Supplier Management — A 3-Day Course

 Open Public Course Closed In-House Course

Course Synopsis

Organisations have always depended on suppliers for their operations but in the 21st Century, and particularly with the development of outsourcing, the range and complexity of customer/supplier relationships has increased. In addition, the responsibility for managing suppliers may fall upon the business area managers but, particularly in the case of outsourced software development and IT services, this responsibility is allocated to other roles such as business analysts or project managers. This course provides a framework for understanding the issues associated with managing suppliers using a blend of soft and tangible techniques.

Publicly scheduled dates, locations, and prices

Outline Course Contents

Introduction to supplier management

• Levels of supplier relationship (strategic, business and operational)
• Lifecycle of a supplier relationship
• Supplier relationship management introduced
• Managing risk in supplier management
• Stakeholder identification

Defining business requirements

• The importance of requirements
• Types of requirements – business, system and performance
• Qualities of ‘good’ requirements
• The ‘requirements document’
• Cataloguing requirements – business, system and performance
• Prioritising requirements

Sourcing and selecting suppliers

• The sourcing process
• Researching possible suppliers
• Request for Information / Pre-Qualification Questionnaire
• Special rules for public sector procurements
• Assessing and filtering responses
• Request for Proposal / Invitation to Tender
• Detailed response assessment
• Non-disclosure agreements

Engaging with the supplier

• Refining the requirements
• The Service Level Agreement – purpose and structure
• Structure of an SLA and steps in establishing the SLA
• Refining and agreeing key performance indicators and deliverables

The contract

• Contract types and duration
• Contract terms and conditions
• Contract placement and termination
• Negotiation, arbitration and litigation
• Variations to the contract
• Acceptance
• Copyright, patents and other intellectual property rights
• Escrow agreements
• Limitations of liability

Establishing the working relationship

• The implications of culture on performance / relationships
• Assessing organisations
• Using emotional intelligence in customer / supplier relationships

Influencing and leading suppliers

• Stages in the supplier relationship
• Styles of leading and managing

Organising and managing supplier reviews

• Introduction – the purpose of supplier reviews
• Template for a review meeting
• Presenting the results – the project dashboard
• Using review for proactive risk analysis and management

Relationship and segmentation analysis

• What is supplier segmentation?
• Risk / Significance / Value model – how customer sees supplier
• Strength / Attractiveness model – how supplier sees customer
• Correlating the two perspectives
• Optimising the relationship

Negotiating with suppliers

• Negotiation defined
• Approaches to negotiation
• Negotiation planning checklist
• Behaviours in reaching agreement

Managing changes to scope and requirements

• The inevitability of changes
• Map for change requirement discussion

Preventing supplier complacency

• Changing and evolving supplier relationships
• Assessing supplier attitudes and behaviour
• Stages of relationship breakdown

Handling disputes and conflict

• An approach to managing conflict
• Escalation and dispute resolution

Closure and exit

• Potential closure situations – project closure, end of long term contract, premature termination
• Risk assessment for the exit stage

Learning lessons from a supplier relationship

• Reviewing a project and a longer-term contract
• Staging an effective review