Importance Of Dashboards In Procurement

Procurement Dashboard What is it ?

Its a tool that allows you to monitor the most important metrics that are constantly  changing within your organization.

It should act as an ‘at a glance’ information center where you can see critical items that may start to need your attention – for example, if a specific supplier has just started to deliver your orders later than required then there may be a trend happening and that’s something you might need to know – similarly if a specific user’s requests are always being disapproved for purchase thats another trend indicating a possible fraud attempt ?

Obviously the more mundane aspects are constantly monitored – buyer throughput, savings, inefficiencies, deficiencies, volumes, timeliness etc  all these aspects can be tracked and a summary displayed on a single customizable page that’s specific to your job function.

Even though there is no real standard for such a dashboard, any eprocurement system should have one –  The final functions of it depend on the specifics of your organization and the weight it puts behind certain aspects of its procurement function but in general you need to look for a solution that integrates well into your existing infrastructure, has access to the free flow of internal data, has a well understood generic interface that can be adapted and changed when required and that can communicate its metrics effectively and accurately.

For example, a busy line manager who does not need to know about the intricacies of the corporate procurement function might still need to know at a glance where his budgets stand, what approvals he still has outstanding to do, where his most important purchases are in the supply chain – if you give him and iphone/iPad screen tat displays this information and that is constantly updated – he will be able to keep his finger on the pulse of his departments procurement activities without know anything about the procurement function per se – and thats the point of an eprocurement dashboard.