Having greater visibility into all analytics processes in the procurement sector allows companies to better understand how they are spending and how they can achieve greater efficiency. Procurement analytics platforms contribute to this better understanding and also make processes more agile and strategic, helping to improve decision-making.
Better data management includes improved contract management, which also makes it easier to identify trends and share information across all stakeholders, as well as providing the purchasing team with simplified analysis and reporting that enables more strategic investment.
Strategic purchasing
Access to the best data and automated systems helps shift part of the purchasing professional's workload to more strategic tasks, and in this shift, they can contribute insights, process optimization and cost reduction. Data analysis solutions help the team change transactional approaches and also facilitate the identification of opportunities and risks for the business.
Data analysis also transforms the purchasing sector into a more strategic area, which now has a more complete view of what is being purchased, what has been contracted and whether or not the expenses are under that contract. With real-time information, professionals in the sector can identify contracts that are at risk or approaching their completion date, for example.
These tools also support more nuanced aspects of the purchasing process, such as understanding issues, whether certain spending categories are exceeding budget, and identifying where products and services are being purchased. Analytics provide a holistic view and better visibility into the entire purchasing flow, improving access to data that helps teams make more informed decisions.
Better contract management
Companies often make purchases only when they need them, without having an effective strategy. This leads to them purchasing items without a contract or simply placing new purchase orders without any requisition or planning. This can result in unapproved purchases, overspending and missed opportunities to optimize processes;
By investing in data-driven contract management, the purchasing department can identify what is being contracted with reports and visualizations that help find opportunities to reduce costs and make purchases more intelligently.
Likewise, the available technology allows you to link purchases directly to billing accounts. This means that any order that goes through the system is analyzed and, if it is under contract, its purchase is automatically authorized. This improves productivity while ensuring that the sector complies with company standards.
The importance of data analysis
With so much data, it’s easy to reach a point where important information starts to get lost in the shuffle. For managers, it’s important to have access to data, insights, and metrics in real time. They need visibility into what’s happening in their business in a dashboard that centralizes all of this information, simplifies reporting, and integrates data in one place.
Data can optimize purchasing processes and transform the sector into a strategic area and a competitive advantage. Talk to one of our experts and find out how COSTDRIVERS can help your company;
