Guy Stafford

Strategic Sourcing Was Always a Compromise

In this episode of Algo Ego, I go solo for a long-overdue lecture on a thesis I've been building over the past several months: Exact Purchasing. The argument, simply, is that Peter Kralik's 1983 HBR matrix has run procurement for forty years, but it was never the right answer. It was the most procurement could afford to do with the labor it had. AI changes that. I walk through the four quadrants of Exact Purchasing (market risk, cost architecture, transaction capture, relationship governance), then turn the lens on the legacy procurement SaaS stack and call code red on suites built around a compromise we forgot was a compromise. I dig into the balance sheets and AI strategies of Coupa, Jaggaer, SAP Ariba, and Ivalua. No holds barred, no economic interest, no apologies. Dor Israeli joins mid-episode for a check on how AI employees change the data picture entirely. No champagne. No cava either.

Managing Things, Leading People

In this episode of Algo Ego, Jason [https://www.linkedin.com/in/jason-busch-96075/]and Lisa [https://www.linkedin.com/in/lisareisman/] take on leadership in the age of AI: not the abstract, Harvard-weekend version, but the real questions facing anyone who manages people, builds teams, or raises kids in a world where unlimited processing power is sitting right next to you. They debate whether AI kills leadership or demands more of it, why the liberal arts may be more relevant now than ever, what happens when entry-level classes shrink and the school of hard knocks loses its enrollment, and whether AI board members are as far-fetched as they sound. Lisa pushes back on ageism, champions the builder mentality, and draws on their family’s experience with military leadership training. Then Jason is joined by Dor Israeli, CTO of Gain [https://www.usegain.ai/], who describes what it’s actually like to lead a software team when one developer can ship 13 features in a day, and why decision fatigue, not code quality, is the new bottleneck. They explore the widening gap between senior and junior developers, why AI slop is already becoming a thing of the past, and how bringing along the average developer may be the hardest leadership challenge of all.

Lisa Reisman

Everybody’s talking about AI layoffs. But the real question at our dinner table isn’t who’s losing jobs, it’s what all of this means for our kids. In this episode, I bring the conversation out of our house and onto the mic with the person who knows my blind spots better than anyone: my wife, business partner, and co-conspirator, Lisa Reisman. Together, we wrestle with some uncomfortable questions: Is traditional education still fit for purpose in an AI-driven world? Is college becoming a necessity, a luxury, or a liability? And how should parents actually think about preparing kids for a future that looks nothing like the one we grew up expecting? We talk about AI's role in the classroom, inversion thinking, career paths that won’t be easily automated, the risks of underemployment, and why helping kids find direction earlier matters more than ever. This isn’t a manifesto or a parenting playbook. It’s an honest, sometimes messy conversation about uncertainty, responsibility, and how to give our kids a real shot at fulfillment in the age of AI.

Guy Stafford

This week, I’m joined by my long-time sparring partner and business builder, Guy Stafford, to reflect on his 25+ years leading the wildly successful procurement firm, Proxima (acquired by Bain), and how those hard-won lessons apply to the age of AI. Guy pulls back the curtain on Proxima’s creation, from a $35 domain name (Buy.co.uk) in the mid-90s to navigating the dot-com crash, before dissecting his philosophy on mentorship: why he works in the shadows, the power of following up, and why the best advice comes from asking, "Who's done this before?" We then launch into a high-octane debate on the future of procurement, covering: * The Proxima 2.0: How AI fundamentally changes the consulting model, forcing businesses to quickly automate tactical work to focus on strategic high-level interactions. * The Black Box CPO: Why AI will make procurement about more than just savings, and how the micro-coaching capabilities of AI could offer live, tailored advice to category managers (like a fitness tracker for your professional life). * The Race to Relevance: Guy shares a crucial warning for CPOs: the race isn't defined by industry, but by who in the organization (Finance, IT, or Procurement) effectively wields the new AI power, and what skills are needed to stay on top.

Sam Kinney - Part II

In this episode of Algo Ego, I sit down with Sam Kinney to revisit the rise of FreeMarkets and explore how its core ideas translate into today’s world of AI-driven market design. We unpack the creative auction formats that reshaped industrial sourcing, the cultural engine that powered the company’s talent, and how those lessons apply as AI begins to automate negotiation, supplier discovery, and cost modeling at massive scale. Sam also shares a forward-looking view of how AI agents might represent buyers and suppliers, how digital “part twins” could reshape engineering, and why rebuilding FreeMarkets today would look radically different — but still grounded in the same market principles that made it work 30 years ago.