Purchasing Intranet Portal

Business Challenge

The Purchasing Department of a global organisation had the need to distribute policy, guidelines, commercially sensitive information and documentation within the world-wide Purchasing Community.

It was difficult and time consuming for the Purchasing Community to exchange Contract and Pricing information to other Territories within the business. As a result, Contracts and Pricing information involving the purchase of similar products and services were not readily available for use or for comparison between Territories.

A Purchasing Intranet Portal was required to make this information readily available to the business’s Purchasing Community. The Solution had to be:

• Simple and intuitive to use
• Easy to manage i.e. it had to be easy to add new documents or remove old documents
• Secure due to the commercial sensitivity of the information
• Access rights only to designated individuals based on job function and seniority within Purchasing and Management
• Flexible in that documents and information in various formats would be added
• Multilingual - Able to handle information and documentation in the world's major languages including Spanish, Portuguese, Japanese, German, Swedish, etc.
• Online Training available (Help and other useful documentation)
• Robust and able to be accessed globally

Solution

The Portal was built using a commercially available collaboration and community product at its core. Project activities included:

• Project management from initiation through to operations
• Documentation of Purchasing Requirements
• Defined Purchasing reporting requirements - ensured delivery of daily, weekly and monthly reports to key Purchasing and management individuals
• Graphical designs and storyboarding of Purchasing Portal
• Building a prototype Intranet site and Beta site for demonstration and review
• Installation of functionality onto Staging & Production Environments
• Definition and Implementation of Security
• Specified and carried out testing from unit through to full end-to-end testing
• Writing of Training and Online Help documentation
• Defined operational support agreements and ensured site operational support
• Provided Site Administrator Training

Business Benefits

On the successful completion of this project, the Purchasing Community and the business enjoyed a number of benefits not previously available including:

• Global Standard - A global standardisation of the Purchasing function within the organisation was achieved
• Contract & Pricing Information - Purchasing Contract and Pricing information was readily available to the Purchasing Community across the company
• Best Price - Purchasing was able to achieve more advantageous pricing
• Reuse of Contracts - Reuse of Contracts already in place in another territories resulted in significant Legal and Purchasing Department cost savings as the Contracts would only require ‘localisation’ to meet the requirements of each country
• Reduced Research Time - Online availability of pricing and other information save on Purchasing Department research
• Stronger Negotiating Position - Negotiation position improved from knowing the cost of similar products or services in other territories
• Focal Point - A focal point for Purchasing, providing a central platform for announcements, initiatives, policies and procedures, etc.
• Improved Communication - Improved communication and co-ordination of Purchasing information to the Purchasing community
• Cost Saving - Cost saving to Purchasing staff, through the online availability of Contracts, Pricing Information, Contact Information, FAQs, etc.
• Cost Avoidance - Through reduced administrative overheads in collating and maintaining the documentation and information centrally, i.e. avoidance of multiple copies and versions of key contracts and documents
• Increased Efficiency - Efficiency increase, cost saving and global standardisation achieved by carrying out and managing the Purchasing function online