Use Products and Services and Business Classifications in Questions

Large and Associates is opening several new offices to handle customers in its western region. Lydia Fernandez, the supplier qualification manager, is creating a new initiative to qualify suppliers for future office furniture purchases.

Among other questions, she creates one question using the Products and Services hierarchy. She also creates a second question using the Small Business attribute of the Business Classifications category.

Using Products and Services in a Question

1. Lydia begins creating her question by entering the question name. She accepts the defaults for the rest of the header attributes.

2. She selects Mapped to supplier attribute. The Supplier Profile Attribute search field is displayed, and Lydia clicks the search icon.

3. When the Search and Select dialog box appears, Lydia opens the Categories menu. She selects the entry for Products and Services, and clicks Search. When the dialog box refreshes, she highlights the entry in the search results area for Products and Services and clicks OK.

4. When the Create Question page displays, Products and Services is identified as the profile attribute. The supplier products and services hierarchy is displayed in the allowable values section.

5. Since the question is concerned with office furniture, Lydia highlights the category for Technology and the category for Telecommunications. She deletes them since they are not applicable to the question. She sets the remaining values to optionally accept attachments.

6. She selects a value called Modular Furniture, marks it as the preferred response, and chooses to display the preferred response to suppliers.

7. The products and services display itself accepts no input from a supplier. It only provides a structure to which the qualification manager can add follow up questions. For each of the products and services shown, Lydia defines one or more branching questions to which the supplier responds.

8. At this point, Lydia is finished with this question, so she clicks Activate and Save and Close.

Using Business Classifications in a Question

1. Lydia begins creating her question by entering the name. She accepts the defaults for the rest of the header attributes.

2. She selects Mapped to supplier attribute. The Supplier Profile Attribute search field is displayed, and Lydia clicks the search icon.

3. When the Search and Select dialog box appears, Lydia opens the Categories menu, selects the entry for Business Classifications, and clicks Search. When the dialog box refreshes, she highlights the entry for Small Business in the search results area for Business Classifications and clicks OK.

4. When the Create Question page is refreshed, Small Business is identified as the profile attribute. The certifying agencies associated with Small Business classification are displayed in the acceptable responses section.

5. Since the question is concerns a new office in the western region, Lydia highlights any certifications that are not in effect for Washington, Oregon, or California and deletes them.

6. Since business qualifications cannot have branching questions, at this point, Lydia is finished with this question, so she clicks Activate and Save and Close.