Supplier Connection: Will It Really Help Help Small Businesses Get ...

IBM and several other large corporations have launched a directory where small?businesses?can get listed to do business with large corporations.

Called the Supplier Connection, the site is open to U.S. small businesses.

If you are wondering what ?small? means, it means your business has to have less than $50 Million in revenues or fewer than 500 employees. ?You have to provide products or services in chemicals, construction, consulting, financial services, auto parts, HR services, information technology, marketing communications, market research, printing, software or security (for the full list, see the Supplier Connection website).

Some of the large corporations that are involved along with IBM include JP Morgan Chase, Kellogg?s, ?Pfizer, Caterpillar, Citi, ?JohnDeere, AMD and Facebook. ?The U.S. Small Business Administration has also gotten behind it.

But Is It Realistic for Small Businesses?

When I first heard about this from Laurie McCabe?s site, I thought it was a great idea. I was excited and decided to try it out.

What I discovered is that the paperwork and requirements are daunting.

First, let?s talk about the paperwork. ?Bureaucracy is a huge barrier to growth for small businesses ? even the perception of heavy?bureaucracy is a barrier. ?According to the Wall Street Journal, one business owner reported that completing a Supplier Profile is ?not a one-hour routine? but takes commitment.

Most small businesses don?t have anything near the 500-employee limit for this program ? instead, think 5 employees. ?That is a much more common size for a small business. ?In a 5-employee small business, there?s rarely anyone you can assign who will have all the knowledge to complete the paperwork. ?The business owner will likely be handling the paperwork himself or herself, probably in the evening (since that?s the only time available).

Beyond the paperwork is the whole issue of whether you can meet the system?s mandatory requirements. ?I started filling out the application and managed to get through the first four steps out of 9, in 20 minutes. ??Hmm, that?s not so bad,? I thought.

Then I got to step 5, the Environment section. It stopped me cold. ?For instance, how many of?you could say ?yes? to the following?

• Does your company have a Corporate Responsibility and Environmental Management System, which measures performance, sets goals, and discloses results?
• Does your company define, deploy, and sustain your corporate responsibility and environmental management system through your engagement with your suppliers?
• Does your company cascade this set of requirements to your suppliers who perform work that is material to the products, parts and/or services being supplied to your customer?

In all, there were over 20 questions about environmental, ISO9001 and ISO14001 compliance, 16 of them required fields to answer.

Very few small businesses with under say, 20 employees, could say yes to the above questions. ?And what if you answer ?no?? ?Well, you are required to specify the exact day, month and year when you plan to be in compliance. ?In our business we ?have no plans to create environmental policies and systems. ?Being an Internet publisher we shut off lights when we don?t need them, recycle paper and soda cans, avoid printing emails and documents unless absolutely necessary, and use power management options on our computers and other equipment. ?But we do not write corporate policies about those actions ? we just do them.

Our suppliers (other small businesses and entrepreneurs) would laugh ? or cry ? if we asked them if they complied. ? There?s no way that even if we wrote policies and systems, that we ?could ?cascade? that requirement to our suppliers.

So that was the end of my attempt to complete the application. ?I gave up.

Some Bright Spots

On the other hand, I do see positives with this program:

• For those who go through the paperwork process, it is something that can give your business a competitive edge. ?Just think of all those who will give up or can?t meet the requirements.
• Another positive: ?you can start the application process and save it as a draft, and finish or edit it later. ?That way you can divide up the work and spread it out over a few days if you need to.
• Finally, there?s just the fact that this directory exists. ?IBM is to be commended for starting it. ?In concept it?s a great idea.

I urge IBM and all the other corporations involved to streamline the requirements to make them more realistic for small businesses. ?Otherwise, the Supplier Connection will be more about medium size businesses. ?And I?d love nothing more than to come back and update you that the application has been streamlined.

About the Author

Anita Campbell is the Founder of Small Business Trends which has been following trends in small businesses since 2003. She is the owner of BizSugar, a social media site for small businesses; and also serves as CEO of TweakYourBiz.com.

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Source: http://smallbiztrends.com/2012/03/supplier-connection-small-businesses-corporate-contracts.html

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