Supplier relationship management (SRM) is a framework that allows organizations to efficiently manage strategic suppliers and deliver tangible commercial benefit. A supplier can be considered strategic when they represent a significant proportion of the annual IT opex/capex budget or provide a business-critical product or service.
The framework relies on key information being available, such as historic investment, associated contracts, budgets, roadmaps, planned projects and issues. Stakeholders from each party attend regular meetings, scheduled monthly, quarterly and bi-annually.
The objective is to ensure commercial, business and IT stakeholders are consistently managing supplier engagement to maximise value, improve governance and decision-making and reduce exposure and risk.