If you’re a supplier diversity professional or a supply chain manager, you’re likely already familiar with the term “supplier diversity data enrichment.” But what is it exactly, and why do so many companies care about it?
Simply put, supplier diversity data enrichment) is the collecting and validating information and verifying businesses’ eligibility for programs offered by corporations, governments, and third-party organizations related to diversity initiatives. This data can include information like a business’s ownership type, certifications, size/revenue qualifications, contact information, etc.
The importance of accurate and up-to-date supplier diversity data cannot be overstated. It allows companies to effectively identify qualified suppliers that meet the criteria needed to benefit from their various programs and initiatives. That’s why understanding how to effectively enrich your supplier data is critical for supplier diversity professionals and supply chain managers. In this article, we’ll explore in greater detail what supplier diversity data enrichment is and how SupplierGATEWAY can help you ensure your data is always up-to-date.
What Is Supplier Diversity Data Enrichment?
Supplier diversity data enrichment is a process that helps organizations get a better understanding of their supplier base. It involves collecting, analyzing, and enriching information about the suppliers of goods and services that an organization works with. By analyzing this data, organizations can gain valuable insights into their suppliers’ backgrounds, capabilities, and potential synergies.
This process enables organizations to effectively identify and manage their diverse suppliers. It also allows them to better understand the differences between suppliers to make more informed decisions about who to work with. Furthermore, it helps organizations track the performance of their supplier base over time as well as ensure compliance with regulations and corporate policies.
Overall, supplier diversity data enrichment is an invaluable resource for organizations looking to get the most out of their supplier partnerships while ensuring they are meeting appropriate standards. With a thorough understanding of each supplier’s capabilities and background, businesses can ensure they are working with the right partners while cultivating a strong and diverse supplier base.
Benefits of Supplier Diversity Data Enrichment
Are you ready to take your supplier diversity program to the next level? Supplier diversity data enrichment is a powerful tool that can help you realize the full potential of your program.
Using data enrichment, you can improve the accuracy and completeness of the supplier information in your supply chain ecosystem. This can lead to improved visibility and analysis capabilities for existing suppliers and better decision-making when selecting new ones. You’ll also be able to leverage up-to-date insights on suppliers’ diversity profiles, certifications, records, and demographic trends over time.
Data enrichment also helps you streamline onboarding processes, which is essential for building strong relationships with suppliers. This will help ensure that all stakeholders have access to quality information quickly and accurately—and that you are leveraging all available resources to create a thriving and diverse supply chain network.
In short, supplier diversity data enrichment offers numerous tangible benefits for supply chain professionals looking for ways to optimize their supplier diversity program.
Steps to Performing a Supplier Diversity Analysis
You may have heard about supplier diversity data enrichment and wondered what it is and how to perform it. The process involves a few steps to ensure the supplier data you’re analyzing is accurate and up-to-date.
Step 1: Collect the Data
The first step in performing supplier diversity analysis is collecting demographic information from your suppliers. This includes race, ethnicity, gender, veteran status, ownership type, business size, and other relevant characteristics. This data is often hard to obtain. This is why third-party data enrichment benefits your supplier diversity program.
Step 2: Validate the Data
Once you have all this data, you’ll want to validate it. Validating your data means verifying that no records are fraudulent or inaccurate. During the validation process, missing or erroneous records will be flagged for removal or correction accordingly.
Step 3: Enrich the Data
The next step is enriching your supplier diversity data with more detailed demographic information about your suppliers. Data enrichment involves gathering more granular insights like how long a particular vendor has been in business, what industries they operate in, and any certifications or attestations a supplier may have about their diversity status.
By collecting and validating supplier diversity data, you can ensure that your analysis is comprehensive, accurate, and up-to-date — which helps you understand how diverse your supply chain is.
SupplierGATEWAY’s Supplier Diversity Platform gives you everything you need to run a successful supplier diversity program. From enriching diversity data to sourcing diverse suppliers, our platform enables your supplier diversity team in making impactful contributions to your bottom-line results.
Beyond Supplier Diversity Data Enrichment
SupplierGATEWAY’s Supplier Diversity Platform has the tools and capabilities to help you with supplier diversity data enrichment. The platform has all the features needed to run a successful supplier diversity program, and data enrichment is an important part of that.
Data enrichment is the process of analyzing existing data and gaining new insights, like finding out which of your current suppliers are diversity-certified. This process can be tedious and time-consuming, but with SupplierGATEWAY’s Data Enrichment app, it’s easy:
Automation
The Data Enrichment app automates most of the process so you don’t have to enrich your data manually. It analyzes your input supplier information and checks your data against hundreds of sources, including private, government, industry-specific, and public databases, to find new opportunities for diversity-certified suppliers. This process helps you verify supplier certifications and company ownerships such as minority-owned (MBE), women-owned (WBE), veteran-owned (VBE) businesses, and disadvantaged business enterprises (DBEs).
Supplier Management
SupplierGATEWAY also allows you to manage your suppliers easily. You can easily invite your suppliers into the system and help ensure you have the most accurate data by getting it directly from the source. With this level of supplier data accuracy and accessibility, you can ensure that all stakeholders are aware of any updates or changes to supplier information.
Reporting Capabilities
The Supplier Diversity Platform also provides reporting capabilities allowing you to report on Tier 1 spend, Tier 2 spend, Economic Impact, and other ad hoc metrics related to your supplier diversity program. Our reporting features make it easy to track progress against goals and help ensure your program is on track.
Supplier Sourcing
Once you have enriched your data, our comprehensive supplier sourcing solution lets you search for diverse suppliers in your local area and across the country. With powerful search functions like location radius search, and keyword search for industry types or goods/services offered, you can find the perfect strategic fit for any supply chain need. With just a few clicks you can engage potential suppliers or simply add them to a list of prospective suppliers that meet your criteria.
Key Takeaways From the Data Enrichment Process
When you choose to use supplier diversity data enrichment, there are some key takeaways you need to keep in mind. You will want to understand the data enrichment process, how it works and the value supplier diversity data enrichment brings to your organization. Here are some key takeaways from the data enrichment process:
- Accurate Data: With accurate data, you can identify and measure your current spend with certified diverse suppliers and uncover new diverse suppliers that could add value to your organization. Remember that good data in means good data out. You’ll want to have basic information like supplier name, TIN/EIN, address, and supplier number to get the most out of the data enrichment process.
- Identify Opportunities: Data enrichment helps you identify opportunities where additional spending with diverse suppliers could have more economic impact and positively influence operational performance.
- Gain Insights: With data enrichment, you will gain insights about current and potential relationships with certified diverse suppliers, as well as benchmarking and analysis of your Tier 1 spend, Tier 2 spend, and Economic Impact.
- Optimization: Data enrichment allows for better alignment between supplier diversity strategies, processes, and outcomes that result in greater efficiency and increased profitability for your business operations.
Conclusion
Supplier diversity data enrichment is a process that can help supply chain and supplier diversity professionals reduce costs, reduce manual processes, and promote an equitable and inclusive supplier network. It’s important to be aware of the different approaches to supplier diversity data enrichment and to select the right solutions for your organization. When you enrich your supplier data, you help ensure that your company has the correct supplier data and can make the best decisions for engaging with diverse suppliers according to your supplier diversity program stipulations.
To learn more about the Supplier Diversity Platform from SupplierGATEWAY, request a demo.