Making the most of OneBoxBM - Supplier Management

This is part of a series of posts that’s designed to help you get the most out of OneBoxBM, to view the index click here.

In OneBoxBM supplier management is split between the supplier management area and the admin area.

To make your life easier, we’re only going to cover the supplier management area in this post, which includes:

• The New Supplier Editor
• The Supplier View
• The Supplier Search
• Shared Supplier Documents
• Excel Exports
• Supplier Boxes

(Prior to reading, we recommend first taking a look at the post around the 'Supplier Admin Area' as some of the fields use the data populated in said area.)

Note: We’ve also put together some useful help guides to help you manage your supplier data; we’ll reference the specific guides in each section.

Following on from our 'Client Management' example we're going to focus around catering for a small wedding; close friends and family.

In our scenario, we recently hosted a small wedding, providing drinks and a small hot and cold buffet for the wedding guests.

While getting everything in order for the couples big day, it became apparent that we need to review our current suppliers.

After a quick search online, it became apparent that we needed to build a shortlist of potential candidates.

The New Supplier Editor

Note: You can view the relevant help guide for the 'New Supplier Editor' at the following link.

When first creating a new supplier in OneBoxBM, your first stop will always be the 'New Supplier Editor'.

To keep things simple, the 'New Supplier Editor' will only prompt you for the key supplier details, such as:

• Supplier Name
• Supplier Group
• Supplier Status

In this instance, we’re going to create our new supplier under the 'Events' group, and we're going to leave the status as 'New'

Note: 'Events' is a group that we have created for this example. The idea being that we can use this to filter our records via the search.

Upon the creation of the supplier record, you will be presented with the 'Supplier View'.

The Supplier View

Note: You can view the relevant help guide for 'Supplier Management' at the following link.

Much of the day to day management of supplier data will be handled within the 'Supplier View', which contains the following tabs/sections:

• Summary
• Details
• Contacts
• Locations
• Comments
• Documents

Now we've already captured our suppliers basic details as part of the supplier creation process, so we can move onto 'Contacts'.

The supplier we've created the record for has a number of different contacts available, we're going to make a note of both the sales and support contact information.

While we're looking to have the items delivered to our premises, we still feel it's going to be useful the have a physical address for the business; the potential to go and purchase something from them directly, may influence our decision to use them or not.

Now that we've captured the suppliers basic details, we want to make some additional notes about the supplier.

To do this we're going to make some comments against the supplier record; this could include details of the products on offer and the general cost/perceived quality of said products.

Management has asked the staff members responsible for managing the recent event to look through the suppliers, which will then be reviewed by a more senior member of the team.

Now all that's left to do is attach any documents we need to the supplier record.

In our scenario, the supplier is still flagged as being 'New', so we don't currently have any documents to attach. Once the supplier has been approved, we're going to look into what documents we may need to attach to the supplier.

Supplier Search

Note: You can view the relevant help guide on searching for suppliers at the following link.

A member of staff who is authorised to review and approve new suppliers is now looking over the shortlist that has been drawn up.

Prior to making a decision about whether to use the supplier or not, they're going to want to review the details.

To do this, they need to search for the supplier record and open the 'Supplier view'.

If they have the reference number for the supplier, they can simply enter the number in the search field. Alternatively they can enter the suppliers name and/or use the various filters on the supplier search.

Once they've found the relevant record they can simply go through and review the details, making an additions and/or amendments necessary.

Shared Supplier Documents

Note: You can view the relevant help guide on 'Shared supplier Documents' at the following link.

In our restaurant example, we have a number of shared documents stored in the 'Supplier Management' area.

This includes:

• Documentation around handling supplier data.
• Documentation around finding a new supplier.

With each type of document being listed under the appropriate category, like so:

• Handling Supplier Data.
• New Suppliers

Each category contains multiple documents. Some of which will be used as a reference, others will be need to be filled in.

In this instance, we're going to need to reference the policy around using new suppliers.

Excel Exports

Note: You can view the relevant help guide on 'Supplier Excel Exports' at the following link.

While you can access OneBoxBM from just about anywhere with an internet connection. We do recognise that there's time where you may wish to get data out of the system, so can:

• Print your supplier records
• Email them to someone who doesn't have access to the sytem
• Import them into another system

Should you wish to do any of the above you can export a selection of supplier records to excel from directly within the system.

Not only that you can select which parts of the supplier record to export, this allows omit certain sections of the supplier records before they even leave the system.

While you can always open the Excel file and delete the parts you don't need, we feel it's in better keeping with GDPR as it minimises the risk of people accessing information they shouldn't really have access to.

Supplier Boxes

Note: You can view the relevant help guide on 'Supplier Boxes' at the following link.

One issue you may run into when searching supplier records is that you can't quite get a right results.

Lets take our restaurant as an example, you may want to export a list of suppliers to Excel so employees can look them up without having to access the system; lets say that don't always have the most reliable internet connection.

You could go through a cycle of:

• Search for the relevant suppliers.
• Export the list of suppliers to Excel.
• Copy the list of suppliers from one Excel spreadsheet to another.

While this would work it's a little cumbersome, it's also going to be frustrating if you decide that you want to export additional data alongside each record; maybe you do need the contact information after all.

Alternatively, you can make use of 'Supplier Boxes' and build your own custom lists of suppliers as you're searching your supplier records.

Each box will contain its own list of suppliers, with each box only containing one copy of each supplier; you can however have the same supplier in multiple boxes.

So going back to the restaurant, how does this work?

From within the 'Supplier Management' area you create a box called 'Suppliers To Export', which you then add records to as you're working through you list of search results. Once you've added all of the relevant supplier records you simply select the box from the 'Box' filter on the supplier search.

We hope this gives you some additional insight into how to make better use of OneBoxBM to manage your supplier data.

In Summary

• The New Supplier Editor
  • Create new supplier records quickly and easily using the 'New Supplier Editor'.
• The Supplier View
  • Store multiple contacts and locations against each supplier record.
  • Capture additional comments against each supplier record.
  • Store a variety of important supplier documents against each supplier record.
• The Supplier Search
  • Search your supplier records using a variety of search filters, including supplier group and supplier status.
  • Group your supplier records by state, making them easier to manage.
  • Filter your supplier list down to only include records in a specific supplier box; not only that you can filter supplier records by their done/not done status in a custom supplier task list.
• Shared Supplier Documents
  • You can use shared supplier documents to store all of your key policy documents and any materials you may need to hand out to supplier in one place.
• Excel Exports
  • Export a selection of supplier records, to Excel, from within the 'Supplier Management' area.
  • Select which parts of the selected supplier records to export, which not only saves you time but helps you stay more GDPR compliant.
• Supplier Boxes
  • Combine search results by creating custom supplier lists, making it easier to export your supplier records to Excel.
  • Combine search results by creating custom supplier task lists, making it easier to manage your supplier records within OneBoxBM.