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[Music] [Music] the three P's be persistent be professional and be patient those are probably the three most important things that one should know whether you're a diverse supplier or your supplier diversity professional because these suppliers have to interact with us on a regular basis and we have to interact and advocate on their behalf inside of our own organizations and we have to have the exact same three P's that they would have coming to us we have to have that with our counterparts internally so that we can get them to understand the value that introducing a new supplier at the right time could bring what frustrates me most about suppliers in general and it doesn't even have to be diverse suppliers it can be anyone that's new trying to enter into the Ford space but one of the things that frustrates me the most is let's say the constant I sent you an email you never responded and then they respond again with another email from the first one that they did the next thing you know you have 20 chains of an email that you didn't get a chance to respond to and that could be the first time you actually saw the email I mean I don't know about you but I can easily have 120 emails unread in my box at any given point of the day and so it's that me first type of attitude that kind of loses professionalism there and I think that people need to keep that in mind that be conscious of the fact that you're not the only one out there knocking on the door and then another thing that frustrates me the most is suppliers really don't know how they can benefit or bring value to form or company if you don't know how how am I supposed to know right so it's so important for a company as complex as Ford Motor Company to understand what is your value proposition what do you bring to the table so that I know the right two players to introduce you to and so that I can actually spend the time asking you the right questions to get to that right person to them facilitate an introduction you get a chance to see creativity and innovation flood every part of what you do when people come from different backgrounds from different origins different thought processes you get the best of the best you really do if you keep if you think about something like if you keep doing the same thing over and over again you can have your grandmother's recipe for macaroni and cheese and it's so good and it's so good but then you taste somebody else's like who would have thought to put a lobster with macaroni and cheese how about that right so when you think about that when you have that opportunity to change something and make it better that's that's really what diversity is about making it better a success story that I would like to share is one that we had with a woman on business who participated in one of our developmental programs that we offer and it's called mentor me and what we do with mentor me as we select diverse businesses and you don't even have to be one of our current suppliers but we offer this through the Michigan minority supplier development Council and you can apply for a mentor session and we will pair you with industry experts whether it's in our company or other corporations under the area of your selecting so we had a woman owned business that applied and she got it and she was paired up with one of our executives and through her mentorship she was able to share what she does and we were able to find her an opportunity based upon her ability to express exactly what her expertise was and also to express where her expertise was not right she was not afraid to ask for help in these areas so that she could be successful what ended up happening is now she's actually a supplier she followed up she was professionally persistent and very patient and over time she was able to develop the relationship that she needed to be able to find the entry point into far more company and I'm very happy to say that she is now one of our women-owned business this we talked about the importance of forging relationships but this one I want to talk about is more about your brand speaking for itself you know I come from the city of Detroit so Street credit is everything right and so your reputation in the industry is so important within days now we have a new minority-owned business that we're going to be working with on one of our huge projects that I'm so excited about they didn't have to really forge a relationship to get there it's ok who do we know that can do this job and this name started popping up over and over and over again and we're like who is the supplier why are we doing business with them and sure enough we met with them and we're ready to go ahead and sign them as a supplier so as as important as professionalism and persistence and patience --is your brand is even more important and you do have to do that work as well [Music] a word-of-mouth right that's marketing 101 right where the mouth is so powerful and so this this company has built their brand based upon what they do and people know about it so when the unique opportunity came up and again it's it's an area that we haven't touched before right so how do we go out and start looking for that other than word-of-mouth and also touching with different advocacy databases that we have but that word-of-mouth is so much more powerful than a database I'm telling you they didn't even have to come looking for us we went looking for them based upon that what I call street credit right because their brand was so strong that we were able to go to them and now we're able to make them one of our suppliers [Music]