training to name a few.
Supplier Management as a key to revenue generation
Again from this year’s annual supplier management research, we know that if your organization is good at supplier management then you are 5 times more likely to get enhanced speed to market for new products and services, you are 3 times more likely to get innovation from suppliers and twice as likely to get scarce resources and the suppliers ‘A’ team. Not to mention the ability to mitigate supplier continuity risk; more than two-thirds of organizations use the relationship with suppliers as their key risk mitigation strategy. Our wish for 2022 is more procurement organizations understand and build into their operations the effect they have on key products and services, how they influence their organization's EBITDA and how good supplier management will improve these.
My three wishes for 2022:
My wishes are all about freeing procurement professionals from paralyzingly slow contract review processes so they can be more agile in the face of the ongoing upheavals in the global supply chain — and I can buy construction lumber from my home improvement store when I need it.
Save time to make time
I want procurement contracts to stop taking three to six months when with AI-enabled automation tools they could be completed in a fraction of the time. This would free up supply chain and procurement professionals to focus on strategic tasks such as customer communication, business planning or issue resolution. This would reduce bottlenecks across every industry from medicine to electronics.
Leave legal out of it
Every contract needs to be run through the legal department. For many standard contracts, the procurement department may not need to seek the review of an attorney if automated software is being used. If a sales contract with a long-term vendor contains clauses that fit within the company’s playbook and the tool already knows to automatically insert that language, the legal department may not need to get involved at all. Implementing automated contract review tools can help organizations determine which potential legal issues should take priority and weed out the contracts that don’t need to be routed to legal.
Eliminate Groundhog Day
Procurement teams spend a lot of time reviewing contracts that are broadly similar (or often almost identical) to each other. If automated tools are used instead, teams can import edits from relevant, previously reviewed, contracts. This would also add a useful layer of data analysis, providing insights into the organization’s historical approach to managing risk. And when a procurement team works with a new vendor, it can upload the new contract into the automated system. AI-powered tools will detect similarities and anomalies with elegant simplicity. If this can save somewhere around 70% of the time normally spent on contracts review, why on Earth not?
Thanks to State of Flux and BlackBoiler, and look out for more solution and services provider wishes/predictions over the next few weeks, with an overall take on the series from our analysts at the end. See more vendor predictions and wishes here.
And if you are looking for procurement services providers to help you with your 2022 decisions, look no further than our Procurement Services Market Landscape Directory.
**Updated for 2022**
Need a fun and simple craft for your students upon returning from winter break? A craft that lets them reflect on the New Year, yet is simple enough for your little learners or special needs learners? Then this wishes wand will be the perfect New Year's activity for your class!
Students can choose from 12 different wishes they have for the New Year to include love, friends, family, health, toys, kitten, puppy, house, vacation, car, food, or money. They choose 5-6 wishes, glue them onto the star, tape on a straw, and add some ribbon to create a fun and flashy New Year's Wishes Wand! Super fun and simple enough for students that need a little extra support!
UPDATE: With the 2022 revision you no longer need to download a new version every year for the new year. I've eliminated the year so you can just write it in with a sharpie and use the same master year after year.
When should you stop saying Happy New Year?
The simple answer is that there’s not a cut off date for when you should officially stop wishing people a Happy New Year.
However, as January rolls around and you bump into people you didn’t see over the new year, you may find yourself wishing them a Happy New Year.
Although this frequently happens, you’ll probably find that you stop naturally saying it as the first month of the new year comes to an end.
But if there are people you really want to make sure you say Happy New Year to and haven’t had a chance to yet, it may be worth sending a quick belated message wishing them the best for the year ahead.
What are New Year’s resolutions?
According to research from YouGov, 16% of Brits say that they will be making a New Year’s resolution this year, compared to the 11% from last year.
YouGov also said that three in 10 of those who made New Year’s resolutions for 2021 claimed to have kept them all, with 44% of people saying that they at least kept some of them. Nearly one in five owned up and admitted to not keeping any that they made.
Common New Year’s resolutions include a new health and fitness regime, saving money and taking up a new hobby.
What are some of the best ways to wish people a Happy New Year?
New Year wishes are ways of bringing in the new year and wishing loved ones a good year ahead.
Common New Year wishes include:
• May all your wishes come true in 2022!
• Cheers to the New Year! May 2022 be an extraordinary one
• Happy New Year! May the coming year be full of great adventures and opportunities
• Happy New Year! 2022 is the beginning of a new chapter
• Wishing you many wonderful memories made in 2022
• May the New Year bring you happiness, peace, and prosperity
What are some of the best New Year quotes?
Some of the most well-known and popular New Year quotes include:
• “Cheers to a new year and another chance for us to get it right.” - Oprah Winfrey
• “For last year’s words belong to last year’s language, and next year’s words await another voice.” - T.S. Eliot
• “Now is the accepted time to make your regular annual good resolutions. Next week you can begin paving hell with them as usual.” - Mark Twain
• “I hope that in this year to come, you make mistakes. Because if you are making mistakes, then you are making new things, trying new things, learning, living, pushing yourself, changing yourself, changing your world. You’re doing things you’ve never done before, and more importantly, you’re doing something.” - Neil Gaiman
• “You can get excited about the future. The past won’t mind.” - Hillary DePiano
Full text of the new year's greetings from Mr. Quan Long:
New Year's Greetings for 2022
Dear Autohomers,
Greetings! With 2022 coming to a close, I want to take this opportunity to wish you a blessed holiday season and a wonderful New Year. At this special moment as we bid farewell to the old and usher in the new, I would like to share some of our achievements in 2022 as well as the many changes we experienced which will lay the groundwork for our future development.
2021 has been a difficult year and we have weathered challenging developments against the backdrop of the ongoing impact of the pandemic as well as the headwinds facing the auto market and auto industry. Despite this, we remain focused on our original aspirations and over the past year, the whole company has made a concerted effort to enable business upgrades and improvements to ensure we steadily move forward.
On March 15, we successfully listed on the Hong Kong Stock Exchange becoming the first U.S.-listed Chinese company in 2022 to complete a secondary listing in Hong Kong. We're delighted to have reached this milestone and be able to embark on a new journey to share the Company's story.
Story continues
Starting from the second quarter this year, chip shortages and rising raw material prices have adversely affected the overall auto market and have dragged down Autohome's traditional business as a result. However, our C-end and B-end business lines remain stable while our innovative business continues to advance. With that, we maintained top position in the auto vertical media industry. We recorded nearly 44 million mobile DAUs surpassing the combined sum of the total DAUs for the second and third players in this vertical. With our revenues firmly occupying the leading position in the auto vertical market in China, Autohome represents a stable "cash cow" business while maintaining strong profitability.
Facing the impressive rise of the new energy vehicle sector, the in-depth digital transformation of traditional automakers and the fast-changing auto-dealership landscape, Autohome took an active response to embrace these developments. On September 15, we held our 2021 Investor Day to fully demonstrate the "ecosystem" strategy upgrade and showcase a full range of services for C-end consumers + B1 end OEMs + B2 end auto ecosystem partners who are capable of enhanced synergy with us in terms of offline activities, traffic and more.
We will comprehensively integrate into the Ping An auto ecosystem. With close collaboration between the two parties and Ping An's advantages in the industry, we will create unique strong suits that will set us apart from competitors. Supported by Ping An's tremendous offline team and channels, massive high-value customer base and over 140 million car owners, the rich vehicle data tags attributed and world-leading intelligent voice technologies, we are determined to create a unique and full-cycle auto ecological platform.
We constituted higher productivity through strategic upgrades of our business models, products and innovative technologies. We strengthened our company structure through better management and organizational practice. We recruited top talents in the industry to lead the company, including Mr. Bibo Xiang, Chief Technology Officer, Mr. Jiang Wu, Senior Vice President, in charge of the overall C-end business and Mr. Song Yang, Senior Vice President, in charge of the B-end OEMs business, marking an increasingly professional and diversified management team.
Meanwhile, we strived to strengthen our strategic focus, build a business closed-loop and elevate efficiency at a reduced cost. For the C-end business, we unified the aftermarket and car usage business units to sharpen our focus on car usage scenarios. This will be conducive to building our end-to-end closed-loop business that covers traffic across reviewing, buying and using cars as well as content production. We will vigorously develop video and live streaming content, new energy vehicles communities and other businesses to strengthen our product appeal along with revamped content advantages. By doing so, we will consolidate resources to create impactful content and IP and continue to be the users' preferred auto video platform, the largest automobile vertical live streaming platform and the largest new energy vehicle media outlet on the internet.
In terms of our fundamental business including advertising and leads business, we focus on the three major points of "taking orders, guaranteeing delivery and improving customer satisfaction". Our OEM business unit integrates commercial mid-stage application products and technologies to consolidate an end-to-end close loop organization from sales, product and technology, operation support and logistic support to realize the strategic transformation of resources-to-solutions (R2S). This offers a one-stop solution to customers with enhanced customer value. We have also adjusted our aftermarket business to construct a one-stop end-to-end close loop service platform from conversion, transaction to aftermarket services with enhanced customer penetration.
As a dynamic company, we will introduce professional talent, increase investment, promote the upgrade of the organization, improve products covering the entire service chain and strive for new business breakthroughs in areas of digitalization, new energy vehicles, used car business and Ping An synergy.
In addition, we will improve the general underlying technology and system capability, further enhance the intelligent data center to consolidate the supportive capabilities and enable our businesses through the comprehensive construction of a big data-driven smart platform with an integrated technical middle platform and real-time data.
At the same time, we have also incorporated and integrated low-value and non-mainstream businesses including auto financing and travel businesses to reduce costs and increase profits.
Our continuous focus on our original aspirations and innovation allows us to receive continued recognition from the market and our customers. The long list of awards includes being listed in "China's Top 100 Internet Companies" for nine consecutive years ranking 20th this year. Autohome's artificial intelligence algorithm team won the global runner-up in the TextCaps task and first place in both the domestic and industry categories. We also received the 2022 annual marketing 'Gold case' award at the "China International Advertising Festival". Lastly, on behalf of Autohome, I was personally named as "2021 Outstanding Contributor to the China Automobile Industry".
We also continue to return earnings and create value for our shareholders. We distribute 20% of our net profit to shareholders each year and in the third quarter of this year, we announced a US$200 million share repurchase program.
2022 is destined to be a year of both opportunities and challenges. Autohome will boldly implement our ongoing transformation, adhere to our value proposition and maintain the pursuit of long-term sustainable growth.
Looking back at 2021, we have overcome difficulties and been fully productive. Looking forward to 2022, we are poised to grow and continue to ride the waves. We will work together to create greater value for Autohome and share the fruits of these developments. Thank you for your contribution and we sincerely wish you a happy New Year and a safe and healthy 2022 for you and your families!
Quan Long
Chairman and Chief Executive Officer, Autohome Inc.
December 31,2021
About Autohome
Autohome Inc. (NYSE: ATHM; HKEX: 2518) is the leading online destination for automobile consumers in China. Its mission is to enhance the car-buying and ownership experience for auto consumers in China. Autohome provides professionally produced and user-generated content, a comprehensive automobile library, and extensive automobile listing information to automobile consumers, covering the entire car purchase and ownership cycle. The ability to reach a large and engaged user base of automobile consumers has made Autohome a preferred platform for automakers and dealers to conduct their advertising campaigns. Further, the Company's dealer subscription and advertising services allow dealers to market their inventory and services through Autohome's platform, extending the reach of their physical showrooms to potentially millions of internet users in China and generating sales leads for them. The Company offers sales leads, data analysis, and marketing services to assist automakers and dealers with improving their efficiency and facilitating transactions. As a transaction-centric company, Autohome operates its "Autohome Mall," a full-service online transaction platform, to facilitate transactions for automakers and dealers. Further, through its website and mobile applications, it also provides other value-added services, including auto financing, auto insurance, used car transactions, and aftermarket services.
SOURCE Autohome Inc.