As the procurement function evolves, new phrases and concepts enter the minds of people wanting to improve their teams and align with business goals. Trending themes include ‘Intake’ and ‘Procurement Orchestration’. Knowing the difference between these notions is crucial to taking use of their strategic advantages—and ideally both—as they are commonly confused.
Both models have separate but related procurement ecosystem goals. They can cover procurement efficiency, risk reduction, user experience, and strategic business alignment. Help us separate these two ideas.
How is intake defined?
Centralised purchase request intake and dynamic routing collect and organise all the information procurement needs to execute a procedure.
It is a’single front door’ to all procurement activities, including sourcing, contracts, vendor onboarding, and buy requests. Intake quickly takes requesters through the right phases, enabling engagement with all procurement stakeholders.
By providing a user-friendly and efficient intake portal, the process becomes more enticing and widely embraced by employees, and it automatically assures compliance with comprehensive procurement laws.
Intake streamlines the approval process and procurement advancement by automating and directing inquiries to IT, legal, privacy, and other stakeholders.
Procurement Orchestration
However, Procurement Orchestration is the whole procurement strategy that goes beyond request intake.
The coordination of all procurement-related operations from Intake-to-Pay ensures transparency and coordination. Procurement Orchestration gives procurement executives full insight and control over the process even as stakeholders spread duties.
Procurement Orchestration improves efficiency and positions procurement as a key player in strategic business goals by facilitating collaboration and integration of disparate processes across the organisation and using AI for process guidance and improvements.
| Intake | Procurement Orchestration | |
| Define | The initial purchase request processing phase.A complete procurement plan from intake to payment. | Increasing procurement lifecycle efficiency, visibility, control, and alignment. |
| Focus | Making procurement requests easier | Increasing procurement lifecycle efficiency, visibility, control, and alignment. |
| Key function | FunctionProvides a ‘single front door’ for procurement requests, assuring compliance and routing | Manages all procurement efforts to ensure stakeholder and tool integration. |
| Strategic importance | Manages requests efficiently and easily. | Promotes efficiency and continual improvement by making procurement a strategic partner. |
Strategic advantage: procurement orchestration
Procurement teams have traditionally been slowed by manual, laborious tasks throughout the cycle.
From the first Intake request to vendor selection, purchase orders, and invoice processing, these procedures are repetitious, administrative, and seldom strategic.
This hinders efficiency and the procurement department’s capacity to achieve organisational goals.
Integration of self-service Intake into a larger Procurement Orchestration network changes procurement from being quicker to wiser, more strategic, and more aligned with the company’s bottom line.
By automating ‘busywork,’ teams can focus on key efforts that save money, innovate, and compete.
Procurement Orchestration guarantees that this strategic activity is part of a company-wide procurement strategy that accelerates results and amplifies impact:
- Automation improves productivity by reducing cycle times, enabling procurement teams to respond more rapidly and adapt to organisational demands.
- Prioritising strategic activities: Procurement experts may focus on high-ROI tasks like strategic sourcing of multi-million dollar contracts that make a difference without administrative hassles.
- Improved stakeholder engagement: Intake lets workers make procurement requests simply and follow them live. This enhances user experience and creates a collaborative organised environment where procurement is a vital partner in company goals.
- Decision-making using data: Platforms with AI-powered analytics give procurement directors immediate insights into spending trends, supplier performance, and process bottlenecks.
Looking ahead to procurement
The procurement function is changing in the future era, and the market category is adapting.
AI-powered insights and process automations provide unparalleled opportunity to increase efficiency, compliance, and company-wide strategic leverage. These tools let procurement teams focus on high-value strategic initiatives that get them a seat at the table.
Procurement can optimise every dollar and minute spent from Intake-to-Pay by understanding how Intake Management and Procurement Orchestration vary and strategically align.
Thus, procurement executives should implement these techniques and seek out new technologies and methods to boost procurement’s strategic value.
They will optimise their procurement procedures and better understand procurement as a driver of corporate value and strategic growth.
