Overcoming key challenges in Supplier Information Management “Let our advance worrying become advance thinking and planning.� Winston Churchill Churchill’s words speak in terms of recognizing potential kinks and challenges one can face in Supplier Information Management before they occur. Though there are several key challenges in the system, we can turn that worry into advance planning as a means to overcome the challenges put forth. Prevention is better than cure, and planning can take us there. Implementing a strong and robust Supplier Information Management (SIM) solution provides efficient data collection, data management and validation services across the organization. SIM provides governance and management of massive volumes of data from suppliers spread across numerous sources. It is not limited to a certain subset of data but it does include all the relevant documentation and data that a company generally needs to increase and optimize transactions and interactions with suppliers. The advantages of a secure Supplier Information Management system: 1. Supplier Information Management ensures that there is strong governance of supplier data 2. It enforces international and global standards of governance of supplier data 3. SIM enforces international standards for allowing increased local flexibility 4. It allows users to adequately manage supplier information by exception 5. It ensures that there is a higher level of productivity and accuracy with regard to the supplier information 6. It generates supplier information which is actionable in nature To make the most of Supplier Information Management, the challenges must be anticipated to ensure advance planning and efficiency in dealing with supplier information.
Key challenges of Supplier Information Management 1. Lack of a comprehensive and trusted view of information One of the primary challenges of SIM is that there is no trusted view across the organization of information available. This makes access to all the required supplier data difficult. 2. Operational Inefficiencies The usual methods of managing suppliers and their information or data is often ineffective, and outdated. This is also accompanied by several manual processes and unnecessary workload which slows down the process to access information. 3. High Supplier Management Costs This is another challenge that may be faced where there is a significant increase in costs related to supplier management. The rise in the price of energy and fuel, increasing global consumers, development of high technology, labor rates puts the operating cost at an all-time high pressure.