In the rapidly evolving ProcureTech landscape, organizations often leap from one platform to another in pursuit of scale, automation, or a promise of “enterprise-level” efficiency. Yet, as one large professional services organization recently discovered, success with a fit-aligned solution can be undone when urgency replaces communication and assumptions replace structured readiness.
This is a story about AdaptOne, Coupa, and the hidden decision-making forces that shape the fate of procurement transformations. More importantly, it is a case study in how the absence of Phase 0—an early-fit assessment that accounts for readiness, flux, and contextual realities—can push even the most successful relationships into avoidable disruption.
And while the organization’s identity remains confidential, its experience reflects a pattern that has played out across the industry for more than two decades.
A Case of Success… Until It Wasn’t
For years, this professional services firm operated on AdaptOne—a highly configurable procure-to-pay and supplier management solution well-suited to organizations with complex, non-manufacturing workflows. As a service-based company with distributed project teams, client-specific requirements, and high process variability, they needed a system that could adapt to them, not force them into rigid templates.
AdaptOne delivered exactly that.
- Supplier registration became frictionless
- Compliance workflows reflected real operational nuance
- Contract routing followed the firm’s project-centered DNA
- Practitioner input shaped the system rather than being constrained by it
- Supplier experience improved dramatically
“The system adapted to us—not the other way around,” the procurement lead said in our interview. It was a rare and coveted outcome in a sector where most P2P transformations struggle to meet practitioner expectations.
AdaptOne quickly became more than a system. It became an operating logic—one that aligned with how the firm actually worked.
The Problem They Thought They Had
Then came growth.
M&A expansion.
A surge in invoice volume.
A new ERP on the horizon.
And pressure—internal and external—to modernize payments and move away from checks.
Around the 45,000–60,000 invoice mark, the organization began to feel strain. Processing invoices took too long. Engineers—whose time bills at significant hourly rates—were spending too much effort in workflows that no longer felt efficient.
Soon a narrative took hold:
AdaptOne can’t handle our throughput.
But as new evidence shows, that narrative was incomplete.
The Email That Changed the Interpretation
After my research was completed, I emailed AdaptOne asking how they responded when the client said they had to move to Coupa due to throughput limitations.
AdaptOne’s top expert replied candidly:
“There was a perceived throughput limitation, but that could have been resolved if they had told us they were concerned about throughput.”
He added:
“Their other concern was that AdaptOne lacked a payment solution. They wanted to get away from paying their suppliers by check, and they wanted a solution sooner rather than waiting for AdaptOne to integrate one.”
This changes the nature of the story in a meaningful way.
The organization didn’t leave AdaptOne because AdaptOne was failing.
They left because:
- A perceived limitation felt real
- A payments requirement was urgent
- Communication had broken down
- There was no Phase 0 assessment
- Timeline pressure overshadowed solution fit
In other words:
The relationship didn’t fail—readiness, communication, and sequencing did.
The Move to Coupa: Solving One Problem While Creating Others
The firm selected Coupa, a well-known enterprise procurement platform. Coupa offered what AdaptOne did not: immediate payment automation, e-payables, and a powerful AP engine capable of industrial-scale invoice processing.
From a purely transactional standpoint, it was a logical move.
But the shift came at a cost.
In Coupa, the organization encountered constraints entirely absent in the AdaptOne era:
- “Cookie cutter — this is what you get.”
- Reduced ability to tailor workflows to clients or project nuances
- Practitioner dissatisfaction (“Why can’t we go back?”)
- Loss of the supplier experience gains earned through AdaptOne
- Increased friction during ongoing M&A consolidation
- Change saturation exacerbated by simultaneous ERP replacement
The system solved throughput, yes.
But it misaligned with how the organization worked, learned, and served its clients.
They addressed one dimension—scale—at the expense of two others:
fit and operational reality.
The Phase 0 Problem: What Was Missing
This case is not about AdaptOne vs. Coupa.
It is about:
- Timing
- Communication
- Sequencing
- Organizational flux
- Decision drift
- The danger of bypassing Phase 0
Had a proper Phase 0 analysis been conducted, three critical insights would have emerged:
1. AdaptOne could have scaled further
The vendor confirmed throughput improvements were possible—if the concern had been raised.
2. Payments could have been integrated without replacing the entire system
AdaptOne could have partnered with a payment provider or integrated a solution—if given lead time.
3. Coupa was ideal for back-end AP processing, not for replacing front-end workflows
A hybrid architecture would have produced the best structural outcome:
AdaptOne (workflow engine)
+
Coupa (payments + AP throughput)
In other words:
Layer the solutions. Don’t replace one with the other.
A Pattern the Industry Has Seen Before
This case fits a recurring pattern observed throughout the Procurement Insights archives:
- A highly successful, contextually aligned solution thrives
- Growth creates new operational pressure
- Leadership assumes replacement is necessary
- A large platform is selected to “fix everything”
- Fit deteriorates because nuance is lost
- Transformation fatigue sets in
- Hidden costs become visible only after go-live
Organizations rarely fail because one system is bad and another is good.
They fail because:
- They adopt systems in the wrong order
- They modify tools instead of workflows (or vice versa)
- They make decisions under flux rather than readiness
- They replace what should have been layered
- They solve the urgent at the cost of the essential
The Real Lesson: Fit First, Scale Second
This organization’s journey offers a simple but critical lesson for the wider marketplace:
A solution aligned to the business is more valuable than a solution that merely scales.
AdaptOne worked because it adapted to the business.
Coupa works because it industrializes transactions.
Both are valid strengths.
Neither is universally sufficient on its own.
The failure wasn’t choosing Coupa.
The failure was choosing Coupa instead of AdaptOne.
Going Forward: A Better Model for Industry Transformation
Across 25+ years of research, we have seen that the most successful ProcureTech roadmaps follow this sequence:
- Fit and workflow alignment first
- Readiness and flux evaluation second
- Layered architecture third
- Platform-scale solutions last
In other words:
- Start with the tool that knows your business
- Add the tool that handles your volume
- Never discard the tool that delivered proven success
- Always conduct Phase 0 before making structural changes
Had this sequence been applied, the organization’s AdaptOne success would have continued uninterrupted, while Coupa would have filled the one dimension AdaptOne did not yet offer: payments and industrial AP.
Why This Matters Now
As AI, autonomous procurement, and agent-based systems continue to reshape the industry, the cost of wrong sequencing will rise sharply.
Platforms like Coupa will become even more complex.
Workflow-centric solutions like AdaptOne will become even more valuable.
And organizations that lack Phase 0 discipline will continue to fall into the 80% failure rate that ProcureTech initiatives have suffered across the last decade.
But the story of this large professional services organization is a reminder that success is not determined by picking the biggest platform—it is determined by picking the right combination in the right sequence for the right reasons.
And by understanding that sometimes, success is not enough—especially when urgency drowns out communication.
Conclusion
This anonymized case study is not about blame. It is about insight.
It demonstrates that:
- AdaptOne was working
- The limitations were perceived, not actual
- Payments urgency drove an accelerated decision
- The hybrid model was the right path
- Communication gaps led to unnecessary disruption
- Coupa solved throughput but weakened alignment
- Phase 0 would have prevented the misstep
- Fit-first thinking remains the most reliable predictor of success
For vendors, integrators, and practitioners alike, this story offers a powerful message:
Don’t replace what works.
Augment it.
Layer it.
Strengthen it.
And above all—align the solution to the business, not the business to the solution.
30
Procurement Insights
When Success Isn’t Enough: What One Professional Services Firm’s Procurement Journey Reveals About Fit, Scale, and the Hidden Cost of “Either–Or” Thinking
Posted on November 26, 2025
0
In the rapidly evolving ProcureTech landscape, organizations often leap from one platform to another in pursuit of scale, automation, or a promise of “enterprise-level” efficiency. Yet, as one large professional services organization recently discovered, success with a fit-aligned solution can be undone when urgency replaces communication and assumptions replace structured readiness.
This is a story about AdaptOne, Coupa, and the hidden decision-making forces that shape the fate of procurement transformations. More importantly, it is a case study in how the absence of Phase 0—an early-fit assessment that accounts for readiness, flux, and contextual realities—can push even the most successful relationships into avoidable disruption.
And while the organization’s identity remains confidential, its experience reflects a pattern that has played out across the industry for more than two decades.
A Case of Success… Until It Wasn’t
For years, this professional services firm operated on AdaptOne—a highly configurable procure-to-pay and supplier management solution well-suited to organizations with complex, non-manufacturing workflows. As a service-based company with distributed project teams, client-specific requirements, and high process variability, they needed a system that could adapt to them, not force them into rigid templates.
AdaptOne delivered exactly that.
“The system adapted to us—not the other way around,” the procurement lead said in our interview. It was a rare and coveted outcome in a sector where most P2P transformations struggle to meet practitioner expectations.
AdaptOne quickly became more than a system. It became an operating logic—one that aligned with how the firm actually worked.
The Problem They Thought They Had
Then came growth.
M&A expansion.
A surge in invoice volume.
A new ERP on the horizon.
And pressure—internal and external—to modernize payments and move away from checks.
Around the 45,000–60,000 invoice mark, the organization began to feel strain. Processing invoices took too long. Engineers—whose time bills at significant hourly rates—were spending too much effort in workflows that no longer felt efficient.
Soon a narrative took hold:
AdaptOne can’t handle our throughput.
But as new evidence shows, that narrative was incomplete.
The Email That Changed the Interpretation
After my research was completed, I emailed AdaptOne asking how they responded when the client said they had to move to Coupa due to throughput limitations.
AdaptOne’s top expert replied candidly:
He added:
This changes the nature of the story in a meaningful way.
The organization didn’t leave AdaptOne because AdaptOne was failing.
They left because:
In other words:
The relationship didn’t fail—readiness, communication, and sequencing did.
The Move to Coupa: Solving One Problem While Creating Others
The firm selected Coupa, a well-known enterprise procurement platform. Coupa offered what AdaptOne did not: immediate payment automation, e-payables, and a powerful AP engine capable of industrial-scale invoice processing.
From a purely transactional standpoint, it was a logical move.
But the shift came at a cost.
In Coupa, the organization encountered constraints entirely absent in the AdaptOne era:
The system solved throughput, yes.
But it misaligned with how the organization worked, learned, and served its clients.
They addressed one dimension—scale—at the expense of two others:
fit and operational reality.
The Phase 0 Problem: What Was Missing
This case is not about AdaptOne vs. Coupa.
It is about:
Had a proper Phase 0 analysis been conducted, three critical insights would have emerged:
1. AdaptOne could have scaled further
The vendor confirmed throughput improvements were possible—if the concern had been raised.
2. Payments could have been integrated without replacing the entire system
AdaptOne could have partnered with a payment provider or integrated a solution—if given lead time.
3. Coupa was ideal for back-end AP processing, not for replacing front-end workflows
A hybrid architecture would have produced the best structural outcome:
AdaptOne (workflow engine)
+
Coupa (payments + AP throughput)
In other words:
Layer the solutions. Don’t replace one with the other.
A Pattern the Industry Has Seen Before
This case fits a recurring pattern observed throughout the Procurement Insights archives:
Organizations rarely fail because one system is bad and another is good.
They fail because:
The Real Lesson: Fit First, Scale Second
This organization’s journey offers a simple but critical lesson for the wider marketplace:
AdaptOne worked because it adapted to the business.
Coupa works because it industrializes transactions.
Both are valid strengths.
Neither is universally sufficient on its own.
The failure wasn’t choosing Coupa.
The failure was choosing Coupa instead of AdaptOne.
Going Forward: A Better Model for Industry Transformation
Across 25+ years of research, we have seen that the most successful ProcureTech roadmaps follow this sequence:
In other words:
Had this sequence been applied, the organization’s AdaptOne success would have continued uninterrupted, while Coupa would have filled the one dimension AdaptOne did not yet offer: payments and industrial AP.
Why This Matters Now
As AI, autonomous procurement, and agent-based systems continue to reshape the industry, the cost of wrong sequencing will rise sharply.
Platforms like Coupa will become even more complex.
Workflow-centric solutions like AdaptOne will become even more valuable.
And organizations that lack Phase 0 discipline will continue to fall into the 80% failure rate that ProcureTech initiatives have suffered across the last decade.
But the story of this large professional services organization is a reminder that success is not determined by picking the biggest platform—it is determined by picking the right combination in the right sequence for the right reasons.
And by understanding that sometimes, success is not enough—especially when urgency drowns out communication.
Conclusion
This anonymized case study is not about blame. It is about insight.
It demonstrates that:
For vendors, integrators, and practitioners alike, this story offers a powerful message:
Don’t replace what works.
Augment it.
Layer it.
Strengthen it.
And above all—align the solution to the business, not the business to the solution.
30
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