Star Wars And It’s Warning To Suppliers
The basic premise of the Star Wars trilogy was the rise of an empire led by a ruthless emperor. Of course, in the movie, good overcame evil and everyone lived happily ever after (less a few entire civilisations destroyed along the way!).
This is all part and parcel of the modern business world, particularly in larger businesses.
It can cause issues internally within the organisation but when a supplier encounters such an individual, it can create all sorts of problems during the engagement.
The individual can, if they are insecure in their role, “big themselves” up to the supplier. They promise all sorts of things and often these promises never materialise. But more frustratingly, they can close off your access as a supplier to other members of the decision making team.
This is usually fine during the normal operation of the contract, but;
- There might be a problem for which you get blamed elsewhere in the organisation.
- The contract is due for renewal and you identify that the person you were dealing with is not actually the decision maker.
- The person you were dealing with might be seen as “difficult” and any associations that person has are considered the same way no matter how well they are doing.
A dangerous position to be in and one that should be avoided at all costs.
Of course, if the gatekeeper is the budget holder and ultimate decision maker, then this is not so much of an issue. But inevitably the people that suppliers deal with on a regular basis are not at this level – they just present themselves in that way.
For this reason, it is imperative that you get to meet as many decision makers as possible during both the tender process and also during normal operations of the contractual engagement.
This will help you;
- Understand other motivations within the company – everyone’s needs are different!
- To share information about your company capabilities to more than one person.
- To protect the integrity of your company by being more aware of the perception of it from other people.
- Understand possible opportunities in other areas that you may not have seen when dealing with the one person.
So if you are a supplier, look out for the empire builders – you just never know when that empire could collapse!
Photo: Kevin Dooley