Donna Glidden
Research Director, Vendor Management
Info-Tech Research Group

• Understand how important your account is to the vendor and how it is classified.
• Understand how informed the account team is about your company and your industry.
• Understand how long the team has been with the vendor. Have they been around long enough to have developed a “brand” or trust within their organization?
• Understand and manage the relationships and influence the account team has within your organization to maintain control of the relationship.

• The vendor account team “came with the deal.”
• The vendor account team has limited training and experience.
• The vendor account team has close relationships within your organization outside of Procurement.
• Managing your organization’s vendors is ad hoc and there is no formalized process for vendors to follow.
• Your market position with the vendor is not optimal.

• Establish a repeatable, consistent vendor management process that focuses on the account team to maintain control of the relationship and drive the results you need.
• Create a questionnaire for gaining stakeholder feedback to evaluate the account team on a regular basis.
• Consider adding a vendor rules of engagement exhibit to your contracts and RFXs.

IT Benefits

• Clear lines of communication
• Correct focus on the specific needs of IT
• More accurate project scoping
• Less time wasted

Mutual IT and
Business Benefits

• Reduced time to implement
• Improved alignment between IT & business
• Improved vendor performance
• Improved vendor relations

Business Benefits

• Clear relationship guidelines based on mutual understanding
• Improved communications between the parties
• Mutual understanding of roles/goals
• Measurable relationship criteria

• Track vendor contacts with your organization.
• Qualify the account team as you would the vendor:
  • Background
  • Client experience
• Consider including vendor rules of engagement as part of your RFP process.
• How does the vendor team classify your potential account?

• Set expectations with the account team for the ongoing relationship.
• Include a vendor rules of engagement exhibit in the contract.
• Depending on your classification of the vendor, establish appropriate account team deliverables, meetings, etc.

• “Evalu-rate” your account team by using a stakeholder questionnaire to gain measurable feedback.
• Identify the desired improvements in communications and service delivery.
• Use positive reinforcements that result in positive behavior.

Don’t forget to look at your organization’s role in how well the account team is able to perform to your expectations.

Measure to manage – what are the predetermined criteria that you will measure the account team’s success against?

• According to Forbes (2012), 55% of salespeople lack basic sales skills.
• 58% of buyers report that sales reps are unable to answer their questions effectively.
• According to a recent survey, 84% of all sales training is lost after 90 days. This is due to the lack of information retention among sales personnel.
• 82% of B2B decision-makers think sales reps are unprepared.
• At least 50% of prospects are not a good fit for the product or service that vendors are selling (Sales Insights Lab).
• It takes ten months or more for a new sales rep to be fully productive.

(Source: Spotio)

Info-Tech Insight

Remember to examine the inadequacies of vendor training as part of the root cause of why the account team may lack substance.

Why it matters

1.8 years

is the average tenure for top ten tech companies

2.6 years is the average experience required to hire.

2.4 years is the average account executive tenure.

44% of reps plan to leave their job within two years.

The higher the average contract value, the longer the tenure.

More-experienced account reps tend to stay longer.

• Take an inward look at how your company engages with vendors overall:
  • Do you have a standard protocol for how initial vendor inquiries are handled (emails, phone calls, meeting invitations)?
  • Do you have a standard protocol for introductory vendor meetings?
  • Are vendors provided the appropriate level of access to stakeholders/management?
  • Are you prompt in your communications with vendors?
  • What is the quality of the data provided to vendors? Do they need to reach out repeatedly for more/better data?
  • How well are you able to forecast your needs?
  • Is your Accounts Payable team responsive to vendor inquiries?
  • Are Procurement and stakeholders on the same page regarding the handling of vendors?
• While you may not have a formal vendor management initiative in place, try to understand how important each of your vendors are to your organization, especially before you issue an RFP, so you can set the right expectations with potential vendor teams.
• Classify vendors as strategic, operational, tactical, or commodity.
  • This will help you focus your time appropriately and establish the right meeting cadence according to the vendor’s place in your business.
  • See Info-Tech’s research on vendor classification.

Consider a standard intake process for fielding vendor inquiries and responding to requests for meetings to save yourself the headaches that come with trying to keep up with them.

Stakeholder teams, IT, and Procurement need to be on the same page in this regard to avoid missteps in the important introductory phase of dealing with vendors and the resulting confusion on the part of vendor account teams when they get mixed messages and feel “passed around.”

Vendor contacts are made in several ways:

• Cold calls
• Emails
• Website
• Conferences
• Social introductions

Things to consider:

• Consider having a link on your company website to your Sourcing & Procurement team, including:
  • An email address for vendor inquiries.
  • Instructions to vendors on how to engage with you and what information they should provide.
  • A link to your Vendor Rules of Engagement.
• Track vendor inquiries so you have a list of potential respondents to future RFPs.
• Work with stakeholders and gain their buy-in on how vendor inquiries are to be routed and handled internally.

• Understand how your business will be qualified by the vendor. Where you fit in the market space regarding spend, industry, size of your business, etc., determines what account team(s) you will have access to.
• Add account team–specific questions to your RFP(s) to gain an understanding of their capabilities and experience up front.
• How have you classified the vendor/solution? Strategic, tactical, operational, or commodity?
  • Depending on the classification/criticality (See Info-Tech’s Vendor Classification Tool) of the vendor, set the appropriate expectation for vendor review meetings, e.g. weekly, monthly, quarterly, annually.
  • Set the expectation that their support of your account will be regularly measured/monitored by your organization.
  • Consider including a set of vendor rules of engagement in your RFPs and contracts so vendors will know up front what your expectations are for how to engage with Procurement and stakeholders.

• Don’t wait until there is an issue to engage the account team. Develop an open, honest relationship with vendors and get to know their key players.
• Seek regular feedback from stakeholders on both parties’ performance against the agreement, based on agreed-upon criteria.
• Measure vendor performance using the Evalu-Rate Your Account Team tool included with this research.
• Based on vendor criticality, set a regular cadence of vendor meetings to discuss stakeholder feedback, both positive feedback as well as areas needing improvement and next steps, if applicable.

• Is truthful
• Asks great questions
• Practices active listening
• Is likeable and trustworthy
• Exhibits emotional intelligence
• Is relatable and knowledgeable
• Has excellent interpersonal skills
• Has a commitment to personal growth
• Approaches sales as a service to others
• Understands the product they are selling
• Builds authentic connections with clients
• Is optimistic and has energy, drive, and confidence
• Makes an emotional connection to whatever they are selling
• Has the ability to put themselves in the position of the client
• Builds trust by asking the right questions; listens and provides appropriate solutions without overpromising and underdelivering

• Goes by gut feel
• Has a sense of entitlement
• Lacks genuine social empathy.
• Considers everyone a prospect
• Is unable to ask the right questions.
• Is not really into sales – it’s “just a job”
• Focuses on the product instead of people
• Loves to talk so much they forget to listen
• Fears rejection and can’t roll with the punches
• If push comes to shove, they keep pushing until you push back
• Is clueless about their product and needs to rely on the “experts”

• Consider being a reference account.
• Say thank you as a simple way to boost morale and encourage continued positive behavior.
• If you can, provide opportunities to increase business with the vendor – that is the ultimate thanks.
• Continue to support open, honest communication between the vendor and your team.
• Letters or emails of recognition to the vendor team’s management have the potential to boost the rep’s image within their own organization and shine a spotlight on your organization as a good customer.
• Supplier awards for exemplary service and support may be awarded as part of a more formal vendor management initiative.
• Refer to the characteristics of an effective rep – which ones best represent your account team?

• Understand what role, if any, you and/or your stakeholders may play in the rep’s lack of performance by determining the root cause:
  • Unrealistic expectations
  • Unclear and incomplete instructions
  • Lack of follow through by your stakeholders to provide necessary information
  • Disconnects between Sourcing/Procurement/IT that lead to poor communication with the vendor team (lack of vendor management)
• Schedule more frequent meetings with the team to address the issues and measure progress.
• Be open to listening to your rep(s) and ask them what they need from you in order to be effective in supporting your account.
• Be sure to document in writing each instance where the rep has underperformed and include the vendor team’s leadership on all communications and meetings.
• Refer to the characteristics of an ineffective rep – which ones best describe your ineffective vendor rep?

• What is the vendor team’s background, particularly in the industry they are representing? How did they get to where they are?
  • Have they been around long enough to have developed credibility throughout their organization?
  • Do they have client references they are willing to share?
• How long have they been in this position with the vendor?
  • Remember, the average rep has less than 24 months of experience.
  • If they lack depth of experience, are they trainable?
• How long have they been in the industry?
  • Longevity and experience matters.

• What is their best customer experience?
  • What are they most proud of from an account rep perspective?
• What is their most challenging customer experience?
  • What is their biggest weakness?
• How are their relationships with their delivery and support teams?
  • Can they get the job done for you by effectively working their internal relationships?
• What are their goals with this account?
  • Besides selling a lot.
• What relationships do they have within your organization?
  • Are they better situated within your organization than you are?

Clearly document your expectations via formal rules of engagement for vendor teams in order to outline how they are expected to interact with your business and stakeholders. This can have a positive impact on your vendor and stakeholder relationships and enable you to gain control of:

• Onsite visits and meetings.
• Submission of proposals, quotes, contracts.
• Communication between vendors, stakeholders and Procurement.
• Expectations for ongoing relationship management.

Include the rules in your RFXs and contracts to formalize your expectations.

See the Vendor Rules of Engagement template included with this research.

Download the Vendor Rules of Engagement template

Download the Evalu-Rate Your Account Team tool

• Use a measurable, repeatable process for evaluations.
• Include feedback from key stakeholders engaged in the relationship.
• Keep the feedback fact based and have backup.

DO

• Be friendly, approachable.
• Manage the process by which vendors contact your organization – take control!
• Understand your market position when sourcing goods/services to establish how much leverage you have with vendors.
• Set vendor meetings according to their criticality to your business.
• Evaluate your account teams to understand their strengths/weaknesses.
• Gain stakeholder buy-in to your vendor processes.

DON'T

• Don’t be “friends.”
• Don’t criticize in public.
• Don’t needlessly escalate.
• Don’t let the process of vendors communicating with your stakeholders “just happen.”
• Don’t accept poor performance or attitude.