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How do you make a supplier contract work? Agreeing what’s to be agreed is typically complicated. Start by setting out the nature of the services to be supplied. Then describe how the services are to be specified and called off month by month. Ask the supplier for a quote, then raise a purchase order. Have the whole process managed by a project manager.
Not infrequently, we begin work with a new client and request to see current employee documentation. And we find there is none. We go to a particular employee’s personnel file and find that either there is no file, or it’s substantially empty. And that’s often after they’ve been with the firm for many years. Simply, this can’t ever be so. Here's why and what to do.
Managing Supplier Agreements
Written by John Berry on 21st June 2021. Revised 22nd June 2021.
7 min read
There are two types of agreement that might be in place between a firm and its people: an employment contract for its employees, and a supplier contract for all others. A supplier contract covers the relationship between the firm and the various consultants, associates, sub-contractors, freelancers and other individuals. Companies struggle to differentiate between the two agreement types. Here's some guidance.
Just Reasonable Belief
Written by Sue Berry on 2nd May 2017. Revised 26th May 2021.
4 min read
The manager’s right to act, to sanction or dismiss, is dependent on the manager having grounds for reasonable belief that the situation occurred. The manager’s right to act, to sanction or dismiss, is dependent on them having grounds for reasonable belief that an unsatisfactory situation occurred. The onus is not as demanding as criminal cases - nor as demanding as in civil cases. But evidence is still needed to inform the manager's decision.
A supplier is any entity or person that supplies goods or services to the firm. The essence of a supplier contract is, “The supplier agrees to supply the firm with goods or services so specified in return for payment of the price and under the terms and conditions set out here”. Any supplier agreement must make this statement real.
Knowledge Management and the Growth of Competence: Achieving competitive advantage in the firm
Written by Sue Berry on 6th May 2017. Revised 27th April 2021.
15 min read
Intuitively we know that knowledge in a firm is good. In the East, those with knowledge are revered. But why is it that knowledge has value, and specifically, why is it that knowledge in a firm is useful to that firm? Something also tells us that knowledge for its own sake is of little value. It needs to be applied, to become competence, to realise its true value. This brief ‘intuitive’ look starts the process of building a framework for knowledge and its conversion to competence.
