Bridging Business Gaps Through Reflective Procurement
Kelly Barner from Art of Procurement discusses procurement with our founder.
Harnessing AI in Procurement: Can we revolutionize Resource Efficiency and Strategy Execution?
Revolutionize your procurement process with AI. From automating routine tasks to enhancing strategic decision-making, can AI transform procurement into a more efficient and insightful function.
Thomas Njor
Oct 27, 2024
Many times, procurement is viewed as “just” a back office cost center, with its employees being so overburdened with operational duties that they fail to fulfill their strategic role of creating significant company value and
competitive advantage. As tasks keep on mushrooming and resources are not likely to be added to the procurement toolbox any time soon, we must explore leveraging artificial intelligence (AI) across our procurement landscape to substitute for resources and bring in new perspectives that were unthinkable only a few years ago. We firmly see AI as a very strong supportive tool across a multitude of areas within the procurement landscape.
Examples of applications of AI in Procurement
- Invest in Analytics: Through in-depth examination of procurement data, artificial intelligence (AI) offers a new degree of insight into expenditure patterns by indicating potential for savings and more successful supplier negotiations. For this reason, at @costbits.com, AI is an essential part of our technology.
- Management and Selection of Suppliers: AI supports more informed supplier selection and management decisions by expanding supplier evaluation beyond simple metrics to include risk analysis, compliance monitoring, and expanded evaluations of performance.
- Administration of Contracts: AI accelerates the entire contract management process, from drafting to execution, by extracting essential information, safeguarding compliance, and recognizing contracts that are about to expire.
- Demand Forecasting: By utilizing past data, artificial intelligence (AI) estimates procurement requirements in greater detail, estimating inventory levels and potentially reducing expenses related to stock deviations.
- Risk Management: AI’s inherent predictive powers are also applicable to risk assessment. By examining supplier health, geopolitical developments, and market patterns, it may spot possible procurement challenges and assist in preventing them early on.
- Process Automation: By eliminating manual errors and freeing up staff time for strategic initiatives, Intelligent Process Automation (IPA) takes on some of the duties of standard procurement operations like order formulation and invoice processing.
- Personalized Purchasing: AI raises efficiency and user satisfaction by personalizing the buying process by offering customized recommendations based on prior purchases and preferences. This effect we have seen externally for years in the B2C sphere, but it is now also finally starting to appear in the internal buying processes.
- Supervisory Quality: AI quality control employs video and image analysis to find defects or deviations in products, ensuring that only those that meet the greatest requirements are granted approval.
- Eco-Friendly Purchasing: By assessing suppliers, materials, and logistics for environmental and social governance (ESG) compliance and encouraging ethical procurement practices, artificial intelligence (AI) helps organizations achieve their sustainability goals. We already leverage this within our Scope I-II-III module in @CostBits, but we are also now starting to see this being used in the market assessment processes.
- Virtual assistants and chatbots: AI-powered assistants help suppliers and procurement teams in real-time by streamlining transactional processes and reacting to inquiries quickly.
Prioritizing areas with the greatest potential for impact and return on investment is essential when integrating AI into procurement. Begin by determining which operations require a great deal of human labor, are prone to errors, or consume a considerable amount of time. Automation of these processes can result in immediate cost and efficiency gains. To further increase the strategic value of procurement, concentrate on using AI to support strategic decision-making processes like risk management and supplier selection.
Integration and data quality are important factors in leveraging technology, and the same obviously goes for the deployment of AI in Procurement. For AI systems to produce accurate insights, comprehensive, high-quality data is required. For AI to be implemented successfully, data integrity and efficient connections into current procurement systems should be provided.
Lastly, aspects of change management and culture must also be taken into account. For a range of reasons, like “will AI take over my job?” there is likely to be opposition to the use of AI in the procurement process. A respectful but effective transition into leveraging AI in Procurement can be achieved by offering training, support, and clear information about the advantages of AI while also proactively addressing the fears that users will have with any new toolbox.
Forward-Looking: AI’s Role in Procurement
The introduction of AI into procurement signals the beginning of a new phase of effectiveness, strategic consciousness, and value creation. AI technologies have the potential to transform procurement processes as well as outcomes, as long as we diligently apply AI where it has the most impact for the company. Procurement teams that adopt AI can stimulate development and achieve a competitive edge by optimizing both their present operations as well as establishing themselves as strategic partners inside their companies.
Along the way, it is going to be important to think of AI as an enhancing tool rather than a replacement, using its powers to support human judgment and knowledge. Artificial intelligence (AI) and human insight working together in balance to create a more strategic, effective, and influential procurement function is where procurement is going to be in the future.