Outsourcing IT Procurement: Benefits, Examples, and Strategies

Providing employees with quality tech like computers, mobile devices, and accessories is a must for most of today's companies. However, because of the complexities and challenging logistics, this is often easier said than done. 

That’s why a growing number of businesses choose IT procurement outsourcing for their supply chain needs. 

What is IT Procurement Outsourcing?

IT procurement outsourcing involves using a third-party provider to obtain IT assets, where they handle vendor selection, purchasing agreements, contract negotiation, logistics, and supplier relationship management. 

Rather than handling IT procurement in-house, which takes time, resources, and know-how, a procurement outsourcing service is hands-off and allows you to focus on core business activities. 

The end result is that your team is supplied with the tech they need without any heavy lifting on your end. 

Procurement Outsourcing Benefits

Access to Expert Strategic Sourcing

At first glance, buying IT assets and distributing them to your team may sound pretty straightforward. But when you’re actually doing it — especially at scale — you’ll quickly realize that it’s often more complicated than you may have thought. 

Simply finding reputable vendors with quality products is a tall task in and of itself. 

And when you factor in procurement costs, evolving tech markets, contract negotiation, shipping IT to remote workers, asset management, and vendor management, it’s more than many business owners care to deal with. 

But when you partner with a procurement specialist, you instantly gain access to in-depth expertise that’s hard for the average internal procurement department to replicate. 

From their intimate knowledge of the current tech market and cutting-edge trends to supplier knowledge and logistics expertise, an external provider brings a lot to the table. 

They eat, sleep, and breathe global IT procurement, and can use their knowledge to help you: 

• Choose a reputable supplier
• Find the best deals
• Negotiate contracts to get the best terms
• Handle supplier management
• Make better IT sourcing decisions
• Fine-tune your IT procurement strategy

If the thought of handling IT procurement and supply chain management yourself sounds overwhelming, working with a business process outsourcing partner can be a smart choice. 

Less Workload for Internal Teams

As mentioned earlier, outsourced procurement is a hands-off approach that frees up much of your time so you can zero in on core business tasks rather than being hassled with procurement operations. 

With simple IT procurement projects typically taking two months to complete and more complex ones ranging from six to 10 months, doing it in-house can be a major source of distraction and a time drain. 

If you’re a small company without a dedicated procurement team, this can be especially problematic. 

However, by using an indirect procurement service provider, this can result in dramatically less workload for your business. 

Outsourcing procurement functions allows you to conveniently get the right tech into your team members’ hands without having to meticulously handle everything yourself. 

If having more “bandwidth” is a top priority of yours, or you simply lack the manpower for effective procurement, a procurement outsourcing company is likely your best bet.

Reduced Procurement Risks

By “risks,” we’re referring to three in particular — unreliable vendors, compliance risks, and security vulnerabilities.

Whatever type of IT assets you need, there is a wide range of vendors out there, with each claiming professionalism and reliability. But at the end of the day, not every vendor is as reputable as they say. 

If you’re handling direct procurement on your own, it’s hard to know who’s legitimate and who’s not. 

Best-case scenario, if you make the wrong decision, you may get poor products and service. Worst case scenario, you end up sourcing from a fly-by-night operation, which can have devastating consequences. 

In terms of compliance risks, this refers to failing to be compliant with industry regulations such as data privacy laws and software licensing. As you probably know, these types of violations can come with stiff penalties, including fines and even legal repercussions. 

And that’s the last thing you want to deal with when you’re trying to grow your business. 

When it comes to security vulnerabilities, there’s always a risk when integrating computers, accessories, and devices into your workforce. 

Things like incorrect pre-configuration, unintentionally sharing sensitive information with vendors or employees, and poorly enforced security protocols, where it’s easy to gain unauthorized access, are all major concerns.

Fortunately, partnering with a professional service provider significantly reduces your risk in all three of these areas. 

That’s because they have a strong understanding of vendor reputation, often with strong existing relationships. 

They know the ins and outs and nuances of industry regulations and software licensing laws. And they bake cybersecurity into their business model, so you have peace of mind with outsourced procurement. 

Greater Procurement Efficiency

In addition, you can expect significantly greater efficiency with outsourced procurement activities for three main reasons. 

First, procurement service providers have existing workflows in place to streamline the procurement process. 

For example, they already have supplier relationships, which allow them to find the perfect IT assets for your company without having to perform extensive research like you’d have to if you did it in-house. 

This overlaps with the second reason for greater efficiency, which is accelerated procurement time. 

Because procurement outsourcing professionals have suppliers at the ready, you can rapidly distribute IT assets to your workforce because you skip supplier evaluation, procurement planning, and other meticulous procurement activities. 

Third, most IT procurement professionals have already undergone contract negotiations with each supplier. 

As a result, this eliminates much of the back-and-forthing that companies handling procurement in-house experience, which also contributes to greater operational efficiency. 

Put it all together, and procurement outsourcing lets you get more done in less time with zero wasted effort. 

IT Outsourcing Example

Here’s what outsourcing procurement could involve in a real-world setting. 

A third-party provider would help you select the perfect mix of desktops, laptops, mobile devices, accessories, and so on, to accommodate the unique needs of your team. 

They would select an appropriate supplier—one who’s reputable, reliable, and offers the best value for what you’re looking for. 

Procurement specialists would take care of contract management to ensure you get favorable terms that match your organization’s goals. 

Outsourcing partners would create kits based on the specific tasks of each worker and handle things like pre-configuring IT assets before they ship out, managing cybersecurity, as well as overseeing software licensing. 

They would also handle logistics and communication, both with vendors and employees, to ensure IT assets reach your workforce in a timely manner, while answering any questions that may arise. 

They would supervise supplier performance to ensure the terms and conditions in the contract are honored and that there are no supply chain disruptions. 

Additionally, they would take care of future IT procurement outsourcing when the original assets become outdated and need to be replaced. 

IT Procurement and Outsourcing Strategies

At this point, it’s clear that outsourcing procurement offers some impressive benefits. But before officially making the move to hire an IT procurement service, you’ll want to have some strategies in place to ensure everything goes smoothly. 

There are three main components to an outsourcing strategy. 

One is determining which specific IT assets need to be outsourced. For instance, maybe you only need to send laptops to remote employees, a fairly straightforward procurement function. 

Or, maybe you have more robust needs and require a full suite of IT assets like laptops, tablets, mobile devices, and other accessories. 

Two is setting concrete objectives that can be measured with quantifiable data. Examples could include increasing procurement and deployment speed by 25% or boosting employee productivity by 10%.

It’s important to use specific numbers so you know how effective procurement outsourcing is and so you can compare it to where you were before partnering with a third-party. 

Three is identifying specific KPIs you’ll use to see how well the results of procurement activities align with your objectives. 

When measuring procurement and deployment speed, you could look at the procurement cycle time, comparing it with pre- and post-procurement services. 

To measure employee productivity, you could look at employee task completion rate and the percentage of project deadlines that are met. 

Outsourcing Laptop Procurement, Storage, and Retrieval

While there is a wide range of IT assets companies may need to procure for their workforce, one of the most common is a laptop. In fact, one study found that 97% of people use either a laptop or a desktop for work.

Therefore, laptop procurement, along with storage and retrieval, is naturally one of the most popular services offered by procurement experts. 

But besides just finding optimal laptops for workers, a procurement outsourcing provider can also manage IT inventory, so you always know what you have on hand at all times and what’s being stored from one convenient dashboard. 

And when an employee leaves or is fired, an IT procurement service can also handle laptop retrieval, where they send a retrieval kit with a box, packing supplies, a shipping label, and instructions. 

That way, the entire process is taken care of from start to finish, so you don’t have to worry about the logistics and complexities. 

And as many companies can attest to—especially those with largely remote teams—this can be a far more efficient and cost-effective route than doing it in-house. 

Automate Your Outsourcing IT Procurement with allwhere

If outsourcing procurement sounds like the right fit for your company, you’re likely wondering what the next step is. One of the top IT procurement services that many businesses have had success with is allwhere.

We pride ourselves on providing companies with an ultra simple way to procure IT assets and seamlessly distribute them to team members all over the world. 

We specialize in global procurement and only partner with highly reputable vendors. Through our relationships, we can supply you with the exact equipment you need, including computers, monitors, accessories, and mobile devices. 

Simply create your kit and we’ll take care of the rest. From end-to-end logistics to vendor communication to employee communication, we’ve got it covered. 

And when it comes to storage and retrieval, we can handle that as well. We offer simple asset retrieval via a one-time kit for a single laptop, as well as bulk retrievals, and can get most items back within one week. 

All the while, you can easily track your IT assets in one convenient platform and monitor the status at all times. 

Get a full rundown on how allwhere works here.

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