Setting The Stage
I have been getting increasing calls from practitioners – especially in the C-Suite, regarding my human-led agent-based implementation and development model. So much so that I am beginning to see a notable trend: solution provider market share and size trumping market experience and expertise. More specifically, it is a big company technology-led equation-based beating out or replacing smaller but more successful providers using a human-led agent-based solution development and implementation model.
Of course, it is not a new trend. Unfortunately, an alarmingly growing trend explains why only 20% of successful ProcureTech initiatives succeed, and 80% continue to struggle or fail outright.
A Little History Lesson
Take a few moments to read the following Procurement Insights post: Revised Forrester Wave Report confirms what I have been saying since 2007 . . . eVA is tops in public procurement by Jon Hansen
The above article concerns the Commonwealth of Virginia’s highly successful eVA initiative, which was launched in the early 2000s and is still going strong today. It was targeted to be replaced in 2014 by one of the “Big Provider” solutions.
Forrester was brought in to justify the change, but to their credit, they did an about-face per the following two article excerpts:
“Our revised Forrester Wave evaluation of feature, function, and integration still shows that eVA provides better functionality for procure-to-pay, and better integration with non-Cardinal ERPs and with suppliers, outweighing Cardinal procurement’s better integration with Cardinal ERPs.“
“Our Forrester TEI analysis of costs, risks, and flexibility benefits shows that expanding eVA’s integration would have much lower initial investment than a Cardinal procurement roll-out, though Cardinal after full roll-out would have lower annual operating costs. On a net present value basis, eVA’s total five year costs are about 10% lower than Cardinal’s . . . Factoring in eVA’s supplier fees and its operational savings to local governments, eVA would have significantly lower costs and lower risks.“
EDITOR’S NOTE: Cardinal Solutions is now owned and has been folded into Insight Enterprises, a global technology company specializing in business-to-business IT solutions. As of 2023, the company reported annual revenues of approximately $9.18 billion, a decrease from $10.43 billion in 2022. The company employs over 14,000 people worldwide.
Back To Today’s Post
With increasing frequency, procurement executives have told me that their successful ProcureTech implementations with smaller, longstanding solution providers are being replaced by more prominent, e.g., bigger providers like SAP Ariba and Workday. The transition results have been generally poor because these larger providers are growing market share through acquisition and assimilation rather than actual procurement industry experience and expertise. In short, boardroom decisions are based on provider size and money rather than successful implementations. Now, the 80% initiative failure rate makes even more sense.
Over the coming weeks, I will delve deeper into these specific case examples to explain why the 20% of initiatives that haven’t eaten the “big company apple” are succeeding.
In the meantime, I will leave you with this closing thought: I have said in recent years that the “nobody ever got fired for buying IBM” 1980s mindset is a thing of the past. I may have been wrong because it appears alive and well in 2025 corporate boardrooms.
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Procurement Insights
The Practitioners View: Why 20% Believe That Bigger Isn’t Better!
Posted on January 24, 2025
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Setting The Stage
I have been getting increasing calls from practitioners – especially in the C-Suite, regarding my human-led agent-based implementation and development model. So much so that I am beginning to see a notable trend: solution provider market share and size trumping market experience and expertise. More specifically, it is a big company technology-led equation-based beating out or replacing smaller but more successful providers using a human-led agent-based solution development and implementation model.
Of course, it is not a new trend. Unfortunately, an alarmingly growing trend explains why only 20% of successful ProcureTech initiatives succeed, and 80% continue to struggle or fail outright.
A Little History Lesson
Take a few moments to read the following Procurement Insights post: Revised Forrester Wave Report confirms what I have been saying since 2007 . . . eVA is tops in public procurement by Jon Hansen
The above article concerns the Commonwealth of Virginia’s highly successful eVA initiative, which was launched in the early 2000s and is still going strong today. It was targeted to be replaced in 2014 by one of the “Big Provider” solutions.
Forrester was brought in to justify the change, but to their credit, they did an about-face per the following two article excerpts:
“Our revised Forrester Wave evaluation of feature, function, and integration still shows that eVA provides better functionality for procure-to-pay, and better integration with non-Cardinal ERPs and with suppliers, outweighing Cardinal procurement’s better integration with Cardinal ERPs.“
“Our Forrester TEI analysis of costs, risks, and flexibility benefits shows that expanding eVA’s integration would have much lower initial investment than a Cardinal procurement roll-out, though Cardinal after full roll-out would have lower annual operating costs. On a net present value basis, eVA’s total five year costs are about 10% lower than Cardinal’s . . . Factoring in eVA’s supplier fees and its operational savings to local governments, eVA would have significantly lower costs and lower risks.“
EDITOR’S NOTE: Cardinal Solutions is now owned and has been folded into Insight Enterprises, a global technology company specializing in business-to-business IT solutions. As of 2023, the company reported annual revenues of approximately $9.18 billion, a decrease from $10.43 billion in 2022. The company employs over 14,000 people worldwide.
Back To Today’s Post
With increasing frequency, procurement executives have told me that their successful ProcureTech implementations with smaller, longstanding solution providers are being replaced by more prominent, e.g., bigger providers like SAP Ariba and Workday. The transition results have been generally poor because these larger providers are growing market share through acquisition and assimilation rather than actual procurement industry experience and expertise. In short, boardroom decisions are based on provider size and money rather than successful implementations. Now, the 80% initiative failure rate makes even more sense.
Over the coming weeks, I will delve deeper into these specific case examples to explain why the 20% of initiatives that haven’t eaten the “big company apple” are succeeding.
In the meantime, I will leave you with this closing thought: I have said in recent years that the “nobody ever got fired for buying IBM” 1980s mindset is a thing of the past. I may have been wrong because it appears alive and well in 2025 corporate boardrooms.
30
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