The Order Management Playbook

Cut inventory costs and optimize staffing with better order data

91% of buying organizations don’t get the data they need from trading partners to determine the status of an order

Why do buying organizations need better data from trading partners? Without the right data from trading partners, buying organizations can’t tell if there is a problem with an order until it is too late. Because buying organizations don’t have the insight they need on order statuses, many of them often hold more inventory than they actually need to prevent running out of stock, hire additional staff to contact their trading partners to manage order updates and guess about how much open-to-buy budget they actually have.

What are the challenges of executing a data exchange program yourself?

Often, buying organizations underestimate the amount of time and resources required for getting data from trading partners. For example, it takes 3 to 5 attempts per trading partner to find the right contact via phone or email.

How does leveraging a service provider help?

A full-service team includes experts to plan the supply chain initiative, a team dedicated to vendor outreach, as well as technology experts that enable automated data exchange.

What results can buying companies achieve?

With the right data from trading partners, buying organizations can plan and execute a seamless warehouse plan as soon as products arrive. This results in a million-dollar impact for many businesses.

“After 14 years, having less than a quarter of our supplier network connected was frustrating. We’d had the technology in place all that time, but SPS brought us a solution – a change management solution, as well as the technology. Manually reconciling orders, order changes, delivery notifications, and invoices is a huge task that, these days, should be handled digitally.”

– Michael Bignell, Head of Operations Planning, Sigma Healthcare