As per a recent Hackett Group 2013 study, 64% of the responding organizations cite Supplier Relationship Managementas ‘major’ or ‘critical’. Another 56% of the organizations cite Reducing Supply Risk as ‘major’ or ‘critical’

In a study conducted by Zycus amongst procurement professionals, 81% of Europe based organizations and 78% of Asian based organizations have invested or planning to invest in supplier management solutions.

The above statistics highlight the growing significance of supplier management solutions in strategic procurement.

Recently Peter Smith, Managing Director, Spend Matters,UK / Europe in the white paper, Putting the Supplier at the Heart of Procurement Thinking suggested that

“time may have come for procurement executives and organisations to put Supplier Management at the heartof their strategy”

With the procurement world vibrating with the news and talks over supplier failure (Read: Bangladesh factory collapse, Ikea’s meatball scandal, etc.), supplier innovation, supplier relationship management, conflict minerals rule etc., it’s hard to ignore the fact that suppliers ARE your organizations’ partner in success or in crime (Read: failure).

Managing supplier information manually or through home grown tools is a resource consuming process. Lack of information repository may result in duplication or loss of data. Additionally, lack of proper evaluation process may result in working with non-competent suppliers even when there are better suppliers in the market.

Another facet to increasing focus on supplier management is to get your supplier’s ‘attention’ or being the ‘customer of choice’ for your key suppliers. It’s a two-way street, when an organization appreciates supplier’s role in its success, suppliers in turn value this partnership.

Today the market is flooded with supplier management solutions. With features like supplier portal, templates, approval workflow, etc. these tools aim to make managing suppliers easier!

In the next blog we will discuss the driving forces behind for supplier management tool implementation.

Learn More: Vendor Management