Total Needs Satisfaction

Fundamentally, of course, you have to satisfy customers’ needs. These vary by industry and the nature of the customers’ business, but essentially these needs include meeting customers’ product or service specifications; delivering consistently high quality; delivering on time, as promised; having the capacity to deliver what customers need, which may mean delivering multiple products to multiple geographies; and having the financial strength to be a reliable supplier. Most of the buyers we interviewed said that these fundamental need satisfactions meant predictable supplier performance. Anything that kept suppliers from performing predictably diminished their value and trustworthiness.

So to work with buyers today, you must be predictable and dependable, which means you must have the capacity to understand and meet their needs and an unwavering commitment to supply those needs. Buyers must trust that you will deliver on your promises and deliver high quality. Furthermore, you should think strategically and be a good fit as a business partner. These qualities will open doors for you, but they will not necessarily make you the preferred supplier. To do that, you must also add strategically significant business value.

Dave Gabriel, formerly Tenneco’s senior vice president and general manager of North American Aftermarket, elaborated on this point: “Frankly, what I look for at a very high level,” he said, “is a supplier’s financial strength, technology position, intellectual skill set, quality, and geographic reach. Understanding these helps you get into the real elements of how a supplier operates. Intellectual capacity is one of the key drivers. You want people who look at their business the same way you do, who think strategically and translate that into business results.”¹⁸

Suppliers all look suspiciously like one another, and the price differentiation is not enough to decide which way to go. You have to look at other things.—Joan Selleck, Nikon Precision