The awards celebrate companies that are working towards a better Africa through innovative and impactful supplier development initiatives. The awards acknowledge and recognise corporates that go beyond scorecard compliance by opening supply chain access to small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) in target groups and empowering them to build the necessary capacity to deliver on commercial expectations.
The Supplier Development Awards are the brainchild of Catherine Wijnberg, CEO of business-growth enterprise Fetola, and aims to foster a collaborative spirit within the sector. The vision is to build a community built on best practice that inspires and challenges professionals to raise their game and unlock the potential of supplier development as a driver of inclusive economic growth and its outcome, job creation. The initiative is aimed at corporates, parastatals and government institutions that implement supplier development programmes within their own supply chains. As the technical lead, Fetola manages the awards process with the guidance of a volunteer advisory panel and an industry-recognised judging panel to adjudicate the finalist applications.
Supplier Development Awards partners Cold Press Media and Arena Holdings are responsible for communications and stakeholder relations, as well as coordinating the awards event itself. Winners of the 2021 awards will be announced at the gala event on 18 November. The judging process and the reasoning behind the final decisions are made public so that the lessons learned and best practice are shared. In addition, all results are benchmarked for year-on-year comparison and collated in an annual report with a view to making visible and accessible the latest information on supplier development practices in South Africa and beyond.
Like most similar initiatives over the past 18 months, the Supplier Development Awards has had to pivot to create added value due to the disruption caused by the Covid-19 pandemic. This gave rise to an ongoing, well-attended series of interactive online discussions with a panel of specialists, hosted by Joanne Joseph of BusinessDay TV. These Digital Dialogues address current issues related to supplier development, such as access to finance, job creation and ethics in supply chain. For those who missed the Digital Dialogue live events, there are additional broadcasts and the recordings are hosted on www.sdawards.co.za.
A second new initiative introduced this year is the Insider Track Series, bringing together thought leaders in supply chain to promote the exchange of ideas. It is linked to an exclusive and growing community of C-suite executives and procurement and supplier development professionals. Interactive online workshops feature specialists and inspirational supplier development stories, showcasing both the corporate and SME perspective, with insight and commentary provided by panellists and the Insiders themselves.
