An integral part of the Societe Generale group’s Corporate Resources Division, the Sourcing line contributes to the Group’s operational excellence and transformation policy.

Both in France and abroad, the Sourcing Division ensures that all of the Group’s business lines benefit from the best possible Sourcing performance, quality and efficiency, and contributes to limiting operational risks. It also contributes to the Group’s positioning in terms of CSR.

180 purchasers, based in France and abroad, covering over 70 sourcing categories and a total of 5.6 billion euros in Group spending in 2010 (including 3.5 billion in France).

Its mission is threefold:
- Normative: to define the standards, organisations and processes designed to
guarantee the Sourcing performance of the Societe Generale entities both in
France and abroad.
- Operational: to optimise the cost/value ratio for the goods and services
provided to meet the Group’s requirements.
- Strategic: to help define sourcing policies for efficient access to resources and
To ensure their operational implementation.

Moreover, the Sourcing Division also manages the sourcing of intellectual services on behalf of the Group’s French entities.

The main lines of our work:
- Standardise and group together requirements within the Group, upstream from the negotiation process;
- Consolidate and globalise volumes across the broadest possible scope, including abroad;
- Ensure the drafting of contracts and their operational implementation by regulating consumption;
- Contribute to the Group’s operational efficiency.

Three golden rules - a threefold ambition:
- Be open and transparent vis-à-vis supplier markets;
- Be innovative in the search for the most suitable goods and services for Societe Generale’s business lines;
- Be efficient in terms of commercial and contractual devising.

Diversity: a reality within the Sourcing Division
Diversity is a source of dynamism that favours innovation and creativity. A key factor in the Group’s development, it is reflected in a desire to acknowledge and promote all talented staff, whatever their country of origin, gender, age, culture or profile.

Within the Sourcing Division, diversity includes:
- Men (45%) and women (55%)
- Experience: over 50% of staff are aged between 30 and 45, and close to 90% have at least a postgraduate degree or equivalent.
- Cultures: 11 languages spoken: English, Spanish, German, Russian, Czech, Italian, Greek, Arabic, Thai, Portuguese and Hebrew.

A cross-business organisation to strengthen the Line
Within the Sourcing Division, purchasers and officers also carry out cross-business missions aimed at strengthening the steering of the Group’s Sourcing Line.
These cross-business missions notably make it possible to:
- Structure the relationship with internal entities with a significant volume of purchases
- Manage the relationship with strategic suppliers
- Ensure, abroad, the relationship with the local Sourcing Officer and site support

An international function
There is a team within the Sourcing Division that is dedicated to running Sourcing teams based abroad and to mobilising managerial expertise for overseas issues with high functional and financial stakes.

The Sourcing Line has a hundred purchasers abroad and covers 21 countries with differing levels of structure: sourcing relays, purchasing teams or shared service centres. The 9 Sourcing shared service centres are in charge of purchases for all Group entities located in the main countries in which the Group is present.