How can you use feedback to communicate more effectively with vendors?

Communication with vendors should be a routine than ad-hoc. The team should have a process to get the agenda ready, which may start from the follow up from the last discussion, get the alignment on the discussion point, incorporate vendor's feedback and conclude the meeting with open points.

There’s one reason that took you to prepare. Is because you’re disappointed ?? or excited ??? Letting the vendor know what happened beforehand will. Establish the timeline, so they understand the cause of your feedback. Provide details about your history and then establish your scope. This will give you more credibility with your vendor to start your argument. If you choose to do it at the end, it will take you more time to review and take your vendor to understand. Of course, you can do other ways, but starting with history, your vendor will see that you care. The other parts will help you supplement it.

Make sure you're giving feedback to the right person. Prepare your feedback to be a mix of positives and questions. Negative feedback is important, but can lose value if you make it personal.

Make sure you have the person's attention and they're the right person. OR if you're delivering feedback for them to relay, be clear and specific so they can represent your concerns/feedback appropriately.

Give feedback is easy either way positive or negative, follow up is more important to achieve long term results and enhance relationships growth

If things improve, make sure to call out/recognize the effort that someone took to act on your feedback. Don't downplay the smallest changes, recognize the vendor for listening/acting.

Ask for feedback on yourself when you're giving feedback on someone else. Make sure there's a level of trust that you have to give feedback, but also receive feedback in the same way.

Don't lose the sincerity of feedback by getting caught up with tools. They're helpful to organize your thoughts, but stick to your specific needs, ideas, and make sure you're clear about what you're saying. Don't rely on a tool/framework to convey your exact ideas.

Receiving feedback and understanding the supplier's suggestions, possibilities, limitations is the basis for good communication. Vendors should be seen as partners in business and respected in that manner. The key to effective communication is timely feedback.

You’re investing in feedback because you want to achieve better results with the vendor, and you’re using communication to better align both parties. Those puts feedback square in the relationship management area of expertise. Invest a lot of time and effort in creating your relationship with your vendor, building trust, consistency, and clear expectations. With those in place, delivering feedback is much easier to reach receptive ears. If you have a non-optimized relationship with the vendor, you risk your feedback reaching resistance, deaf ears, or outright hostility.