Supplier Relationship Management

✍ Scribed by Christian Schuh , Michael F. Strohmer , Stephen Easton , Michael D. Hales , Alenka Triplat

• Publisher: Apress
• Year: 2014
• Tongue: English
• Leaves: 182
• Edition: 1st
• Category: Library

✦ Synopsis

There’s a new buzz phrase in the air: Supplier Relationship Management (SRM). Corporate executives know it’s necessary, but there’s only one problem. Nobody yet knows how to do it. Or they think it’s all about bashing your vendors over the head until they reduce the price another 4%. Supplier Relationship Management: How to Maximize Vendor Value and Opportunity changes all that.
Containing the best and most innovative advice from the operations and procurement experts at consultant AT Kearney, this book shows that SRM is at root a strategic discussion requiring cross-functional interaction and internal alignment at the highest levels. It requires an honest appraisal of the value that suppliers now bring to your firm, as well as their potential value. It then requires a frank and constructive business-to-business dialogue about how to improve the relationship. When this happens, a company reaps myriad benefits, ranging from new opportunity to added value to competitive advantage—and, quite likely, to overall (and sometimes substantial) cost reductions.

This book shows the most concrete methods you can use today to:

Identify value-adding opportunities in the supply chain
Work closely with suppliers to maximize the benefits
Work the "Critical Cluster" of suppliers, where the greatest opportunity for advantage lies
Review suppliers to encourage constant gains in quality and cost
Turn your SRM strategy into a major competitive advantage
Supplier Relationship Management introduces and explains the Supplier Interaction Model, a key tool that will help you get the most from your supplier relationships. It segments the supplier universe into nine categories, from those you want to run away from fast to those so good and so useful to your organization that it can make sense to invest in them directly. Numerous case studies show how to apply the principles to your situation.

Supplier Relationship Management burns off the fog that has surrounded the procurement process for far too long. It is the definitive guide for business executives who want to get the maximum benefits from suppliers and gain very real advantages over competitors.

What you’ll learn

How to manage supplier relationships to promote efficiency and improve profitability
How to tap into opportunities by working more strategically with the “Crucial Cluster” of high-performing suppliers
When and how to apply true partnering approaches to maximize the benefits for both organizations
How to identify the suppliers who will provide the greatest long-term value
When to look to suppliers for innovation and better practices
How to turn supplier management into a true competitive advantage
Who this book is for

Chief procurement officers, operations managers, purchasing officers, supply chain executives, C-level executives, and non-procurement managers who need to understand how to save money and grease operations by managing supplier relationships better.

✦ Table of Contents

Table of Contents

Procurement Success vs. SRM Failure
Supplier Relationship Management
To SRM and Beyond!
Introducing Supplier Interaction Models
The "Ordinaries"
"Problem Children"
The "Critical Cluster"
Putting Supplier Interaction Models to Work
The Role of IT in TrueSRM
The "Difference" You Get from TrueSRM