You're in charge of sourcing. How can you get the most out of supplier engagement?

To maximize supplier engagement, foster open communication and collaboration. Clearly communicate expectations and provide regular updates. Actively seek feedback and involve suppliers in decision-making processes. Build strong relationships based on trust and mutual respect. Offer incentives for innovation and continuous improvement. Regularly evaluate performance and provide constructive feedback. Lastly, prioritize long-term partnerships over short-term gains for sustainable success.

Before onboarding suppliers, define objectives and KPIs for your supply chain programs. This sets a baseline for success and ensures alignment across different departments within your organization

My experience from the industrial field is that having close relationships with your strategic suppliers is essential. You want suppliers who want to drive innovation and development. Good quality products and reliable deliveries are both important, but to stay competitive, every company needs to adapt and improve. The pace of change is fast and unrelenting.

It is important because they have the power to ensure your operation runs smoothly without delays, directly impacting your customer. A partner supplier understands your challenges and will be much more available to assist you, so it's important to build stronger bonds with strategic suppliers and know how to manage your entire supply chain. It's the suppliers who will bring technological innovations before your development team, they will assist in solving technical product problems, provide solutions for your business, and so on.

It is the most vital to have a good supplier engagement. Instead of treating suppliers as mere transactional vendors, consider them as long-term strategic partners. Open communication and support are essential for optimizing operations and mitigating risks.

In order to attain the best common goal and end point is to have a frank to the point sit down meeting with everyone involved at all stages of the relationship with the supplier to ensure everyone clearly understands the end goal and to ensure the maximum quality at the best price. From this point you can then audit the supplier at each stage in the process and highlight possible infractions on the goal line in order to ensure total quality time management and order in full delivery , Monthly audits of the supplier also ensure compliance with what is expected from both parties

The best way to get started is always a meeting in person. You need to make sure you have the same view of where you are and where you want to be. Your suppliers should be interested in helping you reach your goals, because when you do better, so do they.

Be open and present non-compromising and confidential data; it is of paramount importance to show that the business is sustainable, beneficial for both parties, and that it will play a significant role. You need to know how to sell your idea to the supplier, especially when dealing with unique suppliers, which is quite common in some markets. Presenting an image of organization and planning will also help bring suppliers to your side.

It is very important to have clear idea and Reliable data from suppliers is crucial for supply chain and sustainability programs. To embark on a supply chain traceability journey, you need visibility from sourcing to manufacturing to distribution.

Since I work in industry, I have always found it helpful to show my suppliers around in our production facility, and also to visit theirs. This helps tremendously down the line in both innovation and problem resolution. Once contracts are signed, communication should not be limited to only email, as this has a tendency to lower engagement over time. If meetings in person are too demanding, a good alternative is video meetings. For large suppliers, a reoccuring monthly meeting at a predetermined time helps everyone involved find the time and plan around it.

Once you find your people, collaboration should flow naturally. If you have chosen suppliers that are a good fit in terms of culture, innovation drive and goals - you are all working towards the same objective. You should always leverage your suppliers expertise as they often know more than you about what is happening in their market.

Collaborate with suppliers on short- and long-term business objectives. Set mutual targets and jointly develop plans to achieve shared goals related to growth, innovation, productivity, quality and margins

First of all, let people know when they are doing a good job. This goes for everyone, everywhere. And don't just tell them "good job", be specific. For smaller suppliers, it can sometimes be a huge deal to be allowed to use you as a reference customer, and it doesn't cost you anything.