Ghosting in Procurement: The Cost No One Talks About
Let’s be honest here: we’ve all left a message unread, missed a follow-up, or quietly moved on without replying. In our personal lives, it’s irritating, but in business? It is especially so when it comes to ghosting suppliers.
Most people working in sales can tell you precisely what it feels like to pour time, energy, and hope into a promising opportunity, only to be left with nothing. No feedback. No response to voicemails, email, or just silence. After multiple demos, reworked proposals, and pricing requests, most people would think it was a positive sign. Later, after an entourage of outreach, you receive a sheepish email saying they have no budget or, still, nothing! It’s not just disappointing, it’s soul-destroying.
And the icing on the cake, on most occasions, procurement often doesn’t care.
Why? Because procurement has rarely walked in those shoes. We haven’t had the fear of losing our job if we don’t hit quota, chase decision-makers every single moment of every single day, sit refreshing inboxes, or justify how 1000 hours of effort evaporated without so much as a polite decline. Procurement is taught to act like pragmatic, objective, and data-driven business custodians. But if we thought like business owners, we’d treat people better and more respectfully. We’d show empathy, and we’d respect the time others invest in us.
What Ghosting Actually Costs
It’s easy to think that ignoring a supplier isn’t a big deal. But the ripple effects are real.
• Wasted time and resources: Salespeople don’t operate in isolation. Proposals, pricing models, and customised demos often involve behind-the-scenes teams.
• Damaged relationships: You might not need that supplier now, but you might later. And when you do, they’ll remember being ghosted.
• Reputation risk: Suppliers talk. Your procurement team’s name and your brand are part of those conversations.
• Fewer willing partners: If suppliers begin to feel that procurement isn’t worth the effort, they’ll stop engaging. Or worse, they’ll add a premium for the pain.
Why Transparency Matters
I’m not saying everyone is asking for a guaranteed deal. What they are asking for is honesty. If you don’t have a budget, say so. If you’re market-testing, be upfront. If priorities have shifted, tell them. These conversations might be awkward, but far less damaging than silence.
Sales is hard. It’s full of constant rejection, pressure, and uncertainty. The least we can do is show respect to those doing the job. Because guess what? Without them, there is no market to buy from.
A Better Way Forward
It’s time to stop hiding behind process and procedure. Procurement is evolving; we talk about partnership, value creation, and supplier collaboration. But if we want suppliers to show up as true partners, we must treat them as such. That means clear communication, mutual respect, and yes, sometimes, delivering bad news.
There’s a human cost to ghosting. And if we want to attract the best suppliers, create innovation, and be taken seriously as a function that enables the business, not just governs it, then we have to behave like it.
So next time a supplier follows up, even if the answer is no, give them the courtesy of a reply. Because one day, the roles might be reversed, and you’ll remember exactly how it felt.
Source: Iain Campbell McKenna
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