You’re managing vendors for a project. What’s the biggest mistake you can make?

Managing vendors for a project can be a challenging and rewarding skill, especially if you want to get a promotion and advance your career. But it also comes with some potential pitfalls that can derail your project and damage your reputation. In this article, we'll explore the biggest mistake you can make when managing vendors for a project and how to avoid it.

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1 Poor communication

Managing vendors for a project requires effective communication to build trust, set expectations, address issues, and ensure quality. Poor communication can lead to missed deadlines, overspending, underdelivering, and lack of control. To avoid this mistake, you must create a communication plan that covers the scope, objectives, and deliverables of the project; the roles and responsibilities of each vendor and stakeholder; the communication channels, frequency, and format; the escalation process and contingency plan; and the feedback and reporting mechanism. Establishing these guidelines will help ensure the success of your project.

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Akash Jain [ L.I.O.N ]

Contingent Workforce Program Manager | Client Partner | Customer Success Manager | Account Manager
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Poor expectation management is a critical pitfall for vendor managers. Unclear communication of goals, timelines, and deliverables breeds ambiguity, leading to frustration, missed deadlines, and subpar outputs. Additionally, unrealistic expectations concerning vendor capabilities can exert undue pressure and jeopardize project success. To mitigate these challenges, fostering clear communication, establishing realistic goals, and maintaining ongoing collaboration are crucial. By ensuring stakeholder alignment and information flow throughout the project, vendor managers significantly increase the probability of successful outcomes.

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Dr.Harish V.

Empowering Growth as CEO & Founder @ RADISH CONSULTANTS | Expert in New Business Development | Connecting Opportunity Seekers | Harry’s Kitchen Managing Head
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Scope, Objectives, and Deliverables: Clearly outline the scope of the project, its objectives, and the expected deliverables. Ensure that all vendors and stakeholders have a shared understanding of the project’s purpose and desired outcomes. Roles and Responsibilities: Define the roles and responsibilities of each vendor, stakeholder, and project team member. Clarify who is accountable for what tasks and deliverables to prevent confusion or overlap. Communication Channels and Frequency: Identify the communication channels to be used, whether it’s email, phone calls, video conferences, or collaboration platforms. Establish the frequency of communication, such as daily or weekly status updates, to keep everyone informed and engaged.

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Dr.Harish V.

Empowering Growth as CEO & Founder @ RADISH CONSULTANTS | Expert in New Business Development | Connecting Opportunity Seekers | Harry’s Kitchen Managing Head
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Scope, Objectives, and Deliverables: Clearly outline the scope of the project, its objectives, and the expected deliverables. Ensure that all vendors and stakeholders have a shared understanding of the project’s purpose and desired outcomes. Roles and Responsibilities: Define the roles and responsibilities of each vendor, stakeholder, and project team member. Clarify who is accountable for what tasks and deliverables to prevent confusion or overlap. Communication Channels and Frequency: Identify the communication channels to be used, whether it’s email, phone calls, video conferences, or collaboration platforms. Establish the frequency of communication, such as daily or weekly status updates, to keep everyone informed and engaged.

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2 Lack of alignment

When managing vendors for a project, it's important to ensure alignment. This means that your vendors understand and share your vision, goals, and values for the project. If you don't align your vendors with your project strategy, you risk creating confusion, conflict, and inconsistency. To avoid this mistake, you need to involve your vendors in the project planning and decision making process. Make sure they have a clear understanding of the business case and value proposition of the project, the success criteria and performance indicators of the project, the stakeholder expectations and requirements of the project, the risks and opportunities of the project, and the culture and values of your organization. Doing so will help create clarity and ensure that everyone is on the same page.

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3 Inadequate oversight

A third mistake you can make when managing vendors for a project is inadequate oversight. Oversight involves monitoring and evaluating vendor performance, quality, and compliance throughout the project lifecycle. If you neglect this step, you may compromise project standards, scope, and budget. To avoid this mistake, you should implement an oversight process that covers the contract terms and conditions, quality assurance and control measures, change management and issue resolution procedures, audit and verification activities, and recognition and reward system of the project.

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Tom Lazenby

Founder - Mayet | Championing enhanced vendor management in clinical trials | Risk Management | Quality Assurance | 3rd Party Oversight | Clinical Trials |
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One big mistake in managing vendors is inadequate oversight. It starts with poor due diligence during selection and extends to insufficient monitoring throughout the project. This can lead to misaligned goals, communication breakdowns, and ultimately, project setbacks. Effective management requires regular, transparent dialogues, clear KPIs, and proactive risk management to ensure vendors align with project objectives, fostering a collaborative partnership rather than a mere supplier relationship.

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4 Insufficient integration

A fourth mistake you can make when managing vendors for a project is insufficient integration. This means that you need to coordinate and harmonize your vendors' activities, deliverables, and resources with your project plan, schedule, and team. Otherwise, you risk creating gaps, overlaps, and inefficiencies. To avoid this mistake, an integration process should be applied that covers the work breakdown structure and dependencies of the project, resource allocation and optimization of the project, schedule management and synchronization of the project, communication and collaboration tools of the project, as well as knowledge management and learning practices of the project.

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D.Ajith kumar

Sales trainer & Coach II Communication Coach II The Hypnotherapist II NLP Trainer II Coach (ICF). II Professional Speaker. II Ex É Merck II Ex HLL (now HUL) II Ex Kodak. II Ex Xerox II Ex HCL II
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When you are on a project To avoided migvings * There has to clear alignment towards the goal of the project between all parties * Every point needs to be discussed and agreed to, no taking anything for granted * Both we and vendor should be clear who brings what, by when and why * Be clear who would be the personal from all parties playing the game *Ensure good rapport among the personals *When in any doubt call up and discuss * plan and meet regularly to check on progress and bottle necks *All discussions and agreements should be well documented

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5 Unrealistic expectations

When managing vendors for a project, it is important to avoid the mistake of having unrealistic expectations. You should have a realistic and reasonable assessment of your vendors' capabilities, limitations, and constraints. To prevent frustration, disappointment, and dissatisfaction, you should conduct a thorough due diligence and negotiation process with your vendors. This process should include agreeing on the scope and specifications of the project, the cost and payment terms of the project, the time and delivery terms of the project, the quality and warranty terms of the project, and the relationship and partnership terms of the project.

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6 Here’s what else to consider

This is a space to share examples, stories, or insights that don’t fit into any of the previous sections. What else would you like to add?

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Emanuel Matías Tejedor

Ingeniero Industrial - Consultor en Proyectos - Docente
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Algunas ideas sugeridas desde mi experiencia profesional: Solicitar programas de control de calidad Hacer análisis integral tipo "NOSIS" Visitar instalaciones

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You’re managing vendors for a project. What’s the biggest mistake you can make?

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2

3

4

5

6

1 Poor communication

2 Lack of alignment

3 Inadequate oversight

4 Insufficient integration

5 Unrealistic expectations

6 Here’s what else to consider

Vendor Management

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You’re managing vendors for a project. What’s the biggest mistake you can make?

1

2

3

4

5

6

1 Poor communication

2 Lack of alignment

3 Inadequate oversight

4 Insufficient integration

5 Unrealistic expectations

6 Here’s what else to consider

Vendor Management

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