Through out the our years working with Procurement, we have seen good and bad cases of different sized companies trying the hands on selecting, implementing and operating P2P platforms, and we have seen many common pitfalls that have caused higher Return on Investment, dissatisfied employees, and simply: buying in on platforms that turned out to be bad investment and required much more work than expected.
We have put together our 5 most common P2P problems and solutions that you can bring into your daily work. So if you are currently in the market looking for a new platform or just considering optimising your current setup, we hope these points will be valuable for you.
- Lack of proper user experience for the regular user
- Policies and guidance stored different places
- Too many features not being used
- Content management and how to operate the platform
- All suppliers are treated the same on the platform
1. Lack of proper user experience for the regular user
Many platforms are built with features in mind and focused on something other than the user experience for the regular user for which the platforms are being marketed to be used for. This causes low adoption rate and usability and requires structured work on user training within the organisations. More training requires more planning and organisation around the platforms, which can impact the business case and ROI from more significant investments. Users come from a world of apps, software and websites catered towards them (e.i. a B2C world); think about how mobile phones are structured, the apps we download and use, and the better bank portals or social media. But when we go to work, we are exposed to non-user-friendly or complex software that requires extensive training and awareness. Below are our top 5 P2P platform problems and solutions to consider.
2. Policies and guidance are stored in separate folders and platforms with various user interfaces
Using a P2P platform is more than knowing where to type in information and get a result. It’s also about getting the proper guidance on buying correctly and quickly understanding how to comply with procurement policies and use the appropriate buying channels and suppliers. This is where many platforms are not built also to suit the company employees that should be using - or will end up using the platforms. Besides getting access to and starting to use these platforms and tools, employees often go through lengthy training sessions and change management exercises and need to read guidance and policies usually stored in various places and formats. This is not helpful for sound learning, nor does it make compliance easy. It makes it difficult for the employees to comply if they need to work too hard to use a system that is pushed onto them. If there is too much information to remember, they forget when they start using the platforms - and either need to recollect training videos/material or ask a colleague.
Imagine using a B2C platform or website, and you need to look up “how-tos” in a Google search for many of your basic needs. That is not user-friendly nor drives the proper level of guidance or compliance to which the website was intended. We need to make it easy for our employees to be compliant, and even though we might not be able to expect everything to be easy to do in a platform, we should set some expectations for how we build easy compliance steps and guidance into our processes and the platforms we use.
So when optimising your P2P setup and scanning the market for solutions, remember that good user experience also includes how easily a user can be guided through a system - working effortlessly with your platform, policies and processes.
3. Too many features not being used
Let’s face it: Many platforms have a lot of great features, and many tech providers are great at selling them to upper management as a solution to drive automation and cover most procurement processes. But in reality, many organisations fall short of utilising all of these features, reducing the return on investment. Some reasons for this are that they are not equipped to implement and use these platforms and features widely in their organisations. Some features will require a more significant change in how they work and operate (internally and externally) to reap the benefits. Additionally, some features are not available to regular users. Both are tried, implemented and used towards regular users. Some features are more fancy (but can provide value) but are a part of the complete set of platform features that can’t be removed or opted out of.
4. Content management and how to operate the platform is missed
Would you browse around a website if there was no content or if the topic you are trying to find is either not there or you need to spend too much time digging it up through multiple clicks? A good guess would be a big no! This is how users of a P2P platform feel when companies don’t think about content management and dedicate proper time and resources to it. And we sure get it.
Content management is typically not planned to be a part of a company’s regular operations, except in a business’s customer-facing elements. Often, a lack of staffing to manage the platform is seen, or the organisation is not big enough to either employ full-time employees or even turn away from implementing some platforms as they are seen as too employee-heavy, thus sticking with old setups or manual ways of working - which again can hide workload that would be reduced by implementing more straightforward and more user-friendly platforms).
So, when looking to optimise your current set-up or eying out implementing a new solution, then plan for how you should manage content, thus keeping your users engaged and happy and making it more accessible to work with the platform that you want them to use. And if you struggle with finding the time to do content management by your existing employees, then we can also support you with our Admin-As-A-Service offering. Get in touch via our chat to know more.
5. All suppliers are treated the same on the platform
Suppliers come in different sizes (number of transactions and organisation) and are collaborated with in different ways depending on what they deliver and with various geographical locations. From a process, platform, and operational design perspective, how to get involved and work with suppliers is typically forgotten, and it usually ends up using a one-size-fits-all approach. This will generally work for a portion of the supplier base, but taking this approach for every supplier will cause problems - collaboration-wise and from a process perspective.
Buying channels and “how to” collaborate with the supplier must be considered depending on the platform implemented or used. A smaller supplier (in size) can’t necessarily be expected to work with the buyer like a more extensive technology-heavy supplier. Imagine turning the tables on your company; what would efficient and collaborative look like if each of your customers came with their platform(s), technology and standard process?
- Will you - or should you - be able to accommodate various requirements just because you are a supplier?
- And what is the cost you can or eventually should take on yourself to work with your customers?
Efficiency is key on both sides of the table to work smoothly together, but efficiency can come in different forms.
(6.) The platform is too closed around itself.
The headline of this blog post did say, “Top 5 problems and issues”. However, we do want to sneak in an extra to consider.
Not all platforms are suitable for all organisations, and we are not discussing the price tag. There is another piece of the puzzle to watch out for. Some solution providers pride themselves on having a solid network where buyers and sellers collaborate seamlessly and efficiently. While this might be a good thing and even a great way of working if you are a large organisation with a structured approach to what you buy and from whom you purchase it, the reality remains that you can easily be tied in on a dream where most of your suppliers will either have a difficult time onboarding and working with you in the sold solution. Again, yes, it is a great route, but having a more open network where collaborating with suppliers, sending orders and receiving documents back from the suppliers can be the right solution for you.
It all depends - we know it sounds like a consultancy - on how you should be structured, what you buy (materials/services) and generally how your solution landscape looks. Do you really need all those fancy features you won’t fully be using?
You need to ask yourself and the solution provider for this last piece of advice: “How easy is it now and later on to collaborate with our various suppliers?” and “How easy is it to integrate - where relevant - to other solution providers?
Do you have any reflections on our list? And do you want to discuss more on what we in P2Connct can do for your organisation? Get in touch with our team via the chat or go book a demo.