Procurement Organizations of the Future Series:

The Power of Authentic Relationships in Driving Procurement Resilience

 

Think for a moment on this powerful African proverb: “If you want to go fast, go alone. If you want to go far, go together.” Human ancestors learned two million years ago that we are stronger together. Collaborating and building relationships makes it easier to survive and thrive.

This is true in life and in procurement. Our procurement strategies succeed when we collaborate and build relationships with other procurement team members, other stakeholders at our organizations, our customers, and our suppliers. That last group is especially important.

In the age of procurement, it’s easy to reduce our supplier relationships to the shallow connection of making a transaction with a name on a screen. But relationships are stronger and more beneficial when they are built on meaningful connections and long-term collaborations. Anyone can click the ‘Add to Cart’ button and order an item for next-day or even same-day delivery, but this is without authentic human interaction. Neither party knows the other’s back story, motivations, or goals. And there is no motivation to do more than the basic transaction. If the item is out of stock, the customer is out of luck. If shipping is running late, the customer must wait.

The Human Advantage in Supplier Relationships

Procurement professionals have the power to add value to their organizations by cultivating deeper relationships with key suppliers. When you know your supplier and understand their business cycles, you can place orders at a time when you are assured of the best service. And when they know your inventory cycle, they can plan to have stock ready for you. You work together to make business easier and more successful for each other.

It’s important to remember that we’re humans working in procurement. Humans thrive with healthy, positive relationships. Building strong relationships with suppliers based on trust and information-sharing improves supplier relationship management overall and comes with a host of other benefits.

Let’s look at three key benefits: collaboration, credibility, and culture.

Collaboration opens doors to new opportunities

Strong supplier relationships open up opportunities for collaboration and innovation. In some cases, brands collaborate to create limited-edition products or capture a specific audience.

Walgreens and delivery service provider (DSP) DoorDash collaborated this year to better serve SNAP/EBT customers.¹

Customers can now make a Walgreens purchase through DoorDash and pay directly with their SNAP/EBT cards. This partnership marked the first time SNAP/EBT customers could order from a major drugstore nationwide through a third-party delivery service provider. The collaboration more than doubled the number of stores available through DoorDash for on-demand delivery with SNAP/EBT payments, and Walgreens is offering more than 4,000 SNAP-eligible products for delivery within an hour through DoorDash. This innovation not only adds more business opportunities for Walgreens and DoorDash, but it also increases food access for customers, allowing them to get the essential grocery items they need without having to worry about finding transportation or missing work to shop for themselves during business hours.

The innovation has been so successful that similar partnerships are popping up between Walgreens and Instacart and Rite Aid and Instacart.^2,3

Procurement makes collaborative innovations like this possible. When working with a third-party DSP, the scope of work must cover services, technology integration, reliability, performance, root-cause analyses, and other key considerations. By managing the relationship, procurement mitigates risk while allowing the collaboration to thrive. This approach delivers value through increased sales, a stronger competitive edge, greater brand awareness, and valuable business lessons.

Long-term relationships also tend to have benefits, including cost savings, supply chain resilience, and stronger communication. These relationships also give partners the opportunity grow and develop together, bringing out the best in each other and each other’s products and services.

Innovation Through Partnership

Consider the partnership between Apple and Nike.⁴ Since the inception of the iPod, Apple has used Nike as a preferred partner in reaching the athletic customer segment. They collaborated on a special-edition iPod, the Nike+ iPod, to help consumers run to the beat. This partnership trickled into Nike collaborating with Apple on a special edition of the Apple Watch, the Apple Watch Nike+ edition, which seamlessly integrated with the Nike Run Club app. In turn, the product had a competitive edge for athletic consumers compared with Garmin watches

With the imposition of higher tariffs, procurement teams must collaborate closely with suppliers to navigate cost increases and supply chain disruptions. Strong relationships can lead to joint strategies for sourcing alternative materials, optimizing logistics, and exploring local manufacturing options to mitigate tariff impacts.

Reliable suppliers improve your credibility

Strong procurement relationships can also enhance the credibility of a brand. In the examples mentioned above, working with a well-known brand boosts the credibility of the partner. But dependable, less-publicized partners are often the ones that make the difference when market conditions get rough.

During the chip shortage of the early 2020s, Toyota emerged as a reliable brand, thanks to the support of its dedicated suppliers. These relationships had been built almost a decade before the crisis. In 2011, Toyota’s supply chain was disrupted by the earthquake, tsunami, and Fukushima Daiichi nuclear disaster in Japan. This event became a turning point for the automaker. It realized it could not afford unpredictable and tenuous chip lead times. Toyota then developed a business continuity plan, requiring suppliers to stock two to six months’ worth of chips at every production facility—a sharp contrast to its previously famous just-in-time strategy.

When the chip shortage spiked nearly a decade later, Toyota was the only automaker positioned to continue operations. Without these supplier relationships and the continuity plan, Toyota could have lost credibility, as many other automakers did. Instead, it overtook GM as the top-selling vehicle brand in the United States in 2021 and maintains that position today.⁵

In times of regulatory change, such as those we’re facing today, dependable suppliers become invaluable. Their ability to adapt to new compliance requirements and maintain consistent delivery schedules reinforces your organization’s credibility and reliability in the market.

The importance of cultural awareness

The age of global supply chains not only brings about global risks like the Toyota examples, but it also gives procurement professionals the opportunity to collaborate with people from around the world and learn more about their cultures. With more than $350B of materials, components, and products being imported into the United States annually, chances are, you’ve connected with an international supplier at some point.⁶

Cultural competency will provide you with a leg-up when it comes to building supplier relationships. Understanding the cultural and operational nuances of international suppliers is crucial when adjusting to new trade policies. Cultural competence enables procurement professionals to communicate effectively, negotiate favorable terms, and foster resilience in the face of geopolitical shifts.

These perspectives also tend to be the creative link that provides innovation and growth to projects that may have otherwise languished. Respecting and even celebrating other cultures helps your diverse suppliers feel like they belong and are a valued member of the partnership. And when people feel that they have a place on a team, they are more engaged and productive. These diverse connections grow your business.

Having cultural competence in the workforce allows you to be a better negotiator, collaborator, and leader. When a procurement professional can understand the viewpoint of a supplier before interacting with them, the procurement professional will have multiple negotiation levers that will help both sides enter a win-win position.

Looking ahead: Reap the benefits of strong supplier relationships

Procurement professionals are in a unique position to create these deep supplier relationships that deliver benefits from dedicated collaboration, increased credibility, and innovative ideas inspired by diverse cultural perspectives. These combined boost resilience, giving partners in deep supplier relationships a competitive edge from groundbreaking innovations as well as loyalty to each other’s goals. Together, these relationship benefits are the fuel that boosts companies to achieving their growth ambitions.

Sources:

¹ DoorDash, “DoorDash and Walgreens Launch Unprecedented Access for SNAP Customers”, 2024

² Chain Store Age, “Walgreens adds new partner for SNAP/EBT delivery orders”, 2024

³ Progressive Grocer, “Rite Aid Now Offers EBT SNAP Online Payment for 1,400 Stores”, 2024

⁴ CNET, “Apple’s partnership with Nike lives on with the Apple Watch”, 2016

⁵ Reuters, “Toyota sells 10.8 million vehicles in 2024 to remain world’s top-selling automaker”, 2025

⁶ Bureau of Economic Analysis, “U.S. International Trade in Goods and Services”, April 2025