Private Social Networks like Facebook and MySpace have seen a tremendous development in the last two years and the concept of social networking has spread to almost any area of private life. Also some corporations are slowly starting to leverage the power of social networking to interact and collaborate with their customers and employees.
So how can Supplier Relationship Management leverage this new way of communicating and sharing information?
When searching for “Social Networking” in relation with “SRM” I only found one article on Supply Chain Management Review which really tackles the topic. Here is a quote which I think summarizes the benefits quite well:
Consider several of the main advantages MySpace and similar technologies bring: communication (instant, structured, unstructured, and syndicated), globalization, and on-demand collaboration. These technologies provide a powerful means for exchanging information between and within enterprises. And, they have the added benefits of being inexpensive, innovative, and fast. Embracing some of these technologies in the same way teenagers have welcomed social software like MySpace and Facebook, could go a long way in overcoming some longstanding supply management challenges. From Joe Raudabaugh – full article http://www.scmr.com/article/CA6492754.html
If you have an account on Facebook (or on any other big social network) you will realize how easy it is to get and to stay in touch with someone. By linking up with a person (which usually takes not more than a mouse click) you will instantly gain access to a great amount of information about this person and to information about other people connected to this person. The network enables you to share files with a group of people, run discussions and collaborate globally. Now just imagine doing this with your suppliers – sounds good to me! I will definitely dig deeper!
June 23, 2008 at 11:56 am
[...] On the way to Enterprise 2.0 Forrester Research recently published a forecast report on the Global Enterprise Web 2.0 Market. This report deals with the influence of the latest Web 2.0 technologies (social networks, RSS, mashups) on the enterprise market and predicts a spending on related technologies and tools of $4.6 billion by the year 2013. The concept of Social Networking will boost collaboration and productivity for the enterprise worker and this will definitely have any impact on ePurchasing as we know it today – I also tackled this in one of my last posts. [...]
September 6, 2008 at 5:57 pm
I think that consumer sites such as Facebook will be replaced by B2B sites for Supplier Management.
Do you really want your suppliers seeing photos of your latest holiday?!
You are right that social networks can greatly enhance supplier management but it will be through the use of B2B sites where the real opportunities lie.
Paul Smith
http://www.buybl.net
September 8, 2008 at 9:44 am
Yes, you are absolutely right! ePurchasing needs to take the concepts from social networking and transfer them into B2B life. My opinion is that social networks within an organization could already bring a lot of value to Purchasing. Just imagine a new employee is starting in a purchasing department – an internal social network would allow him to get instant access to internal expert groups, profiles of other buyer colleagues, etc. I think this would make a big difference.