How do we do this? By turning our attention inward to existing contract obligations by focusing on committed spend, especially when minimum commitments are involved, and on renewals.

When things underneath break, even partially, the negative effects can reach all the way to our dinner tables. This is true with Contract Management, a critical discipline within Sourcing and Vendor Management. For most people, this is not an alluring topic. Some people (not me of course) might even liken it to organizing a drawer full of socks.

In the last installment of this 2-part blog, we used the story from the movie Casino Royale to color up the value of inviting strangers into your cyber security strategy...and how strategic sourcing of vendor partners is relevant in that effort.

Improve your cyber security strategy by making the strategic sourcing process and cyber security vendor partners part of the planning discussions...early and often.

It hit the CEO’s inbox as committed. The IT team had worked for nearly a year evaluating vendors and negotiating a critical enterprise infrastructure technology deal with a new vendor. Everyone was ready to get the deal done and get to work.

A story about a health insurance company’s RFP journey to the right vendor partner and 23% pricing relief on a ten-digit investment.

3 Access Points for Creating Financial Value From Vendor Agreement Renewals.

Vendor renewals often get a “check the box” treatment. Here’s a true story about a vendor renewal that seemed fairly routine…until it wasn’t.

Insights to the often missed opportunity to win with renewals, including a 3-Point checklist for better understanding your mid-term renewals.

Insights to the often missed opportunity to win with renewals, including a 5-Point technical checklist for better understanding your renewals.

How to achieve results in strategic sourcing projects by buildind the stool of success. John, a friend and strategic sourcing colleague, was struggling with how to finish vendor negotiation with a positive outcome. He was struggling to guide the business stakeholder…

A recent Bitdefender article said one in ten firms will lose $10MM from cyberattack and, as a result, greater investment in cybersecurity is being made by companies. That’s great! BUT cybersecurity firms, by the nature of the service they provide, may represent a greater security risk than ‘normal’ vendors. Here’s a story to illustrate what I mean.

A recent CPO article by Mark Lotti quipped, "…a vendor's cyber risk becomes the client's cyber risk".  The sheer number of breaches and data loss make this statement ring true, now more than ever.  The question is, how do you manage your vendors’ risks to keep your data secure?

The fast-technological evolution means that nearly every aspect of your business is experiencing change in some way, and vendor management is no different. When it comes to procurement and vendor management in the digital age, look out—and be ready—for these emerging technologies and trends.

A look inside the four results (not titled ‘best price’) you want in negotiating every deal you ever do.  

Adversarial or collaborative? Here’s a story about a recent negotiation where the vendor representative took a very adversarial approach. Let’s see how it worked out for them…

Adversarial or collaborative? Here’s a story about a recent negotiation where the vendor representative took a very adversarial approach. Let’s see how it worked out for them…

This is the third and final blog in our POWW series where we discuss the WW for Win-Win.

Welcome to the Seprio Blog, a place where you will (hopefully) find pearls useful in protecting your business priorities, where we tell stories and talk about best practices in vendor management, negotiating, and contracting better. Today’s post focuses on the O in POWW: Objectivity.

Welcome to the Seprio Blog, a place where you will (hopefully) find pearls useful in protecting your business priorities, where we tell stories and talk about best practices in vendor management, negotiating, and contracting better. I’m your host and Seprio Master Certified Negotiator, Patrick Bohnenkamp. Today’s post is the first in a three-part series on the tenets of best practice negotiating.