Supplier Diversity Moves up the Corporate Agenda – but Europe Lags behind North America

JAGGAER-TealBook 2021 Survey reveals that positive reputational impacts and supplier innovation are regarded as the main benefits. However, organizations lack data and visibility.

Research Triangle, NC and Toronto, Ontario. September 21, 2021 – Supplier diversity is a priority for 70% of organizations around the world, according to a survey conducted by JAGGAER and TealBook this year. However, most organizations have not started, or have only just started, on their journey towards greater supplier diversity and inclusiveness. The main obstacles hindering progress are difficulty identifying suppliers that are owned or managed by women and minority-owned business enterprises (MWBEs) that also meet procurement criteria, and a lack of data and insights into supplier diversity. The survey uncovered wide divergences on the issue between North America and Europe.

More than half (53%) of North American survey respondents stated that supplier diversity is a “high priority”, but this fell to just 17% among European organizations. The survey suggests that Black Lives Matter movement and calls for diversity have had a strong influence in North America, where 68% stated that they agreed or strongly agreed with the proposition that this heightened internal pressure to boost supplier diversity initiatives.

“Our work with customers around the world has revealed a growing awareness of the positive business benefits of diversifying the supply base to include more MWBEs, and this is borne out by the survey,” said Jim Bureau, CEO, JAGGAER. In North America, reputational impact is seen as one of the two biggest benefits by 66% of respondents, whereas 55% of Europeans cited supplier innovation. Many respondents also mentioned improved internal culture and greater competition within the supply base.

While the majority of organizations regard supplier diversity as a priority, they also face serious challenges.

A third of survey respondents stated that one of the two biggest obstacles to progress is “difficulty identifying diverse suppliers that also meet procurement criteria” while a further 27% identified a similar challenge, namely, “lack of supplier diversity data and insights”. A further 17% replied that they felt unable to verify supplier diversity claims. More than 11% stated that they simply “don’t know where to start”. European companies wishing to increase supplier diversity are also challenged to identify MWBE suppliers in tier 2 and beyond.

These are precisely the kind of issues that TealBook helps organizations to overcome. “Small and diverse businesses are the pipeline for innovation and have increasingly become a board-level ESG requirement,” said Stephany Lapierre, TealBook CEO. “Until recently, the complexities of these requirements, along with the time-consuming and cumbersome disparate supplier updates, have made it incredibly challenging to capture and access these businesses. That’s now possible with the combined powers of TealBook and JAGGAER, which removes these barriers and integrates supplier diversity data within the sourcing process, reporting and tracking supplier diversity spend with ease and accuracy.”

The full survey report is available for free here.

About JAGGAER: Procurement Simplified

We drive customer value for buyers and sellers through our global connected network served by offices located in the Americas, APAC, Asia and EMEA. JAGGAER develops and provides comprehensive source-to-settle SaaS-based solutions, including advanced Spend Analytics, Category Management, Supplier Management, Sourcing, Contracts, eProcurement, Invoicing, Supply Chain Management and Inventory Management. These all reside on a single platform, JAGGAER ONE. JAGGAER has pioneered spend management solutions for more than 25 years and continues to lead the innovation curve by listening to customers and stakeholders in all industry sectors, public services and academia. For more information, visit www.jaggaer.com

MEDIA CONTACT JAGGAER:
Abigail Holmes
Corporate Ink for JAGGAER
jaggaer@corporateink.com
+1 617.969.9192

About TealBook

TealBook is the leading supplier data foundation that autonomously maintains supplier primary data, powers e-procurement technology, drives supplier diversity, and enables supplier performance. Using AI and ML, TealBook gathers, predicts, and refines supplier data to build the world’s most comprehensive supplier intelligence. When there are supply chain disruptions, companies leverage TealBook to identify emergency sourcing options; when it’s business as usual, they use TealBook’s technology to unleash full procurement possibilities. TealBook has been adopted by Fortune 100 companies and is the winner of many prestigious awards including Spend Matter 50 Vendors to Watch and Gartner’s Cool Vendor. For more information, visit www.tealbook.com

MEDIA CONTACT TEALBOOK:

Carin Warner, Public Relations Director

978 509-5660

carin@tealbook.com

www.tealbook.com