When I very briefly joined TCS (Tata Consultancy Services) as an IT service management (ITSM) consultant a year ago today, I met a fellow new recruit Sandy Winschief – a vendor/supplier management specialist armed with a pair of Six Sigma black belts. Sandy was/is a key piece in TCS’ Service Integration offering jigsaw and someone who made me think more about the relationships between IT infrastructure and operations (I&O) organizations and their suppliers.

Sorry, you said, “Service Integration”?

For those new to Service Integration I offer the following “definition” from a Forrester colleague’s “thinking”:

“To make multisourcing arrangements effective, customers must get suppliers to work together, both from the commercial and operational standpoint. The services integration layer, comprising elements of process, tools, service-level agreements (SLAs), and related structures, is absolutely critical to the success of these arrangements.”

My ITSMWPROW podcast colleague James Finister gives a more detailed overview in his personal blog.

So how can Sandy’s vendor/supplier management expertise help I&O professionals?