Getting Value From Your Procurement Platform Means Getting People To Use It!

So here is the good news - if you are already using VendorPanel you have taken a big step towards lower-risk, more efficient procurement. The platform delivers insights, transparency, and better management of strategic and decentralised sourcing. But to maximise these benefits, you need to ensure widespread use by your buyers.

This is why we encourage clients to mandate the use of VendorPanel throughout their organisation, something that our implementation process is designed to support. Mandated use drives your return on investment, gets users skilled up and benefiting, and accelerates the transformation of procurement into a business enabler.

Think of procurement software as a book club. The more people actively participate, the more value everyone gets from being a member. More knowledge is shared, the insights are deeper, and better decisions can be made - for example on what book to read next. It's exactly the same with an information-rich procurement tool that is used by a wide group of people.

One of our clients, the Shire of Wyndham-East Kimberley in WA mandated the use of VendorPanel on procurement purchases over $10,000, as manual processes has proven inefficient and hard to manage.

After 12 months of widespread use the Shire achieved 32% cost avoidance savings, as well as significant time reduction on administration. This allowed the procurement team to support both buyers and suppliers more effectively. They reported that VendorPanel’s transparency and security meant that all sourcing activity could be referred back to and reported on with the click of a button.

So to get the most from the platform, we always recommend mandating its use. One way we support you in getting there is with a dedicated Customer Success team. Our specialist Customer Success Representatives help clients implement VendorPanel successfully based on specific goals and objectives, and then work with them on an ongoing basis to ensure they get the most from their investment.

I have summarised here the five biggest benefits of implementing VendorPanel - you can see that promoting widespread use among buyers will have a significant effect on achieving them.

Better insight

VendorPanel Analytics leverages sourcing data from the VendorPanel platform and presents it in dynamic dashboards. It gives full visibility of procurement activity, usage and behaviour, allowing you to uncover insights and make more informed decisions.

It also allows you to monitor procurement activity and performance with data that is refreshed daily, getting both a high level view and the ability to drill into detail.

Analytics offer increased insight over:

• buyer activity and engagement across divisions and groups
• usage of supplier panels & lists, and a view of individual supplier engagement
• visibility of categories being used, and ability to identify new panel opportunities
• cumulative savings & cost avoidance, and potential for further savings
• reporting on social procurement and local economic development

The more the platform is used, the more data becomes available, allowing better insights and more informed decisions.

Reduced risk

Manual procurement processes are both inefficient and prone to risk of non-compliance, especially on decentralised spend that is often managed by buyers outside of procurement. When sourcing requests are lost in multiple emails and spreadsheets they can be hard to manage and even harder to get ready for audit.

As VendorPanel houses all procurement requests in one platform, users have complete transparency and oversight of spend. When you implement the software and mandate use of the platform you can rest easy knowing that everything is in one place, ensuring your risk of non-compliance remains low.

Cost-saving

In unprecedented times like these, budget constraints are front of mind, especially for procurement teams and buyers.

A recent survey has shown that VendorPanel users saved an average of 9.74% on direct-to-market RFxs and 5.1% on requests to pre-approved panels made through the platform.

Additionally, the VendorPanel cost structure is specifically designed to promote continued use. Buyers can source for all of their sub-tender jobs on the platform without the worry of exceeding an arbitrary RFx limit.

Efficiency

Procurement requests and tenders are time-consuming tasks. We understand that buyers looking after decentralised sourcing have no shortage of other priorities, and time management is crucial.

VendorPanel acts as a central location for all RFx documentation, with easy management and audit-reporting reducing time spent on administration. In fact, users of VendorPanel have reported a 4.5 hour saving per RFx, essentially giving buyers an extra half-day to dedicate to other areas of work.

One point of access to all suppliers

Users can easily onboard pre-approved suppliers to create their preferred panels while benefiting from the local supplier Marketplace for any requirements outside of normal sourcing needs.

By presenting buyers with a large pool of suppliers and making it easy for them to include them in their RFQs, clients can easily open up their sourcing to new businesses in the region and those that haven’t previously worked with them. This, combined with oversight and a structured process, helps create a fair and transparent process to engage with new suppliers.

Mandating the use of VendorPanel is crucial to the success of implementation and will unlock the full potential of the platform. You can read the full Shire of Wyndham-East Kimberley case study to see how mandated use of VendorPanel positively impacted their procurement process.

Our Customer Success team of myself, Alex, Vivek, Glen, Angel and Anita are experienced and knowledgeable in SaaS implementation. Every client is designated a Customer Success Representative to ensure they are getting the most from VendorPanel and continue to reach their procurement goals through the platform.

If you are interested in learning more about VendorPanel we would love to chat about the platform, our processes and people, and to answer any questions you have about implementation by our Customer Success team.

Or if you would like any further information on mandating use, including our available training resources and subscriptions, please Contact us to arrange a call.