TITLE:
Supplier Portfolio Management: Strategies for Design and Growth
AUTHORS:
Cameron Fisher
KEYWORDS:
Contract Management, Organizational Design and Development, Portfolio, Strategic Sourcing, Supplier Management, Third-Party Risk Management, Technology Management, Business Economics, Dual Mandate, Price Stability
JOURNAL NAME:
American Journal of Industrial and Business Management,
Vol.13 No.12,
December
26,
2023
ABSTRACT: The analysis identifies
opportunities to design and grow supplier portfolio management. Recent advances
in process automation enable better coordination across a complex set of
enterprise participants. By deploying emerging solutions and practices, the
supplier portfolio management can mature. Typically overseen by CFO or COO, the
set of providers are subject to extensive due diligence during the pre- and
post-award stages. Supply management professionals assess the landscape of
current and prospective providers to determine viable sourcing options. The
goal is to set-up, manage and complete initiatives to maximize success. As a
result, alignment, compliance, consistency, focus and scale are better
accomplished. Recent advances in autonomous sourcing, robotic process
automation, cloud transformation and agile application development can
accelerate the benefit realization timeline. In order to identify, evaluate and
manage offerings from a range of suppliers, an organization needs to design and
grow an effective approach. As new suppliers are added to the portfolio, other
suppliers will roll-off. This article provides recommendations for supplier
portfolio practices. As the portfolio and teams mature, dynamic business
conditions attract new and exciting offerors. Existing supplier relationships
may require less hand-holding but still need to be monitored and their
performance reported. Obsolete providers are curtailed. In a similar vein, the
experience, capability and composition of team members will evolve.