On a more important note, Peter and I did actually get some work done. We caught up with a number of Chicago-based spend management providers including Fieldglass, BravoSolution and Spend Radar. In particular, our discussion with Fieldglass touched on some really interesting services procurement use-case examples and innovations; it also included a chat around the potential for forecasting (e.g., rates, quality, broader economy) using contingent labor data. Fascinating stuff. We learned a good deal in many of these largely informal discussions and look forward to reporting back. On the Bravo front, we have several things to report in terms of solution innovation examples and strategy. And at Spend Radar, we believe that we hopefully inspired the team to share, on a more frequent basis, the many dozens of dataset combinations they've been crunching in taking spend analysis beyond highly standard GL classification and analysis implementations.
Peter and I also had a few minutes to catch up and plot out our next steps in building our UK/Europe empire (starting with a celebration and "thank you" party of our first year) sometime in November, complete with live music, located in a venue somewhere on the outskirts of London. Stay tuned for more details on that. In short, Peter and I thus far have had a wonderful time collaborating together and planning out the next phase of our work. Despite the "Hustler Honeys" paraphernalia he appears to have attempted to stuff in his roller bag (see the above link for more details), we generally maintain similar interests as well. So refreshing in a world where relationships are often built on individual needs rather than mutual interest, intellect and exploration.
Jason Busch
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