100 Top Supply (Management) Tips

Yesterday, Procuri and Supply Excellence released the mini e-book The 100 Greatest Supply Management Tips of All Time on their new Top Supply Tips website.

As Tim says in his announcement post, the tips found in this book are not complex. They don’t require a huge budget, top executive support, or years to deploy. Instead, they are practical, easy-to-understand approaches – most of which you can implement today. Furthermore, they’re not new tips either … they are all examples of simple best practices that the major supply chain blogs have been promoting for the last couple of years. However, this is one of the few collections you will find with such a broad set of recommendations, and one of the largest collections of simple best practices I’ve seen. Therefore, it’s worth a download and a read. Some of the recommendations are so simple, you probably dismissed them as “too simple” the first time your heard them and forgot about them, even though they could be valuable to you.

Some of my favorites, which might just be because they have a cool title, are:

  • #14 Hang out with losers
    Take the time to debrief suppliers that fail to win your business. The best suppliers will use your advice to develop new capabilities and bidding tactics to meet your future needs.
  • # 24 Fire Your Best People
    Remove your best team members from their day jobs and put them in charge of your most important supply management improvement initiatives. This ensures program success and helps retain talent.
  • # 45 Make it Personal
    Ensure senior executives understand supply management’s contribution to your company’s profits, performance, and competitive edge by illustrating how supply management affects their personal lives.
  • # 67 Don’t be afraid of commitment
    Assess future pricing and supply market implications to determine when to engage in long-term supplier or hedging agreements. This will assure supply and lock in preferred pricing, which is particularly wise in the face of rising metals, plastics, and energy prices.

For more best practices, check out random posts in the Best Practices category.