Take Note: Vendor Strategy By Bill Sullivan 99 dialogue, and listens to its partners. Your supply chain can and should be your eyes and ears in the market place to help you keep pace with the latest trends and best practices in the marketplace. 1. Leverage technology platforms at your disposal. With the rising generation of first-time Millennial homebuyers, it's critical to take note of the role technology plays in the homebuying experience from discovery to close. 2. Look for ways to expand your partnership through integrations and workflow collaboration. Often vendors can provide best practices from other lenders they may work with. Consider the resources that a vendor can provide to you as well. 3. Choose vendors and utilize their supply chain primarily or exclusively in a rigid procurement process focused on minimizing price. By not engaging suppliers to fully understand the business problem lenders often deprive themselves of tremendous subject matter expertise and industry experience that could yield an even better solution than the best price model. The best way to work with vendors is to utilize them as partners. Not only will this help to reduce costs, it also provides a better and more transparent experience for customers. The strength of a long-term partnership helps lenders deliver the best results for their customers. Bill Sullivan is Stewart's executive vice president of the Enterprise Revenue Group-Lender Sales. Connect with him on LinkedIn. n National Mortgage Professional Magazine n APRIL 2017 Just as critical as choosing the right business partner for your company is how you work with them. It's up to you to get the most out of these relationships: them as partners for a mutually successful relationship. Often vendors are selected based on a single need or single price. Look at your vendors holistically and as enterprise partners, not simply for one immediate need. 4. Rather than asking "what does it cost?" consider asking "how can we solve for this business need?" Often a good supplier has encountered the same critical business issue that you are trying to solve. Your business partners will be grateful for this approach too. By engaging them collaboratively you help them "up their game" and improve their understanding of current business issues. Unfortunately lenders too often engage with NationalMortgageProfessional.com experience of the partner and expect more from them. What approach do they take to solving issues? The first answer should never be "no." Partners should be open-minded and willing to invest time and energy to explore remedies and options. 3. Work with vendors that have scale and breadth and can execute at a local level. As the market gets more competitive, the borrower experience becomes a critical competitive issue. Finding the right mix of cost-efficient and customercentric can be a challenge. Suppliers with large scale and robust compliance discipline can seem attractive from a price perspective, but often the borrower experience suffers at the hands of such large companies. 4. Relationships are key. Partner with a vendor, leverage that vendor's knowledge, expertise and market reach to help grow your business and make connections for you. Choose partners that allow for access to leadership and responsive, openhttp://www.NationalMortgageProfessional.com