Standard operating procedure · PR1A · Procurement & Source-to-Pay
Category Strategy Refresh
Judgment procedure owned by Category Strategy in Procurement & Source-to-Pay. 8 numbered steps, 1 of them a person deciding and 7 of them agent work … more
Procedure code
PR1A
Judgment
Rule versions in force
v4.1 · v5.1
2 governing rules stacked over it
In force since
2024-10-09
Earliest effective date across those rules
Last reviewed
2026-07-27
Latest review date across those rules
Rules approved by
1
VP Category Management
Rule health
2/2
0 under review · 0 superseded
There is no document register behind this header. The version, the dates and the approver names are read off the governing rules this procedure runs inside, which is the closest thing the estate holds to a document control record. Nobody wrote these procedures. There is no document library behind this page and no Word file anywhere in the estate. Every procedure below is generated from rows this platform already holds: the line and its ordered stations, the owning team and the person accountable for it, the policy items bound to that team, and the governance gates seeded against the function. The steps, the owners, the gates, the approvers, the dwell times and the volumes are read straight off those rows. The sentences that join them together are generated. Read a procedure as the estate describing itself, not as a document somebody signed.
Purpose and scope
What this procedure is for and where it stops
To run category strategy refresh to one repeatable standard inside Category Strategy, part of Procurement & Source-to-Pay. more
Entry condition
Runs judgment. Starts when a break condition on a live position fires.
Exit condition
The unit clears publish. more
In scope
- Every unit of category strategy refresh raised inside Category Strategy, from the trigger below through to the final step.
- 7 of the 8 steps, which run without a person present.
- 1 decision that stops the line until a named person releases it.
Out of scope
- Anything outside the envelope set by the owning team. It leaves the line at a gate and becomes the named approver's decision.
- Work that belongs to another function. This line records no handoff, so nothing leaves it mid-flow.
- The 1 step carried on the shared AI GBS spine. They are done for this line but not by this function.
Who owns it
Runs the line
Category Strategy Orchestrator
Accountable person
VP Category Management
The end of the escalation path. Above them sits Procurement Chief of Staff for the function.
That team’s remit
Owns category plan work end to end inside Procurement & Source-to-Pay. more
That remit describes the whole team, not this one procedure, so its counts are larger than the ones on this page.
Autonomy
42% now · ceiling 68%
Agents author the category strategy including the should-cost model. more
The procedure, step by step
8 numbered steps · 1 of them stop for a person
A step is one station on the line. more
| No. | Step | Who does it | What happens | System of record | Time on the step | In flight |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 01 | Frame category Agentstrategy | Market Structure Agent | Market Structure Agent performs this step unattended at the strategy layer, inside the envelope its owning team has set, and writes an evidence record naming the actor, the authority it acted under and the digests of what it read and wrote. | Group ERP — Financials | 2.0 daysstandard 3.3 days | 39 |
| 02 | Map market Agentstrategy | Supply Base Mapping Agent | Supply Base Mapping Agent performs this step unattended at the strategy layer, inside the envelope its owning team has set, and writes an evidence record naming the actor, the authority it acted under and the digests of what it read and wrote. | Group ERP — Financials | 28.4 hrsstandard 36.4 hrs | 37 |
| 03 | Model should-cost Agentstrategy | Demand Profile Agent | Demand Profile Agent performs this step unattended at the strategy layer, inside the envelope its owning team has set, and writes an evidence record naming the actor, the authority it acted under and the digests of what it read and wrote. | Group ERP — Financials | 2.5 daysstandard 4.5 days | 43 |
| 04 | Model options Agentstrategy | Should-cost Modeling Agent | Should-cost Modeling Agent performs this step unattended at the strategy layer, inside the envelope its owning team has set, and writes an evidence record naming the actor, the authority it acted under and the digests of what it read and wrote. | Group ERP — Financials | 12.0 hrsstandard 15.4 hrs | 46 |
| 05 | Draft strategy Agentstrategy | Category Strategy Agent | Category Strategy Agent performs this step unattended at the strategy layer, inside the envelope its owning team has set, and writes an evidence record naming the actor, the authority it acted under and the digests of what it read and wrote. | Group ERP — Financials | 2.6 daysstandard 3.3 days | 16 |
| 06 | Challenge Agentstrategy | Make-Buy-Partner Agent | Make-Buy-Partner Agent performs this step unattended at the strategy layer, inside the envelope its owning team has set, and writes an evidence record naming the actor, the authority it acted under and the digests of what it read and wrote. | Group ERP — Financials | 2.1 daysstandard 3.9 days | 11 |
| 07 | Council ratify HumanpolicyDecision | VP Category Management Releases: VP Category Management | Work stops. VP Category Management reviews what the line has produced and either releases the unit or sends it back. Nothing downstream of this step runs until that decision is made.Holds until: Held for a named human when the unit exceeds the category plan decision envelope, when confidence falls below the floor, or when a policy clause is engaged. | Group ERP — Financials | 33.1 hrsstandard 2.4 days | 9 |
| 08 | Publish GBSgbs | Category Strategy Orchestrator | Category Strategy Orchestrator performs this step unattended on the shared AI GBS transaction spine, outside the function, inside the envelope its owning team has set, and writes an evidence record naming the actor, the authority it acted under and the digests of what it read and wrote. | Group ERP — Financials | 2.5 daysstandard 4.4 days | 31 |
The swimlane
The same steps, laid out by who is holding the work
Three lanes: a person deciding, an agent working, and the shared services spine. more
Run the procedure
One unit walked along that swimlane on the happy viable agentified path
Press run and a single unit enters at station 01. Each station takes exactly the dwell this platform records for it and is held by whoever the estate says holds it. more
Nothing has happened yet. more
- The lanes are the recorded lanes. 1 of the 8 stations stop for a person and every one of them still does on this run.
- Every one of the 1 decision is still taken by the person who holds it. The happy path is that each one is released first time, not that it is skipped.
- The owning team is held to a 68% autonomy ceiling and this run sits at 91% unattended, inside it.
- 1 system is attributed across the stations, and 0 of them are connected. Nothing in this run has been watched executing against a real system of record.
One decision, held by VP Category Management. more
- 07 Council ratify — The last decision on the line. Something on every procedure ends with a person, so this one is never offered.
This is a run, not a forecast. more
Happy means nothing goes wrong: no station raises an exception, no gate sends the unit back, no rework loop fires and nothing sits in a queue between stations. more
The second clock is the allowance. more
A decision may be handed to the agent lane only if two things hold … more
The run reads the station rows only. more
What this run does not model: arrival patterns, contention between procedures for the same person, shift patterns, weekends, learning curves, and the cost of anything. more
Run it again, going wrong
The same unit, the same stations, broken the way the estate already records breaking
This is the same unit on the same stations, breaking. more
No break below was chosen. more
One play head, two tracks, the same scale. The clean run stops when it runs out of stations; the other one keeps going.
As written
8 stations, nothing waiting, nothing sent back
0 min of 14.9 days
now Frame category · Market Structure Agent · 2.0 days
As the ledger has it
the same stations, plus 3 categories the estate already counts
0 min of 15.1 days
now Frame category · Market Structure Agent · 2.0 days
What breaks, and where it is counted
No break below was chosen. more
What the two runs say together
3 counted categories land on this procedure. more
What this run cannot claim
These breaks are shown together on one unit so the shape of a bad day fits on one screen. more
Two clocks run. Worked time is the sum of the time the work is actually being done … more
Roles and responsibilities
9 named parties
The responsibility grid is assigned by a rule, not lifted from a chart. more
| Party | RACI | Steps | Duty | Escalates to |
|---|---|---|---|---|
Category Strategy Orchestrator orchestrator | Runs the line | 0 | Sequences this line, holds its timetable and decides what has to surface to a person. more | Raises to VP Category Management when a unit falls outside the envelope or confidence drops below the floor. |
Market Structure Agent agent A2% autonomy · ceiling A2% 94% clean · 4% overridden | Responsible | 1 | Executes the category strategy step it owns, posts its evidence, and hands the unit to the next stage. | Escalates to VP Category Management when the unit falls outside the decision envelope or confidence drops below the floor. |
Supply Base Mapping Agent agent A2% autonomy · ceiling A2% 89% clean · 4% overridden | Responsible | 1 | Executes the category strategy step it owns, posts its evidence, and hands the unit to the next stage. | Escalates to VP Category Management when the unit falls outside the decision envelope or confidence drops below the floor. |
Demand Profile Agent agent A2% autonomy · ceiling A2% 91% clean · 1% overridden | Responsible | 1 | Executes the category strategy step it owns, posts its evidence, and hands the unit to the next stage. | Escalates to VP Category Management when the unit falls outside the decision envelope or confidence drops below the floor. |
Should-cost Modeling Agent agent A2% autonomy · ceiling A2% 95% clean · 5% overridden | Responsible | 1 | Executes the category strategy step it owns, posts its evidence, and hands the unit to the next stage. | Escalates to VP Category Management when the unit falls outside the decision envelope or confidence drops below the floor. |
Category Strategy Agent agent A2% autonomy · ceiling A2% 89% clean · 13% overridden | Responsible | 1 | Authors positions on category strategy. more | Escalates when two options sit inside the confidence band and the evidence cannot separate them. |
Make-Buy-Partner Agent agent A2% autonomy · ceiling A2% 90% clean · 16% overridden | Responsible | 1 | Authors positions on category strategy. more | Escalates when two options sit inside the confidence band and the evidence cannot separate them. |
VP Category Management person | Accountable and responsible | 1 | Holds 1 decision on this line. more | Accountable to VP Category Management for the decisions held here. |
Category Strategy Orchestrator agent A2% autonomy · ceiling A2% 87% clean · 9% overridden | Responsible | 1 | Owns the category strategy lane end to end. more | Escalates to VP Category Management when the unit falls outside the decision envelope or confidence drops below the floor. |
Decision points and escalation
1 places this procedure stops
07 · Council ratify
33.1 hrsHeld for a named human when the unit exceeds the category plan decision envelope, when confidence falls below the floor, or when a policy clause is engaged.
VP Category Management
Handoffs out of this procedure
Nothing leaves this procedure for another function. It completes inside Category Strategy.
The rules this procedure runs inside
2 governing rules
Category Strategy Decision Envelope
activePR1-POL-200 · envelope · vv4.1
Agents in this lane may act without a human when the category plan sits inside the stated value, risk and confidence envelope. more
Approved by VP Category Management · in force 2025-07-08 · reviewed 2026-07-27
Binds Market Structure Agent, Supply Base Mapping Agent, Demand Profile Agent, Should-cost Modeling Agent
EU · UK · US
Category Strategy Evidence Standard
activePR1-POL-201 · evidence · vv5.1
Every autonomous decision writes inputs, the rule version applied, the model and prompt version, the output and a reversal path. more
Approved by VP Category Management · in force 2024-10-09 · reviewed 2026-06-19
Binds Market Structure Agent, Supply Base Mapping Agent, Demand Profile Agent, Should-cost Modeling Agent
Global · EU
Systems this procedure touches
1 named · 0 connected
System attribution is a rule, not a reading. more
| System | Vendor | Domain | Criticality | Steps | Connection |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Group ERP — Financials | SAP S/4HANA | ledger | critical | 8 | modeled |
0 of the 1 systems on this procedure is connected to the platform, and none of the twenty-six in the estate register is. 1 of them are marked as taking a write back, which is a property of the system, not a live path from here.
How it performs
End to end
14.9 days
Summed from the time each step sits, standard 23.9 days — running at 62% of the standard.
Touchless
28%
Agent share
88%
A week
1
In flight
232
Effort a week
1,985 human minutes · 19,457 agent minutes
Volume multiplied by the time on each step. more
Assurance over this procedure
4 governance gates sit above it
The twenty-four controls and eighteen exception classes in this platform are held at estate level … more
| Gate | What trips it | Who releases it | Clock | Waivable |
|---|---|---|---|---|
Purchase order above $25,000 approval | Any PO above $25,000 or off approved catalog or unbudgeted | Category manager | 1 business day | No |
New supplier or bank-detail change approval | Supplier onboarding or any change to payment banking details | Procurement controller | 2 business days | No |
Payment above $100,000 approval | Payment release above $100,000 | Finance controller | Payment run | No |
Single-source award or critical negotiation escalation | Single-source exception or any negotiation affecting critical supply | Chief Procurement Officer | 3 business days | No |
Next to it on the same team
Category Strategy
What this document is and is not
These procedures describe the modeled estate. more
Actions
What is waiting on a person
What one procedure document gives you, and what to check before you treat it as the standard.
named approvers appear across the library
Every decision point on every procedure carries a job title, not a queue. more
steps in the library hand their unit to another function
A handoff is where a procedure stops being one team’s problem. more
controls exist in the estate, and they belong to no procedure in particular
Controls and exception classes are held estate-wide. more
Operations
What this desk is allowed to start
A surface that only reports is not operable. more
Trigger and bound
A procedure document prints purpose, scope, entry and exit, the numbered steps with the actor on each, the roles and their RACI position, the swimlane, the decision points and escalation, the handoffs, the governing rules with version and approver, the systems by rule and the timings. more
Live observability
What the record shows right now
The whole library, by lane, so a single document can be read against the estate it came from. more
Current distribution
2,748 steps
Is policy and strategy coming to fruition
Whether the written intent is holding here
Half. The document is complete and every actor on it is measured more
Not holding on the record
A procedure here carries a version, an approver, an in-force date and a last-review date. more