Vendor Relationship Management: Complete Guide

Every business relies on vendors. From the software that runs your operations to the supplies that stock your shelves, third-party relationships are woven into the fabric of modern commerce. Yet many organizations approach vendor management reactively—scrambling when deliveries are late, discovering compliance lapses only when auditors come calling, and treating supplier relationships as necessary evils rather than strategic assets.

This piecemeal approach leaves money on the table and exposes organizations to unnecessary risk.

Vendor Relationship Management (VRM) offers a better way. It's a systematic approach to managing interactions with suppliers that maximizes value, minimizes risk, and transforms transactional vendor relationships into genuine strategic partnerships.

This complete guide covers everything you need to know about VRM: what it is, why it matters, how to implement it effectively, and how the right tools can make the process dramatically easier.

What is Vendor Relationship Management?

Vendor Relationship Management (VRM) is the systematic process of managing and optimizing a company's interactions with its suppliers. It encompasses the entire lifecycle of vendor relationships—from initial identification and selection through ongoing management, performance monitoring, and eventual renewal or termination.

Effective VRM goes far beyond simply placing orders and paying invoices. It involves:

When done well, VRM creates long-term partnerships that deliver value beyond the immediate transaction—better pricing, priority service, collaborative innovation, and supply chain resilience that pays dividends during disruptions.

VRM vs. Vendor Management vs. Vendor Risk Management

These terms are often used interchangeably, but they have distinct meanings:

Vendor Management is the broadest term, encompassing all activities related to overseeing vendor relationships. It includes administrative functions like contract management, procurement processes, and payment handling.

Vendor Relationship Management (VRM) emphasizes the relationship aspect—building trust, fostering communication, creating strategic partnerships, and maximizing mutual value. It's the "human" side of vendor management.

Vendor Risk Management focuses specifically on identifying, assessing, and mitigating risks that vendors introduce to your organization. This includes cybersecurity risks, compliance risks, financial risks, and operational risks.

A comprehensive vendor program incorporates all three: efficient management processes, strong relationship practices, and robust risk mitigation.

Why Vendor Relationship Management Matters

The business case for investing in VRM has never been stronger. Research shows that 45% of vendor collaborations plateau at some point because organizations fail to nurture the relationship. Meanwhile, companies that treat vendors as strategic partners consistently outperform those that don't.

Here's why VRM deserves your attention:

Cost Optimization Beyond Price Negotiations

Strategic vendor relationships unlock value that pure price negotiations can't achieve. When vendors understand your business deeply, they can suggest process improvements, alternative materials, or efficiency gains you'd never discover through arms-length transactions.

Long-term partnerships also create opportunities for:

Supply Chain Resilience

Global supply chains face unprecedented volatility. Companies with strong vendor relationships navigate disruptions more effectively because their suppliers prioritize them, communicate proactively about potential issues, and work collaboratively to find solutions.

When everyone is competing for limited supply, relationships matter. Vendors allocate scarce resources to customers they value—not just those who pay the highest price.

Quality and Consistency

Vendors who feel valued as partners invest more in meeting your standards. They're more likely to flag quality issues before shipment, accommodate special requests, and maintain consistent service levels even during challenging periods.

This quality advantage compounds over time as vendors learn your specific requirements and develop processes tailored to your needs.

Risk Reduction

Open communication with vendors helps identify potential problems earlier—whether it's financial instability, capacity constraints, regulatory changes, or emerging cybersecurity threats. This visibility enables proactive risk management rather than reactive firefighting.

Strong relationships also mean vendors are more likely to alert you to issues rather than hiding them until they become crises.

Innovation and Competitive Advantage

Your vendors see your challenges from a different perspective. They work with multiple customers across industries and often have insights into emerging solutions, technologies, or best practices that could benefit your business.

But vendors only share their best ideas with customers they trust and value. Transactional relationships rarely produce breakthrough innovations.

Compliance and Regulatory Protection

Third-party vendors increasingly trigger compliance obligations. Whether it's data privacy regulations, industry-specific requirements, or internal governance policies, organizations are responsible for ensuring their vendors meet applicable standards.

Effective VRM creates the visibility and documentation needed to demonstrate compliance and avoid costly penalties.

The Vendor Relationship Management Lifecycle

VRM follows a structured lifecycle that ensures consistent, effective management of vendor relationships from start to finish. While specific steps vary by organization, most VRM programs include these core stages:

Stage 1: Planning and Needs Assessment

Every vendor relationship should begin with clear understanding of what you need and why. This stage involves:

Defining requirements: What products, services, or capabilities do you need? What quality standards must be met? What are your delivery expectations, budget constraints, and compliance requirements?

Assessing criticality: How important is this need to your operations? A vendor supplying mission-critical components requires different management than one providing office supplies.

Determining relationship type: Should this be a strategic partnership with deep integration, or a straightforward transactional relationship? The answer shapes your entire approach.

Involving stakeholders: Different departments bring different perspectives. Procurement focuses on cost and terms, operations cares about reliability and quality, IT evaluates technical compatibility, and legal assesses risk. Involving relevant stakeholders early prevents conflicts later.

Stage 2: Vendor Identification and Selection

With requirements defined, you can begin identifying potential vendors and evaluating them against your criteria.

Sourcing candidates: Use market research, industry networks, trade shows, referrals, and online research to build a list of potential vendors.

Initial screening: Evaluate candidates against basic requirements—can they deliver what you need, where you need it, when you need it?

Due diligence: Investigate promising candidates more deeply. This might include:

Selection: Choose the vendor(s) that best meet your criteria, considering not just price but total value, risk profile, and partnership potential.

Stage 3: Contract Negotiation

The contract establishes the foundation for your vendor relationship. Key elements include:

Pricing and payment terms: Beyond unit prices, consider volume discounts, payment schedules, and mechanisms for price adjustments over time.

Service Level Agreements (SLAs): Define specific, measurable performance expectations and consequences for failing to meet them.

Deliverables and timelines: Specify exactly what will be delivered and when.

Compliance requirements: Include relevant regulatory obligations, security standards, and internal policies.

Risk allocation: Address liability, insurance requirements, indemnification, and force majeure provisions.

Exit provisions: Establish clear procedures for contract termination, including transition assistance and data handling.

Effective negotiation seeks win-win outcomes. Contracts that squeeze vendors too tightly often backfire through reduced service quality, corner-cutting, or relationship deterioration.

Stage 4: Vendor Onboarding

Onboarding sets the tone for the entire relationship. A thorough, well-organized process ensures vendors can start delivering value quickly while meeting all compliance requirements.

Document collection: Gather essential information including:

System integration: Set up vendors in your procurement, finance, and communication systems.

Compliance verification: Confirm all required documentation is current and valid.

Expectation alignment: Ensure vendors understand your processes, standards, communication preferences, and performance expectations.

Relationship introduction: Connect vendor contacts with their counterparts in your organization.

Poor onboarding creates friction that compounds throughout the relationship. Investing in a smooth, professional process pays dividends for years.

Tools like VendorJot dramatically simplify onboarding by automating document collection, tracking compliance status, and ensuring nothing falls through the cracks during these critical early stages.

Stage 5: Ongoing Relationship Management

Once vendors are onboarded, the real relationship work begins. This stage involves:

Regular communication: Establish appropriate check-in schedules based on vendor importance. Strategic vendors might warrant monthly reviews, while transactional vendors might need only quarterly touchpoints.

Performance monitoring: Track agreed-upon KPIs and provide regular feedback. Vendors can't improve what they don't know is problematic.

Issue resolution: Address problems promptly and collaboratively. How you handle conflicts often strengthens relationships more than smooth sailing.

Contract management: Monitor compliance with terms, track renewal dates, and proactively address needed amendments.

Strategic alignment: For key vendors, periodically review how the relationship supports your broader business objectives and identify opportunities for deeper collaboration.

Stage 6: Performance Evaluation

Regular, structured evaluation ensures vendors continue meeting expectations and identifies opportunities for improvement.

Quantitative assessment: Measure performance against established KPIs for delivery, quality, cost, compliance, and other relevant factors.

Qualitative feedback: Gather input from stakeholders who interact with the vendor about communication quality, responsiveness, and overall relationship health.

Vendor feedback: Create opportunities for vendors to share their perspective on the relationship, including challenges they face and suggestions for improvement.

Comparative analysis: Benchmark vendor performance against alternatives and industry standards.

Stage 7: Renewal, Renegotiation, or Exit

Every vendor relationship eventually reaches a decision point. Based on performance evaluation and strategic fit:

Renewal: If the vendor is meeting expectations, renew the contract with appropriate updates to terms and pricing.

Renegotiation: If the relationship has value but terms need adjustment, negotiate changes that address gaps while preserving the partnership.

Exit: If the vendor consistently underperforms or no longer fits your needs, terminate the relationship professionally. Proper offboarding includes:

Even when exiting a relationship, maintain professionalism. Business needs change, and you might work with this vendor—or their employees—again in the future.

Vendor Segmentation: Allocating Resources Effectively

Not all vendors require the same level of attention. Trying to build deep partnerships with every supplier wastes resources on low-impact relationships while potentially neglecting critical ones.

Effective VRM programs segment vendors to allocate time, energy, and investment appropriately. Common segmentation models include:

The Kraljic Matrix

This classic framework categorizes vendors based on two dimensions:

Profit Impact: How significantly does this vendor affect your financial performance? Supply Risk: How difficult would it be to replace this vendor?

The resulting four quadrants guide relationship strategy:

Strategic (High Impact, High Risk): These vendors provide critical goods or services that are difficult to replace. They require deep partnerships with significant investment in relationship building, collaborative planning, and risk management. Examples: Sole-source component suppliers, mission-critical software providers.

Leverage (High Impact, Low Risk): These vendors significantly affect your costs or operations, but alternatives exist. Focus on optimizing value through competitive bidding and negotiation while maintaining good relationships. Examples: Commodity suppliers where you have significant buying power.

Bottleneck (Low Impact, High Risk): These vendors provide specialized items that are difficult to source elsewhere, even though they don't represent major spend. Prioritize supply security and develop contingency plans. Examples: Specialized equipment or niche service providers.

Non-Critical (Low Impact, Low Risk): These vendors provide routine items with many available alternatives. Streamline processes for efficiency and minimize management overhead. Examples: Office supplies, generic services.

The Pyramid Approach

A simpler model that categorizes vendors into three or four tiers based on strategic importance:

Tier 1 - Strategic Partners: Your most important vendors who directly impact competitive advantage, innovation, or business continuity. Require executive-level engagement and significant relationship investment.

Tier 2 - Preferred Vendors: Reliable, important suppliers who consistently meet expectations. Require regular relationship management and performance monitoring.

Tier 3 - Approved Vendors: Standard suppliers who meet basic requirements. Require efficient processes but minimal relationship investment.

Tier 4 - Transactional: One-time or occasional vendors with minimal ongoing relationship. Require only basic procurement processes.

The key insight from any segmentation model: focus your limited relationship-building resources where they'll have the greatest impact.

Key Vendor Performance Metrics

What gets measured gets managed. Effective VRM programs track Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) that quantify vendor performance and enable data-driven decisions.

Delivery and Reliability Metrics

On-Time Delivery Rate: Percentage of orders delivered by the agreed deadline. Industry benchmarks typically expect 95%+ for reliable vendors.

Order Accuracy: How often orders arrive correct in terms of quantities, specifications, and destinations.

Lead Time Consistency: Variance in delivery times relative to committed lead times.

Responsiveness: How quickly vendors respond to inquiries, issues, and urgent requests.

Quality Metrics

Defect Rate: Percentage of deliveries with quality issues requiring returns, replacements, or rework.

Specification Compliance: How consistently products or services meet defined standards.

First-Pass Yield: Percentage of deliveries accepted without requiring rework or correction.

Cost Metrics

Pricing Competitiveness: How vendor pricing compares to market alternatives.

Total Cost of Ownership: Full cost including price, shipping, handling, quality issues, and management overhead.

Cost Reduction Contributions: Savings from vendor-suggested improvements or innovations.

Invoice Accuracy: Frequency of billing errors that require correction.

Compliance Metrics

Contract Compliance: Adherence to agreed terms, conditions, and SLAs.

Regulatory Compliance: Meeting required legal, safety, and industry standards.

Documentation Currency: Keeping required certificates, insurance, and other documentation current.

Relationship Metrics

Communication Effectiveness: Quality and timeliness of vendor communications.

Issue Resolution Time: How quickly problems get addressed and resolved.

Innovation Contributions: New ideas, improvements, or capabilities vendors bring to the relationship.

Stakeholder Satisfaction: Internal ratings of vendor performance and relationship quality.

Implementing Performance Measurement

For metrics to drive improvement:

Vendor scorecards that combine multiple KPIs into a single view make it easier to compare performance, identify trends, and have productive conversations.

Vendor Risk Management: Protecting Your Organization

Every vendor relationship introduces potential risks. Effective VRM programs identify, assess, and mitigate these risks before they become problems.

Types of Vendor Risk

Cybersecurity Risk: Vendors with access to your systems or data create potential pathways for cyberattacks. Weak security controls at a vendor can expose your organization to breaches, ransomware, or data theft.

Compliance Risk: Vendors who don't meet regulatory requirements can trigger fines, legal action, or reputational damage for your organization. You're often responsible for ensuring vendor compliance.

Financial Risk: Vendor financial instability can disrupt supply chains, interrupt services, or leave you scrambling for alternatives. Bankruptcy, acquisition, or simply cash flow problems can affect delivery.

Operational Risk: Service failures, outages, or capacity constraints at vendors can interrupt your critical workflows and damage customer relationships.

Reputational Risk: Vendor misconduct—whether ethical violations, environmental problems, or public relations disasters—can damage your brand by association.

Concentration Risk: Over-reliance on a single vendor for critical needs creates vulnerability if that vendor experiences problems.

Geopolitical Risk: Vendors operating in politically unstable regions may face disruptions from conflict, sanctions, or policy changes.

Risk Assessment Process

Vendor tiering: Classify vendors by risk level based on data access, operational criticality, and spend. Apply more rigorous assessment to higher-risk vendors.

Due diligence: Before onboarding, investigate vendor security practices, financial stability, compliance status, and operational capabilities.

Risk questionnaires: Use standardized questionnaires to gather information about vendor risk management practices, security controls, and compliance certifications.

Documentation review: Examine SOC reports, security certifications, financial statements, insurance coverage, and compliance documentation.

Ongoing monitoring: Don't treat risk assessment as a one-time activity. Continuously monitor vendor risk profiles and reassess periodically.

Risk Mitigation Strategies

Contractual protections: Include appropriate security requirements, compliance obligations, liability provisions, and audit rights in vendor contracts.

Insurance requirements: Require appropriate coverage levels for general liability, professional liability, cyber liability, and other relevant risks.

Contingency planning: Develop backup plans for critical vendors, including identified alternatives and transition procedures.

Diversification: Avoid single points of failure by maintaining relationships with multiple vendors for critical needs.

Regular audits: Conduct periodic assessments of vendor compliance with contractual obligations and risk management requirements.

Incident response: Establish clear procedures for responding to vendor-related security incidents or service disruptions.

Technology for Vendor Relationship Management

Technology can dramatically improve VRM effectiveness by automating routine tasks, centralizing information, and providing visibility that manual processes can't achieve.

Core VRM Technology Capabilities

Centralized vendor database: Consolidate all vendor information—contact details, contracts, compliance documents, performance data, and communication history—in a single, searchable system.

Automated onboarding: Streamline document collection and verification with self-service portals, automated workflows, and compliance tracking.

Compliance monitoring: Track insurance expirations, certification renewals, and other compliance requirements automatically, with alerts before deadlines.

Performance tracking: Monitor KPIs in real-time with dashboards that highlight trends and issues requiring attention.

Contract management: Store contracts centrally, track key terms and obligations, and receive alerts for renewal deadlines.

Communication tools: Facilitate vendor communication through integrated portals, messaging systems, and document sharing.

Reporting and analytics: Generate reports on vendor performance, compliance status, and relationship health for stakeholders and audits.

Choosing the Right Tools

The vendor management technology landscape ranges from simple tools for small businesses to complex enterprise platforms. Key considerations:

Fit for purpose: Match tool complexity to your actual needs. Enterprise-scale solutions may be overkill for smaller organizations, while basic spreadsheets become inadequate as vendor bases grow.

Ease of use: Tools only deliver value if people actually use them. Prioritize intuitive interfaces that reduce friction for both your team and your vendors.

Integration capabilities: Consider how vendor management tools connect with your existing procurement, finance, and compliance systems.

Scalability: Choose solutions that can grow with your business and vendor base.

Total cost of ownership: Consider not just licensing costs but implementation time, training requirements, and ongoing maintenance.

VendorJot offers a right-sized solution for businesses that have outgrown spreadsheets but don't need enterprise complexity. Purpose-built for vendor compliance and relationship management, VendorJot streamlines the aspects of VRM that consume the most time and create the most risk.

Key features include:

Magic link onboarding: Instead of chasing vendors via email, send them a simple link where they can submit required documents directly. The process is easy enough that vendors actually complete it.

Automated document collection: VendorJot requests and organizes certificates of insurance, W-9s, contracts, and other critical documents in one centralized location.

OCR-powered date extraction: Upload a document and VendorJot automatically captures expiration dates, eliminating manual data entry and ensuring accuracy.

Set-and-forget reminders: Configure automated notifications at 90, 60, and 30 days before document expirations. Never let compliance lapse because someone forgot to follow up.

Real-time compliance dashboard: See at a glance which vendors are current, expiring soon, or past due. Instant visibility enables proactive management.

One-click reporting: Generate compliance reports instantly for audits, internal reviews, or stakeholder updates.

With transparent pricing and no per-user fees, VendorJot makes professional vendor management accessible without enterprise budgets or implementation timelines.

Best Practices for Effective VRM

Based on the experiences of organizations that excel at vendor relationship management, here are proven best practices:

Start with Clear Strategy

Before implementing processes and tools, define your VRM strategy:

Strategic clarity prevents scattered efforts and ensures activities align with business objectives.

Segment and Prioritize

Apply the Pareto Principle: roughly 20% of your vendors likely account for 80% of your spend and business impact. Identify your critical vendors and invest relationship resources accordingly. Don't try to build deep partnerships with everyone.

Invest in Onboarding

First impressions matter. A thorough, professional onboarding process sets expectations, establishes credibility, and creates momentum for a productive relationship. Conversely, chaotic onboarding undermines relationships from the start.

Communicate Consistently

Regular communication is the foundation of strong vendor relationships. Establish appropriate cadences for different vendor tiers and stick to them. Don't let relationships go dormant between transactions.

Communication should flow both ways. Create opportunities for vendors to share feedback, raise concerns, and contribute ideas.

Pay on Time—Every Time

This simple practice matters enormously. Late payments signal that you don't value the relationship and create financial stress for vendors. Consistent, on-time payment builds trust and goodwill that pays dividends when you need flexibility or preferential treatment.

Measure What Matters

Establish KPIs that align with your objectives and track them consistently. But don't measure for measurement's sake—focus on metrics that drive action and improvement. Share performance data with vendors and discuss it in regular reviews.

Address Issues Promptly

Don't let problems fester. Address performance issues, compliance gaps, or relationship concerns as soon as they emerge. Early intervention prevents small issues from becoming big problems and demonstrates commitment to making the relationship work.

Treat Vendors as Partners

The organizations that get the most value from VRM treat vendors as extensions of their own teams rather than adversaries to be squeezed. This doesn't mean being a pushover—hold vendors accountable for performance. But approach the relationship with mutual respect, seek win-win outcomes, and recognize that vendors need to be profitable to serve you well.

Leverage Technology Appropriately

Use tools to automate routine tasks, maintain visibility, and enable proactive management. But don't let technology replace human relationship building. The best VRM programs combine efficient processes with genuine human connection.

Review and Improve Continuously

Periodically assess your VRM practices. What's working? What isn't? Where are there opportunities to improve? Gather feedback from both internal stakeholders and vendors. Evolve your approach based on learning.

Common VRM Challenges and Solutions

Even well-designed VRM programs encounter obstacles. Here's how to address common challenges:

Challenge: Too Many Vendors to Manage

As vendor bases grow, managing every relationship becomes impossible.

Solution: Implement rigorous segmentation. Focus relationship investment on strategic and preferred vendors. Streamline processes for transactional vendors using automation and self-service tools. Consider vendor consolidation to reduce overall numbers where appropriate.

Challenge: Inconsistent Processes

Different departments or locations manage vendors differently, creating confusion and compliance gaps.

Solution: Standardize core VRM processes across the organization. Create clear policies and procedures for vendor selection, onboarding, performance management, and compliance. Use centralized systems that enforce consistent workflows.

Challenge: Compliance Documentation Chaos

Critical documents—insurance certificates, contracts, compliance certifications—are scattered across email inboxes, file shares, and desk drawers.

Solution: Implement centralized document management with clear organization, version control, and expiration tracking. Tools like VendorJot automate document collection and compliance monitoring, ensuring nothing falls through the cracks.

Challenge: Reactive Risk Management

Organizations discover vendor risks only after problems occur.

Solution: Shift to proactive risk management. Conduct thorough due diligence before onboarding. Monitor vendor risk profiles continuously. Establish early warning indicators and response procedures. Maintain contingency plans for critical vendors.

Challenge: Relationship Complacency

Long-standing vendor relationships become stagnant, with both parties going through the motions.

Solution: Schedule periodic strategic reviews to assess relationship health and identify improvement opportunities. Benchmark vendor performance against alternatives. Create mechanisms for innovation and continuous improvement.

Challenge: Internal Resistance

Stakeholders resist VRM processes they perceive as bureaucratic obstacles to getting work done.

Solution: Demonstrate value clearly. Show how VRM prevents problems, reduces costs, and improves outcomes. Make processes as frictionless as possible. Involve stakeholders in design so processes address their actual needs.

Building a VRM Program: Getting Started

If your organization lacks formal VRM processes, here's a practical approach to getting started:

Phase 1: Assessment (Weeks 1-4)

Inventory your vendors: Create a comprehensive list of all vendors your organization uses. You may be surprised how many there are.

Segment by importance: Classify vendors by criticality and spend to identify priorities.

Document current state: How are vendors managed today? What processes exist? What gaps are evident?

Identify pain points: Where are the biggest problems? Compliance lapses? Performance issues? Documentation chaos?

Define objectives: What do you want your VRM program to achieve?

Phase 2: Foundation (Weeks 5-12)

Establish core processes: Develop standardized procedures for vendor selection, onboarding, performance management, and compliance.

Select tools: Implement technology to support your processes. Start with critical capabilities like document management and compliance tracking.

Create documentation standards: Define what information you need from vendors and how it should be organized.

Focus on high-priority vendors: Begin with your most critical vendors. Get those relationships right before expanding.

Phase 3: Expansion (Months 4-12)

Roll out systematically: Extend VRM processes to additional vendor segments progressively.

Build internal capability: Train team members on VRM processes and tools.

Gather feedback: Learn from early implementation to refine processes.

Demonstrate value: Track and communicate benefits achieved to build organizational support.

Phase 4: Optimization (Ongoing)

Measure and improve: Use performance data to continuously refine your approach.

Expand capabilities: Add more sophisticated elements like strategic partnership programs, innovation collaboration, or advanced risk management.

Benchmark externally: Compare your VRM practices to industry peers and best practices.

The VendorJot Advantage

Managing vendor relationships effectively requires attention to detail, consistent follow-through, and reliable systems. As your vendor base grows, keeping track of documents, compliance requirements, and performance data becomes increasingly challenging.

VendorJot was built specifically to solve these challenges for businesses that need professional vendor management without enterprise complexity or cost.

For vendor onboarding: Magic link technology lets vendors submit their own documents through a simple, intuitive process. No more email chains chasing missing paperwork.

For compliance management: Automated tracking monitors document expirations with set-and-forget reminders at 90, 60, and 30 days. OCR technology extracts dates automatically so you're not manually entering data.

For visibility: Real-time dashboards show compliance status at a glance—which vendors are current, which are expiring soon, and which need immediate attention.

For reporting: Generate compliance reports with one click for audits, internal reviews, or stakeholder updates.

For your budget: Transparent pricing with no per-user fees means your whole team can access what they need without escalating costs.

If you're still managing vendors through spreadsheets, email folders, and calendar reminders, you're working harder than necessary while increasing the risk of costly compliance lapses. See how VendorJot can help at vendorjot.com.

Conclusion

Vendor Relationship Management isn't just an administrative function—it's a strategic capability that can create real competitive advantage. Organizations that invest in VRM benefit from:

The path to these benefits doesn't require massive investment or years of implementation. It starts with recognizing that vendor relationships deserve intentional management, then building processes and systems that make effective VRM sustainable.

Whether you're just starting to formalize vendor management or looking to improve an existing program, the principles in this guide provide a foundation for success. Segment your vendors thoughtfully, invest relationship resources where they matter most, track performance rigorously, manage risk proactively, and leverage technology to handle the details.

Your vendors want to succeed with you. Effective VRM makes that success possible—for both of you.