As VP, Director of Production Procurement I am some times called upon to mediate "issues" that have developed between a production team and a supplier. My first responsibility is to carefully listen to both sides of an "issue" to truly understand it and then see if I can help lead both sides to a meaningful and equitable solution. All too often I find myself trying to mediate a situation that has formed through poor communications. Emails have been fired back and forth and quick phone conversations have been had and yet nothing has been placed in formal writing and signed by both parties. I'm sure you can see that whatever the "issue" might be it is based in an honest miss-understanding between parties. The fact that there hasn't been anything placed in formal writing which shows the resulting "understanding" means there can't be an "oh, that's what you meant?" moment!
I have found that 90% of these "issues" are the result of honest assumptions and miss-understandings which can lead to bent feelings and potential real issues. All of these types of situations can either be avoided all together or easily remedied when discussions and assumptions are placed into a formal document, reviewed, agreed to and signed by both parties. In the instance of a 3rd party supplier this document should most always be a Purchase Order (PO). The PO functions as your contract with a supplier and should function to show any changes in scope of work. A PO is your central and most effective tool to help facilitate clear and fully understood requirements. The PO seems like such a simple and relatively unimportant thing, but in reality it functions as the central document that facilitates healthy and productive relationships with your suppliers.
Comments (2)
This is a correct assessment, Eric. The PO is not just the pillar between the agency and the vendor, but also a crucial piece of the agency/ client relationship, which brings another important topic: managing expectations. Amongst the issues I had to diffuse (Caribiner, Glamma, Ipsos-Novaction), many could have been avoided with a thorough assessment of the clients understanding of the deliverables.
Posted by Marc on July 2, 2008 10:29 PM
By "miss-understanding" -- are you saying this is a gender-specific problem?
Posted by Tom on August 13, 2008 2:30 AM