How can you present your supplier sourcing results and recommendations effectively?

1 Understand your audience

Before you prepare your presentation, you need to know who your audience is, what their expectations are, and what their level of knowledge is. Depending on your situation, your audience may include senior management, procurement team, engineering team, quality team, or external partners. Each of them may have different interests, concerns, and questions about your supplier sourcing results and recommendations. Therefore, you need to tailor your presentation to suit their needs and preferences. For example, senior management may want to see the strategic benefits, risks, and return on investment of your supplier sourcing decisions, while the engineering team may want to see the technical specifications, capabilities, and certifications of your selected suppliers.

2 Structure your presentation

A good presentation should have a clear and logical structure that guides your audience through your supplier sourcing process, results, and recommendations. A common structure is to start with an introduction that summarizes the purpose, scope, and objectives of your supplier sourcing project. Then, you can present your sourcing criteria, methods, and tools that you used to identify, evaluate, and compare potential suppliers. Next, you can show your results in terms of supplier performance, compliance, and fit with your requirements. Finally, you can provide your recommendations on which suppliers to select, contract, and manage, as well as the expected benefits, risks, and actions to implement them.

3 Use visual aids

Visual aids can help you communicate your supplier sourcing results and recommendations more effectively and engagingly. They can also help you highlight the key points, data, and comparisons that support your decisions. Some examples of visual aids that you can use are charts, graphs, tables, diagrams, maps, photos, or videos. However, you should avoid using too many or too complex visual aids that may confuse or distract your audience. Instead, you should use simple, clear, and relevant visual aids that complement your verbal message and enhance your presentation.

4 Prepare for questions

After you present your supplier sourcing results and recommendations, you should expect and welcome questions from your audience. Questions are a sign of interest and feedback that can help you clarify, explain, or justify your decisions. Therefore, you should prepare for possible questions that your audience may ask, such as how you conducted your supplier research, how you weighted your sourcing criteria, how you mitigated your sourcing risks, or how you measured your sourcing outcomes. You should also practice your answers and provide evidence or examples to back them up. Additionally, you should be respectful, confident, and honest when answering questions, and admit if you don't know the answer or need more time to provide it.

5 Here’s what else to consider

This is a space to share examples, stories, or insights that don’t fit into any of the previous sections. What else would you like to add?