The Cole Papers, Nilan, April 1997

Tucker reply: Dr. Nilan's cure for assisted supplier suicide

"If at first you don't succeed, try, try again. Then quit. No use being a damn fool about it."

-- W.C. Fields

Enough already!
As I move into a new phase of my career, I'd like to offer a simple cure for what ails us -- buyer and seller. (I'm now a consultant after 20 years in the supplier business, most recently as vice president for marketing and business development at System Integrators Inc.)

The demise of the traditional newspaper systems supplier is more a case of assisted suicide than natural evolution (or free market economics). Newspaper selection committees have become collective Dr. Kevorkians who stand ready with the lethal cocktail of a kitchen-sink RFP and an inadequate budget.

We need to change the buying and selling behaviors of the industry. I'm not a doctor and I never played one on TV, but let's look at what I call my "miracle cure for assisted suicide."

Newspaper ingredients

Throw out the RFP. The biggest waste of time and money in the purchasing dance is the Request for Proposal (RFP). The embodiment of the worst aspects of committees, the RFP is often an implausible intersection between Rube Goldberg and Steven Spielberg. You know:

"Selected supplier must integrate all of our old systems into a new enterprise network which must incorporate every new technical buzzword and acronym we have ever heard of."

Get rid of it. (See: "Be realistic.")

Be honest. It's dishonest when you set false expectations or miscommunicate vital purchasing information. Your timetable and budget approval process are vital to the supplier.

Be clear -- and honest -- about your plans. Who knows? Your supplier might reciprocate.

Stop the threats. The current newspaper-supplier relationship is built on fear. Suppliers quake and too often roll over for propositions like, "If you don't do this for us or if you obsolete our software, you'll never sell to another paper in our chain!"

The irony is that these Coercion Specials help weaken suppliers to the point where they are less likely to win the other deals anyway.

Be realistic. Your system requirements and associated budgets are unrealistic. The rock bottom prices enjoyed over the last few years have come at a cost: shrunken R&D departments, fewer industry-specific products and a general industry brain drain.

Don't expect to be the loss leader for every new product and let your supplier make it up on the next guy. And don't expect to solve all your system problems with off-the-shelf solutions.

Buy something. What are you waiting for? The year 2000 is coming fast and is not, as previously believed, a supplier scheme to get you to replace your 15-year-old system. Capital spending by newspapers has been down for each of the last six years.

The best way to have a stable supplier community is to place purchase orders, instead of placing bets on which supplier is the next to die.

Supplier ingredients

Stop answering RFPs. This flawed process is perpetuated when the supplier lemmings climb over one another to answer these things. Offer an alternative process that works for both parties. (See: "Raise your level of professionalism.")

Say "no" to bad deals. Be realistic about what resources are required to fulfill a contract and what the value of the deal is to your company.

Wholesale discounting can win a deal, but as SII's CEO Frank Washington says, "It's poison meat." Such an entrée will kill you just as surely -- and perhaps more painfully -- than not getting the business at all.

Be honest. Every segment of the software industry is haunted by the inability to deliver products on time; the newspaper software business is no different.

A supplier who can say "no" to bad deals also can have the backbone to be realistic in providing software delivery dates it can meet.

Honesty also extends to being open about the future, especially when it comes to product obsolescence. Do what you must, and be clear and honest in your communications.

Who knows? Your customers might reciprocate.

Raise your level of professionalism. Suppliers want to be treated as professionals, but often they wallow in seat-of-the-pants business practices.

How many have truly invested in training their front-line employees? How many have acquired or developed the skills in their organizations to do a professional job of analyzing a newspaper's business practices to provide a meaningful solution?

The best case suppliers can make for their own viability is to change the way they conduct their businesses. If newspapers don't respond to professionalism, see below.

Broaden your horizons. Just in case Dr. Nilan's prescription doesn't meet the timetable for a miracle, I strongly suggest that all suppliers take a hard look at their businesses and seek some market diversification. Relying completely on the newspaper family to take care of us has proven fatal too many times.

To put it another way: If your primary physician is Dr. Kevorkian, you might want to seek a second opinion.

-- Steve Nilan

Tucker reply: Dr. Nilan's cure for assisted supplier suicide

From THE COLE PAPERS, April 1997, Copyright © 1997, All Rights Reserved.