Poll

Does today's business world require any further communications with vendors who are not selected as a future partner.

This poll has expired. Voting is no longer possible.
31 votes were received.

I would think some type of follow up with all participants is expected.	21		68%
Welcome to corporate America. Ms. Manners has left the building and noone has time to spend on folks who aren't part of the work going forward.	10		32%

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A long time client, ( a large company) has been in major transition over the past few years and I have seen my work and role there slowly being marginalized over time. ( due to new people, trimmer budgets etc) This company was folded into a larger company last year and due to this, the marketing team that I dealt with was absorbed into the new larger entity. My main contact there was moved to a new position and no longer involved with marketing. Another contact ( call her Tina) remained on the team but in a smaller marginalized role reporting to a new VP of Marketing. ( Tina is not a fan of me. Not a great sign.)

SO I was recently asked to be a part of a RFI presentation where 4 vendors ( 3 competitors and my company) were to present to the new team based on a very involved set of criteria. The presentation were very in-depth and required about 4 days worth of work to prepare.

We went in and did our presentation to a very dour crowd. Sigh.... And I definitely got the impression we were an "also ran". Fine. I had known that I was losing the business and figured this day would come. I already have replaced the work with new accounts and am kind of glad to be free from dealing with this struggling company and I'm definetly in a "move on" mind set after the presentation.

We were told that "partners would be identified the week of 1/19" and from there future work and projects would be determined. Well, no emails or calls that week. We dropped some thank you notes in the mail and I emailed an assistant who organized the meetings, thanking him and inquired if a decision had been made. No emails, no phone calls....

I'm certain we didn't get the work but I can't help but be really put off by the non communication. I've worked for this company for 8 years and have been fairly integral to their marketing efforts.

I guess this is rantish but, if you prepared a huge presentation for a company to some very specific criteria and had worked for them for several years, would you expect at the very least a "let down call" or even a "let down" email?

I'm more upset about the lack of professionalism than the ended relationship.
It just seems so .... tacky.

Oh, well, diving back into the new client's work.
Just curious if my thinking on this is not realistic to today's business world.

3P

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Over the past 7 years I've worked at companies that do RFPs on a pretty regular basis. About 99% of the time we will get a notice of one type or another letting us know we didn't get it. These are medical facilities and organizations so its a little different area.

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Sadly, I am seeing more and more of this kind of thing all across the board.
You can blame it on the economy or the focus of self-preservation...dunno'?

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Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 01/27/2009 09:31AM by Buckeye_Sean.

The lack of professionalism, might be a good indicator that you really don't want to work for them anyway.
With 4 days of work just to do the presentation, it is just plain wrong to not contact you.

Bet you think twice before you do that again.

On the other hand, maybe there is some sort of internal struggle going on, and they have not come to a decision....like they are tying to get a better deal from the presenters, and don't want to burn the others yet.

maybe they haven't decided yet. Sometimes this stuff drags on far longer than originally planned. I have been working without a contract for over a year. Everyone I interface with keeps telling the Contracts people I can jack my rates up 400%, and the company is required by law to pay me. My boss said to give myself a raise this year, because of my dedication in soldiering on with my bad back, and coming in with a walker while everyomne bailed out that week because of the snow.

It sounds a little like a gray area to me.

If the meeting ended with something along the lines of 'Thank you for coming today...' and ""partners (will) be identified the week of 1/19" and from there future work and projects would be determined."

I would take that as an end to the matter if I didn't hear anything by the 19th. They've thanked me for presenting during the meeting and told me when I would be receiving an "answer". I wouldn't expect to be thanked again necessarily.

Quote
Ken Sp.
The lack of professionalism, might be a good indicator that you really don't want to work for them anyway.

AGREED. I would think you probably wouldn't want to do work with them either, especially with that lack of professionalism.

If they called tomorrow and accepted your presentation, I suspect you'd accept and not be concerned if they followed up with others or not. As you described it, with takeovers and mergers and all, this is a whole new entity with no institutional memory of you.

I wouldn't take it so personally.

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"Who's more foolish - the fool or the fool that follows him?" - Obi Wan Kenobi