If this is a political vendor, then you could have a major problem on your hands. If they are well connected, then putting pressure on them may just make your position worse. It is better to sit down with the vendor and start getting into the detail.

A similar approach works with technical vendors. As you become aware that a vendor is not working up to speed or quality, then you should increase your presence in the country and with them. Sit down and review both the plan and open issues. Initiate more joint tasks so that you can see what is going on behind the scenes. As you get more involved in their detailed work, you will acquire more knowledge of the situation.

The Vendor Changes Staff Often

If the problem occurs, then make staff turnover an issue in the project. Indicate the impact and effect on the project due to the loss of knowledge and learning curve as well as by the substitution of junior people. When you use your own employees, you don’t want to cripple the department by getting the best people. For the vendor you want almost the best people. Why “almost the best?” Because the best are likely to be difficult to manage. They may view themselves as prima donnas.

The Vendor Wants to Impose Their Own Management Approach on the Project

This occurs sometimes with larger management consulting firms working with mid-sized client firms. Why do they do this? It makes it easier for them. They can make your project look like a similar one they did a year ago. Maybe they can reuse some of the work and results—it has happened before. They also want control for control’s sake.

What are some signs of this occurring? One sign is that they volunteer to do project management tasks such as reports, notes of meetings, plans, etc. Another sign is that they begin to call meetings and start to direct the internal employees.

This has to be prevented unless you are planning to turn over the project management to them. The project leaders must lay down the rules at the start. Each time the vendor leader starts to intrude into project management, the project leaders need to push him/her back. This should be done directly. After a few times, the vendor should give up.

The Vendor Work and Staff Quality Vary Greatly by Country

This is the case with everything. Let’s suppose you have a commercial airliner. You can get complex and any other repair done in country A. However, it is very expensive. You can get simple repairs done for far less in country B. Your plane has a problem. What do you do? The problem could turn out to be serious. You might want to try country B to see if that will work.

Every vendor who comes to work for you has their own preferences for methods and tools. In many cases, this is not a problem since the method or tool is only required one time. However, there are situations in which the method or tool selected during the project will be required after the project is completed for maintenance and operations support. Then the methods and tools become critical.