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Register early—members get 20% off when enrolling 60+ days before courses start.
Charting Your Course to Success
From foundational knowledge to advanced leadership skills, NIGP offers a wealth of tools and resources to help you navigate your professional journey and achieve your leadership goals.
Your step-by-step guide to a successful career in public procurement.
Get 20% off by registering 60 days prior to the course start date.
All the tools to help you successfully prepare for certification.
Sit for the new NIGP-CPP Modules C & D Exam in February 2026 and test for the NIGP-CPP ON US!
Start your job search in the field of Public Procurement.
A Network of 18,000+ Professionals working in the field of Public Procurement.
As volunteers serve the Institute, the Institute serves the profession, and the profession serves society.
Each year, NIGP recognizes members who have achieved hallmark status in the eyes of their peers.
Access to Our Exclusive Audience of Procurement Officials
19,000+ public procurement professionals, over 2,400 agencies, and 65 regional chapters across North America
Kirk Buffington
Vendor or supplier risk assessment is critical for government procurement offices to ensure secure, reliable, and compliant procurement operations. Best practices for conducting vendor risk assessments include establishing clear risk thresholds, categorizing suppliers through tiering, and implementing a "trust but validate" approach. Additionally, assessing risk across all suppliers, not just those in IT, mitigates operational, legal, and financial vulnerabilities. This blog post will introduce risk strategies, which will offer the procurement officer a deeper look at a particular vendor’s risk. Next week's blog post will discuss another best practices, vendor tiering, which can be undertaken to manage supplier risk on a deeper level.
1. Establishing Risk Thresholds
2. Trust but Validate
3. Importance of Assessing All Suppliers, Not Just IT Vendors
Summary of Best Practices
Conclusion
Implementing a comprehensive vendor risk assessment framework helps procurement offices proactively identify and mitigate risks across the supply chain. This approach ensures that government procurement operations are resilient, compliant, and protected from the potential disruptions or vulnerabilities that suppliers may introduce.
Our next column will focus primarily on vendor tiering, which will offer the procurement officer a deeper look at a particular vendor’s risk.
Implementing a comprehensive vendor risk assessment framework helps procurement offices proactively identify and mitigate risks across the supply chain.
Kirk Buffington
Implementing a comprehensive vendor risk assessment framework helps procurement offices proactively identify and mitigate risks across the supply chain.
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