Contract

INTERVIEW

Organisations are increasingly outsourcing activities and becoming more dependent on other links in the value chain. This makes managing contracts and relationship effectively more important than ever. It is not just about formalising agreements, but above all about ensuring that external parties genuinely contribute to the organisation’s objectives.

Linda Tonkes is Managing Director of CM Partners, which develops best practices and provides training in contract and supplier relationship management. She sees dependencies increasing across every sector. Specialisation plays a major role in this. Organisations are focusing on a smaller part of their own value chain and outsourcing other activities. At the same time, technology is advancing rapidly and market conditions are becoming less predictable. As a result, it is becoming harder to make accurate long-term commitments about what needs to be delivered and when.

“An organisation can no longer fully realise its ambitions independently. Increasingly, it depends on other parties. This makes the success of these collaborations critical to the organisation’s own success. Contract and supplier relationship management therefore plays a direct role in achieving business objectives.”

Clear roles

For Tonkes, contract management also includes administrative contract management and goes well beyond supplier relationship management. The key is to ensure that supplier and contractual objectives are directly aligned with the broader organisational objectives.

This requires clear responsibilities within the organisation and a clear understanding of the role of each supplier. Roles must be defined in advance, so that everyone knows who manages what and when consultation or escalation is required.

“Many problems arise because organisations use the same words but mean different things. One person views a performance as a legal obligation, while another sees it as a promise or expectation. One party fulfils its contractual obligations, while the other feels let down. If these roles are not clear, people can end up talking past each other for years. Clear agreements make collaboration easier.”

Tonkes believes this also helps ensure compliance with obligations. Organisations must not only steer towards achieving contractual commitments, but also towards broader business objectives, in both the short and long term. When working with external parties, they should not focus exclusively on operational performance, but also discuss what they want to achieve together. A cleaning contract, for example, should not be assessed solely on the work performed, but also on employee satisfaction, sustainability and innovation.

According to Tonkes, professionalisation begins within the organisation itself. Sometimes the shift starts at the top, for example when management takes a firmer approach to risk and performance. In other cases, it starts on the shop floor, where employees experience unclear processes or overlapping responsibilities.

In both cases, the starting point is to make contract and supplier management a structural part of the organisation’s way of working.

“You can buy a new system or hire additional people, but that will not solve the problem if the underlying processes are unclear. First, you need to establish how you want to work and who is responsible for what. Only then can you use technology or additional capacity effectively. Otherwise, you are simply automating existing ambiguities.”

A blueprint

Tonkes also points to the CATS Best Practices framework from CM Partners. The framework provides a blueprint containing definitions, roles and processes that organisations can use in their own way. The methods are based on years of practical experience and are designed to help organisations avoid having to reinvent professional contract and supplier management from scratch.

Technology is playing an increasingly important role. Contract management systems and supplier relationship management systems are already widely used, and artificial intelligence (AI) is also helping organisations automate parts of the work. In particular, standard tasks can be automated more easily.

This also increases the importance of well-defined processes. “AI can perform many standard tasks and identify deviations more quickly. But if the underlying processes are not properly designed, automation also becomes unreliable. Human capabilities remain essential, particularly when interests conflict or relationships need to be built.”

Tonkes expects this to lead to a shift in the content of the work. Legal and administrative tasks will increasingly be automated, while communication and relationship-building skills will become more important. At the same time, she sees further specialisation emerging. Just as IT and facilities management have evolved, contract management may also become a function that organisations partially outsource.

Managing contracts and relationships is becoming increasingly important because organisations are taking greater responsibility for the impact they have on their customers and the wider world. Legislation is one factor, but customers, financiers and other stakeholders are also placing higher demands on suppliers and supply chain partners. Good contract management is therefore becoming increasingly intertwined with the continuity and long-term viability of organisations.

Source
This interview was first published in Dutch as partner content by CM Partners in Legal Success & Compliance, a Contentway special distributed with Het Financieele Dagblad on 16 October 2026. Translated and republished with permission.

Read the original publication (in Dutch): https://issuu.com/contentway/docs/legal_success_compliance_43546c9320d617
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