Streamlining your supply chain can help you achieve good operational efficiency. It’s important to note that you can improve relationships with your trading partners and lay a better business environment with efficient operations. Further to operational efficiency, you can stay relevant amid a bureaucratic system that can cause inconvenience in cross-border transactions.
If you deal with suppliers in different time zones, sometimes communications can cause delays in deliveries and payments. Finding a way to reduce this communication drawback can enable your business to maintain good supplier rapport.
Apart from communication, payment for suppliers can hugely affect your business operations. Therefore, you need to find how to pay international suppliers securely and promptly so that your products always reach you on time. Various payment ways are available, and finding one that works well for both businesses is the key.
You can practice the below tips to help foster a good relationship with your business partners.
- Reduce Duplicate Data And Tasks
Regularly perform supply chain process reviews to determine similar or closely related tasks. Such tasks can take up time and resources, thereby reducing the productivity of team members. You can merge these tasks or eliminate the repetitive ones.
In addition, consider running a database management review to find duplicate data that can slow down your systems. Such a review can help increase productivity and ease of database maintenance. It can also be easier for team members to work remotely with smartphones or tablets when your database is clean.
- Make Use Of Current Technology
Various technologies like chatbots and inventory scanners can help improve your business operations. However, you need to get a technology that fits your business needs. For example, Warehouse Management System (WMS) software can help manage your inventory better.
A WMS can help track your inventory, manage labor and shipping, and generate reports when integrated into the supply chain. As the system follows a precise data path of products, reports can help you analyze overall performance and generate relevant policies for improvement.
Even on a lower budget, ensuring automation of your operations can increase your returns due to a reduction in response time and fewer manual entries. For instance, automation can help auto-generate and send an invoice once you key in specific data. It means the finance department can reduce time preparing invoices, and your customers can get invoices in real-time.
- Implement Latest Financial Technology And Payment Methods
For efficiency, your business should embrace modern payment methods and not rely on old payment processes that can take several days to complete. For example, consider using Real-Time Gross Settlement (RTGS) instead of Electronic Funds Transfer (EFT). Newer payment methods can also mean quicker transaction times and a better supplier-buyer relationship.
Other payment technologies offer real-time payment tracking, optimizing routing, and reducing risks. It also allows currency preference when transacting.
- Have Clear External And Internal Communication
When you provide clear internal communication channels, you create an open platform where staff can stay up to date and know the goals to achieve. It also leads to fewer wait times and reduces inefficiency and confusion. Staff productivity can increase with this in mind, thus improving your business value.
Good internal communication means that everyone in the team knows what and how to communicate with your business partners. This is especially important for customer service staff who may need to know the status of shipments and payments when communicating with clients.
- Analyze Your Sourcing Partners And Strategies
Know your customers and determine what image you want to portray for your business. What does this mean? Ideal sourcing offers three ideal options: high quality, short lead times, and low prices. However, you may not find all three from one source, and this needs you to choose what your customers want versus what you want to achieve as a business.
Whichever sourcing strategy you opt for, every stakeholder needs to understand the implications and what to expect from each source option.
- Stay Up To Date With Local And International Regulations
With cross-border transactions, regulations governing specific industries can change, which requires you to monitor how these regulations affect your business. For example, some countries may have policies on the maximum amount you can transact in a single transaction. It should tell you how you can relate with business partners affected by such a policy.
- Review Your Supply Chain Processes
As every transaction affects several management systems in the business, you need to perform a thorough supply chain review to find any problems in the process. This review can help identify challenges and enable you to set guidelines that can reduce costs and improve efficiency. It can allow you to pass the savings on costs to the customer and improve your business relationship.
Conclusion
Maintaining a good business relationship can become a challenge when conducting business across borders. However, with a good streamline of the supply chain, you can reduce costs and improve operational efficiency. As a result, you improve relationships with your business partners and achieve good returns.
