It's a question worth pondering given April's executive high jinks, corporate housecleaning and financial restatements. Whether it's Computer Associates' horrid month culminating with the resignation of CEO Sanjay Kumar, or Nortel's latest accounting problems and the termination of CEO Frank Dunn and CFO Douglas Beatty, it helps to have a plan just in case a vendor unravels.

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While CA and Nortel pick up the pieces, the chaos atop their organizational charts serves as a cautionary tale to customers who commit to any one vendor for key business applications only to discover executives at their most important supplier are law- enforcement targets or cleaning out their desks.

When a supplier is in trouble, customer service, support and the product pipeline can suffer.

Here are some ways to protect yourself.

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