Why I Left

Why I Walked Away…An Op Ed on the State of Supplier Diversity

[byline] By Amy Elizabeth Goudy

I once believed in supplier diversity, To the point that I was almost evangelical about it; I would engage anyone I met on the topic and wax philosophically about the “spirit of diversity.” Now, I am the owner of a record label and my consulting services have narrowed to IT-related services. Here is why I walked away from something that I lived and breathed for more than eight years:

My resume is stacked with procurement roles from as far back as 1990, and by 2004 I was a part of the Global Procurement team for a Fortune 500 contract manufacturing company. As a “private label” company, there wasn’t a push for brand recognition. Most of the customer base was in the telecom, IT and consumer products arenas so it wasn’t surprising that when the push for 2nd Tier spend reporting wave came through, the executives were nudged to deliver data related to spend with diverse suppliers.

Tapped to “find out what they are talking about” when customer contracts suddenly required a report with a “percentage of spend” I was thrilled with what I discovered. As a biracial woman, I connected with the idea of providing opportunities for entrepreneurs who normally would have a hard time getting contracts from major corporations. The next couple of years I tried to learn everything I could about the business case for the inclusion of diverse suppliers. I knew I would have to prove to the decision makers in the company why it was critical to allocate resources to this new program.

At the time, companies were just beginning to adopt reporting standards and utilize database tools to capture the data. The calculations were based on the total spent as a company and then how much of that was with suppliers that are certified as either a women-owned business enterprise (WBE) or a minority-owned enterprise (MBE) as outlined by the certifying organizations. From there, the percentages were calculated.

Once I understood the why, I set out to become a professional at the how. Joining council boards, attending all the conferences and networking in industry and local agency groups.  Representing a $10 billion company, suppliers flocked to me looking for support and a chance to be on the approved supplier list. Unfortunately, I couldn’t help any of them.

Truth is, companies are in business to make a profit, and publicly traded companies want the maximum profit possible. Their business decisions are never “because it’s the right thing to do” even if that is what is printed on their supplier diversity mission statement.  In 2008, a competitor acquired the company I worked for, I was informed that while supplier diversity was a “nice to have”, none of their customers listed diversity as a condition of doing business. They were the leader in the industry and so could turn away business. There was no budget to fund a program that didn’t show a direct return on investment..

With a “thank you” and a severance check, I decided to take my passion to the people who would appreciate it. I believed corporations would see how important diversity was to the health of the economy, especially during a recession when small businesses were folding daily. They just didn’t know how to start, I would be a consultant and help everyone in the process. Problem was, since none of these companies understood why they needed me, there wasn’t a budget for my services.

I began helping business owners with what I called “Navigating Corporate Culture” in all those networking sessions with other corporate supplier diversity professionals there seemed to be a universal complaint;  WBE/MBEs wanted to do business with corporations but often weren’t prepared “to play with the big boys”. It was the small things like having an aol.com email address or a clip art logo, bigger issues were not having a high enough credit rating. Certified as both an MBE and a WBE myself, I spent a number of years teaching and coaching entrepreneurs and yet, I can’t claim a single major success story in the area of helping a client land a corporate contract.