The right kind of help can be hard to find. Partnering with us is a good first step.

Fractional services to help you meet your timelines and budget.

As your business grows, your supply chain management capabilities should grow with it.

Skalable Partners lends flexibility and strength to the supply chain management capabilities of growing businesses in support of their brave efforts to become bigger and more successful. 

In particular, we enjoy supporting small and medium-sized enterprises by enabling them to quickly, precisely and cost-effectively scale-up their owned-ability to manage strategic and critical procurement, contracts, inventory, warehousing and logistics activities and events.

Optimize your Supply Chain with a Scalable Operating Model

A well-run supply chain can offer significant competitive advantage. On the other hand, supply chain disruption will confound the successful operation of other dependent business functions (sales, manufacturing and operations, etc.) and by extension, the ability of the whole enterprise to create value for its customers. 

A smartly designed fractional capability model can give you flexible access to scalability when you need it, adding resilience to your supply chain.

A fractional resourcing model is an alternative to traditional forms of capability building that often result in some form of value loss.

Specifically, we can save you losses caused by:

1 - FTE levels that are fixed and not well suited to dealing with situations of fluctuating demand, often resulting on one hand, in unnecessary fixed cost burdens and on the other, overwhelmed employees that tend to quit;

2 - engagement of expensive 3rd-party “teams of experts” who execute a specific scope and then promptly leave and take their expertise with them; and

3 - capital expenditure on systems, that seem like solutions, but tend to become something new to manage, leaving owners no better off.

“Using a fractional resourcing model instead of, or in careful combination with traditional capabilities building methods, will help reduce the risk of loss and optimize your supply chain capability.”

Meet the Team

  • Skalable Partners Founder Richard

    Richard

    PMP, CCCA, CCM, M.B.A, LL.B.

    Richard is the Founder of Skalable Partners and has 20+ years of experience in commercial management in a diverse set of industries. He is a qualified lawyer, certified in Construction Law and holds a MBA from the Schulich School of Business. Richard is professionally trained or certified in Project Management, Change Management, Construction Contract Administration, Adult Education, Mediation, Arbitration and ISO 44001- Collaborative Working.

  • Skalable Partners team member - Anna

    Anna

    PFF, CCS, P.Log, M.B.A

    Anna has 30+ years experience predominantly focused in Logistics, Transportation, Customs and Trade Compliance. Anna has three professional designations in the Supply Chain Industry; PFF – Professional Freight Forward through the Canadian International Freight Forwarders Association, CCS – Certified Customs Specialist through the Canadian Society of Customs Brokers, and her P.Log – Professional Logistician through the Canadian Logistics Institute.

  • Skalable Partners team member - Chris

    Chris

    Chris has 20 years of experience in the energy sector in both domestic and international markets with exposure to heavy oil, oil sands, conventional oil, shallow gas, coal bed methane, offshore deep-water oil, and power generation businesses, in the fields of drilling, completions and production operations. Chris is accomplished in technology administration, having created, implemented and led a supply chain technology Portfolio Management Office with accountability to design user training programs (including SAP) and execute organizational change management.

  • Skalable Partners team member - Don

    Don

    C.P.M., MBA, IACCM

    Don Smith’s impressive career in Integrated Supply Chain, Plan to Pay, BPO, Category Management, Finance, Operations, HR, IT Architecture, Strategy, Transformation and Infrastructure Services spans more than 25 years. Don currently holds a lifetime C.P.M. certification from the Institute for Supply Management and is an executive sponsor of the IACCM (International Association for Contract and Commercial Management) accreditation program. Don holds an MBA in Agricultural Economics, Finance and Statistics and a Bachelor of Commerce.

  • Skalable Partners team member - Ian

    Ian

    BME, M.B.A, CIPS

    Ian is a highly motivated and quality-focused Supply Chain Management Data Scientist with 14 years of experience in oil and gas and aviation. His unique skill set comes from his background in engineering, supply chain management, and computer science. He is skilled in SCM advanced analytics, category management, business intelligence, process automation, reporting and training. When he’s not doing performance measurement and reporting for Suncor Energy, he teaches various SCM and analytics courses for the Supply Chain Management Association of Canada (SCMA).

  • Jim

    Jim

    BME, M.B.A, CIPS

    After graduating in Civil Engineering Technology from Mohawk College, Jim started his career as a surveyor/field inspector at an oil refinery. With 40+ years of experience his career included working for world class EPC companies and major global oil companies in the field of contracts management. Jim held senior management positions in many mega-projects, was the architect of 5 contracts management system implementations, the builder of a Contracts Center of Excellence (CCOE) and has multiple experiences in the field of EPC claim litigation and arbitration.

  • Skalable Partners team member - Yuri

    Yuri

    SCMP

    Yuri has spent the last 10 years specializing in the application of best practices in strategic sourcing and category management in support of major projects for oil and gas organizations such as Suncor, Husky Energy, and CNOOC/Nexen. During his career, Yuri developed a specialization in managing Indirect spend categories, including supporting, facilities, finance, travel and IT functions, – and also has experience in managing more traditional oil and gas categories such as drilling and completions. He has successfully executed global initiatives in countries such as: China, Guyana, Russia, and United States.

  • Skalable Partners team member - Stewart

    Stewart

    CD, M.B.A, PLog

    Exceptionally motivated and results-driven executive with 40+ years of well-rounded leadership experience. Superior analytical ability and a highly strategic thinker who is passionate about operations and has the ability to produce robust solutions to problems to ensure operational excellence. Proven expertise in operations management, contract negotiations, strategic change management, materials management, process development, supply chain management, procurement sourcing, and ERP selection/implementation.

Skalable partnered with the contract management team of a Energy Transition Technology organization and helped them get in front of surging contract processing demands. Our efforts improved the organization’s reputation for “contracting speed”, improved the work-life balance of internal staff and helped managers show up well with Executive stakeholders.

“Your work is absolutely fantastic.”
- Manager of Finance and Contracts

Here are some examples of the success stories and results our clients have realized

Skalable supported the leadership of an industrial contractor owed tens of millions of dollars of aged (accumulated) receivables with our unique, relationship-based negotiations approach.

“Had VAP not been engaged, we would not have recovered those receivables so quickly - they would have been stuck in litigation for years.”
- Chief Executive Officer of the Industrial Contracting Company

While functioning as the supply chain department of a small owner-managed fabricator, SKALABLE’s project procurement team identified—within a complex, ever-changing bill of materials—certain long lead items, which would have had a devastating critical path impact on its biggest project. With some furious expediting, we enabled our client to take back control of its project schedule, and avoid the loss of confidence of its biggest customer.

“I love talking to you guys.”
- Chief Executive Officer of Fabricator

While leading and managing a sub-unit of the Canadian supply chain department of international Oil & Gas major for a two year period, Skalable resources generated a 20% saving on a $250M spend by using our proven sourcing and supplier relationship management models across a wide variety of indirect spend categories.

“SKALABLE’s leadership style was just right – hard on issues, but soft on people.”
-GM of the Supply Chain

A transcontinental railway experiencing rapid growth such that the legal and procurement functions were experiencing work volumes that they could not effectively resource. The client engaged Skalable to help solve its “volume problem”. We were able to quickly absorb the volumes, noticeably improve the speed of RF(X) and contracting processes, and unburden internal resources permitting them to focus on more critical matters.

“Given (its) unique skills and experience, (Skalable) added substantially greater value beyond anything that I’ve experienced in the contracting/procurement process in the past.  You helped us to hire the right people to internal jobs, and assisted us in building a strong procurement organization with the support, training, mentoring, and intelligent changes that you brought to us.  I am extremely pleased with our new internal group.”
- Managing Director, IT Sourcing

While supporting the sourcing function of a Western Canadian Airline, our approach to sourcing and negotiations with major technology vendors yielded excellent results, including significant (~$20M’s) in savings increased service levels, improved relationships and optimal allocations of risk between client and supplier.

“An experienced, strong and judicious negotiator.  Knowledgeable and tough but very reasonable and fair.  (SKALABLE’s) goal is a win-win, which means that both sides feel that they have received a good deal. This is, in my opinion, the best way to begin a relationship.”

“Not just a procurement expert, but a lawyer as well. Being able to do ‘double duty’ (procurement/law), combined with an action-oriented approach helped us negotiate complex contracts at unusually high speed. SKALABLE Partners got it done.”
- EVP and CIO

What do we do Differently?

Skalable Partners will apply best practices in collaborative business relationship management in our effort to create your supply chain capabilities. Specifically, we adhere to the ISO 44001 standard for collaborative working in our approach to value creation, both in terms of how we engage with our clients - as part of your team - as your partner for growth; and how we engage with our client’s supply chains. Our focus is on relationships and win-win scenarios that appeal with all stakeholders.