Introducing the Hansen Fit Score™ Cross-Series Risk Map: Why the Gap Between Technology Capability and Implementation Outcomes Is the Only Number That Matters
I’ve been writing about procurement technology for 18 years. In that time, I’ve watched the industry develop an extraordinary capacity for measuring the wrong thing.
Analyst firms measure technology capability. Feature depth. Platform architecture. AI readiness. Cloud infrastructure. And by those measures, every major ProcureTech solution provider scores well. Some score brilliantly.
But here’s the question nobody wants to ask: if the technology is this good, why do 80% of implementations still fail to deliver their projected outcomes?
The answer is not in the technology score. It’s in the gap between the technology score and what organizations actually achieve when they deploy it. That gap — the Capability-to-Outcome Gap — is what the Hansen Fit Score™ measures. And today, for the first time, I’m publishing the full cross-series risk map that plots every assessed vendor on a single chart.
Cross-Series Risk Mapping — HFS Composite vs. Capability-to-Outcome Gap | All Vendors Assessed | Updated February 2026
How to Read This Chart
The horizontal axis is the HFS Composite Score — the weighted average across five assessment dimensions (Technology Capability, Implementation Model, Behavioral Alignment, Evidence Base, and Services Model). The vertical axis is the Capability-to-Outcome Gap — the distance between what a vendor’s technology can do and what organizations actually achieve when they implement it.
The ideal position is bottom-right: high composite score, narrow gap. That means the technology is strong and organizations are successfully converting that capability into outcomes.
The worst position is upper-left: low composite score, wide gap. That means limited technology capability compounded by poor outcome predictability.
Any vendor above the 4.0 line sits in the Structural Misalignment Zone — where the gap between capability and outcomes reflects business model misalignment, not implementation variance. This is not a bad technology finding. It is a readiness finding.
What the Map Reveals
Ivalua (HFS 7.2 / Gap 2.5) holds the strongest position: highest composite score in the series with the narrowest gap among full-confidence assessments. The natively built platform, absence of PE-driven revenue pressure, and strong government sector retention create a structural profile that resists the capability-outcome divergence I’ve documented across acquisition-assembled platforms.
Coupa (HFS 6.4 / Gap 5.0) carries the widest gap in the series — despite having the highest technology capability score (9.2). The Convergence Chart I published alongside the SAP Ariba executive briefing series reveals that this gap existed from inception and was masked by growth momentum. The 2025 acquisitions of Cirtuo and Scoutbee accelerated the pattern. But here’s what makes Coupa’s position interesting rather than simply problematic: Cirtuo’s guided strategy creation workflow is structurally adjacent to Phase 0 organizational readiness assessment. The mechanism for closing the gap may already exist inside Coupa’s own acquisition portfolio. Whether they deploy it that way is the question the next assessment cycle will answer.
SAP Ariba (HFS 4.3 / Gap 4.7) remains in the Structural Misalignment Zone with the lowest composite score and the second-widest gap. The 18 years of documented evidence in the Procurement Insights archives make this the most precisely measured position on the chart — and the foundation for the upcoming executive briefing series.(SAP Ariba Executive Briefing (SINGLE SEAT) or SAP Ariba Executive Briefing (3-SEAT))
Zycus (HFS 6.0 / Gap 3.6) sits in the Systemic Implementation Risk zone, pending updated evidence.
ZIP and ORO Labs are plotted with diamond markers indicating evidence-deferred status. Both show promising profiles, but the longitudinal independent evidence isn’t there yet. Their scores will be refined as their records mature — that’s the methodology working as designed.
Why This Matters for Practitioners
Every analyst ranking you’ve ever read tells you which vendor has the best technology. None of them tell you which vendor’s implementation model most reliably converts that technology into outcomes for your organization. That’s the gap this map fills.
If you’re evaluating a ProcureTech investment and your vendor sits above the 4.0 line, the message is not don’t buy. The message is don’t deploy without Phase 0 intervention. Assess your organizational readiness before the technology arrives. Because the technology has never been better. And the ability to convert capability into outcomes has never been more unevenly distributed.
A Score That Changes When Reality Does
The Hansen Fit Score™ is not a static ranking. It’s a living instrument. Scores change as new evidence accumulates — new client wins, new retention data, new implementation outcomes, new acquisitions, new organizational readiness programs. A vendor that adopts Phase 0 thinking should see their score improve. A vendor that bolts on more technology without improving implementation alignment should see their gap widen.
That feedback loop is the structural differentiator. Analyst firms publish annually and the rankings decay from the moment they’re released. The Hansen Fit Score™ responds to behavioral change. That’s not a ranking. That’s a flywheel.
Starting in March 2026, the Hansen Fit Score™ Cross-Series Assessment will follow a quarterly release cadence — four scheduled updates (March, June, September, December) with the ability to issue a mid-quarter supplement when a material event warrants it. An acquisition like Coupa’s purchase of Scoutbee, a major implementation failure surfacing in the archives, a leadership change that restructures a vendor’s delivery model — these are the events that move scores, and the methodology should respond when the evidence arrives rather than waiting for the calendar. Quarterly cadence also aligns with how practitioners think: budget cycles, quarterly business reviews, and the decision windows where technology investments are actually evaluated. You don’t need twelve updates a year when scores move on evidence, not on schedule. And you don’t want two, because the market moves faster than that. Four releases plus event-driven supplements is the rhythm that matches the evidence cycle.
The full cross-series assessment document — including individual vendor scorecards across all five dimensions, methodology documentation, and the Convergence Chart analysis — is available through Procurement Insights. The SAP Ariba executive briefing series continues with the Phase 0 diagnostic roadmap.
The gap is the Achilles heel. Not the score.
Jon Hansen | Procurement Insights | Hansen Models™ | Hansen Fit Score™ Vendor Assessment Series
-30-
The SAP Ariba Briefing: What Steps You Can Take Now
The upcoming executive briefing on the SAP Ariba assessment isn’t a vendor pitch. It’s a diagnostic walkthrough — grounded in 18 years of longitudinal evidence and the Hansen Fit Score™ methodology — that will show practitioners what Phase 0 looks like in practice.
Specifically, the briefing will cover:
How to introduce Phase 0 thinking into your current SAP Ariba environment — not as a replacement for what you have, but as a diagnostic layer that surfaces what your current reporting can’t show you.
What the Hansen Fit Score™ assessment reveals about SAP Ariba’s trajectory across three corporate phases — and what that means for organizations currently on the platform.
What steps you can take to get an initiative back on track — because failed initiatives are not about technology. They are about alignment.
If the Procurement Director’s earlier observation resonates — if you’re in the “after-the-fact” position, whether it’s redirecting the ship or deciding whether to blow it up — this briefing is designed for exactly that moment.
SAP Ariba Executive Briefing (SINGLE SEAT) or SAP Ariba Executive Briefing (3-SEAT)
Procurement Insights
The Map That Shows What No Analyst Report Will Tell You
Posted on February 16, 2026
0
Introducing the Hansen Fit Score™ Cross-Series Risk Map: Why the Gap Between Technology Capability and Implementation Outcomes Is the Only Number That Matters
I’ve been writing about procurement technology for 18 years. In that time, I’ve watched the industry develop an extraordinary capacity for measuring the wrong thing.
Analyst firms measure technology capability. Feature depth. Platform architecture. AI readiness. Cloud infrastructure. And by those measures, every major ProcureTech solution provider scores well. Some score brilliantly.
But here’s the question nobody wants to ask: if the technology is this good, why do 80% of implementations still fail to deliver their projected outcomes?
The answer is not in the technology score. It’s in the gap between the technology score and what organizations actually achieve when they deploy it. That gap — the Capability-to-Outcome Gap — is what the Hansen Fit Score™ measures. And today, for the first time, I’m publishing the full cross-series risk map that plots every assessed vendor on a single chart.
Cross-Series Risk Mapping — HFS Composite vs. Capability-to-Outcome Gap | All Vendors Assessed | Updated February 2026
How to Read This Chart
The horizontal axis is the HFS Composite Score — the weighted average across five assessment dimensions (Technology Capability, Implementation Model, Behavioral Alignment, Evidence Base, and Services Model). The vertical axis is the Capability-to-Outcome Gap — the distance between what a vendor’s technology can do and what organizations actually achieve when they implement it.
The ideal position is bottom-right: high composite score, narrow gap. That means the technology is strong and organizations are successfully converting that capability into outcomes.
The worst position is upper-left: low composite score, wide gap. That means limited technology capability compounded by poor outcome predictability.
Any vendor above the 4.0 line sits in the Structural Misalignment Zone — where the gap between capability and outcomes reflects business model misalignment, not implementation variance. This is not a bad technology finding. It is a readiness finding.
What the Map Reveals
Ivalua (HFS 7.2 / Gap 2.5) holds the strongest position: highest composite score in the series with the narrowest gap among full-confidence assessments. The natively built platform, absence of PE-driven revenue pressure, and strong government sector retention create a structural profile that resists the capability-outcome divergence I’ve documented across acquisition-assembled platforms.
Coupa (HFS 6.4 / Gap 5.0) carries the widest gap in the series — despite having the highest technology capability score (9.2). The Convergence Chart I published alongside the SAP Ariba executive briefing series reveals that this gap existed from inception and was masked by growth momentum. The 2025 acquisitions of Cirtuo and Scoutbee accelerated the pattern. But here’s what makes Coupa’s position interesting rather than simply problematic: Cirtuo’s guided strategy creation workflow is structurally adjacent to Phase 0 organizational readiness assessment. The mechanism for closing the gap may already exist inside Coupa’s own acquisition portfolio. Whether they deploy it that way is the question the next assessment cycle will answer.
SAP Ariba (HFS 4.3 / Gap 4.7) remains in the Structural Misalignment Zone with the lowest composite score and the second-widest gap. The 18 years of documented evidence in the Procurement Insights archives make this the most precisely measured position on the chart — and the foundation for the upcoming executive briefing series.(SAP Ariba Executive Briefing (SINGLE SEAT) or SAP Ariba Executive Briefing (3-SEAT))
Zycus (HFS 6.0 / Gap 3.6) sits in the Systemic Implementation Risk zone, pending updated evidence.
ZIP and ORO Labs are plotted with diamond markers indicating evidence-deferred status. Both show promising profiles, but the longitudinal independent evidence isn’t there yet. Their scores will be refined as their records mature — that’s the methodology working as designed.
Why This Matters for Practitioners
Every analyst ranking you’ve ever read tells you which vendor has the best technology. None of them tell you which vendor’s implementation model most reliably converts that technology into outcomes for your organization. That’s the gap this map fills.
If you’re evaluating a ProcureTech investment and your vendor sits above the 4.0 line, the message is not don’t buy. The message is don’t deploy without Phase 0 intervention. Assess your organizational readiness before the technology arrives. Because the technology has never been better. And the ability to convert capability into outcomes has never been more unevenly distributed.
A Score That Changes When Reality Does
The Hansen Fit Score™ is not a static ranking. It’s a living instrument. Scores change as new evidence accumulates — new client wins, new retention data, new implementation outcomes, new acquisitions, new organizational readiness programs. A vendor that adopts Phase 0 thinking should see their score improve. A vendor that bolts on more technology without improving implementation alignment should see their gap widen.
That feedback loop is the structural differentiator. Analyst firms publish annually and the rankings decay from the moment they’re released. The Hansen Fit Score™ responds to behavioral change. That’s not a ranking. That’s a flywheel.
Starting in March 2026, the Hansen Fit Score™ Cross-Series Assessment will follow a quarterly release cadence — four scheduled updates (March, June, September, December) with the ability to issue a mid-quarter supplement when a material event warrants it. An acquisition like Coupa’s purchase of Scoutbee, a major implementation failure surfacing in the archives, a leadership change that restructures a vendor’s delivery model — these are the events that move scores, and the methodology should respond when the evidence arrives rather than waiting for the calendar. Quarterly cadence also aligns with how practitioners think: budget cycles, quarterly business reviews, and the decision windows where technology investments are actually evaluated. You don’t need twelve updates a year when scores move on evidence, not on schedule. And you don’t want two, because the market moves faster than that. Four releases plus event-driven supplements is the rhythm that matches the evidence cycle.
The full cross-series assessment document — including individual vendor scorecards across all five dimensions, methodology documentation, and the Convergence Chart analysis — is available through Procurement Insights. The SAP Ariba executive briefing series continues with the Phase 0 diagnostic roadmap.
The gap is the Achilles heel. Not the score.
Jon Hansen | Procurement Insights | Hansen Models™ | Hansen Fit Score™ Vendor Assessment Series
-30-
The SAP Ariba Briefing: What Steps You Can Take Now
The upcoming executive briefing on the SAP Ariba assessment isn’t a vendor pitch. It’s a diagnostic walkthrough — grounded in 18 years of longitudinal evidence and the Hansen Fit Score™ methodology — that will show practitioners what Phase 0 looks like in practice.
Specifically, the briefing will cover:
How to introduce Phase 0 thinking into your current SAP Ariba environment — not as a replacement for what you have, but as a diagnostic layer that surfaces what your current reporting can’t show you.
What the Hansen Fit Score™ assessment reveals about SAP Ariba’s trajectory across three corporate phases — and what that means for organizations currently on the platform.
What steps you can take to get an initiative back on track — because failed initiatives are not about technology. They are about alignment.
If the Procurement Director’s earlier observation resonates — if you’re in the “after-the-fact” position, whether it’s redirecting the ship or deciding whether to blow it up — this briefing is designed for exactly that moment.
SAP Ariba Executive Briefing (SINGLE SEAT) or SAP Ariba Executive Briefing (3-SEAT)
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