E-Procurement in Government and Public Sector

Public procurement is the act of buying or purchasing of goods and services by government or public entities that involve considerable fundings, investments and plays a vital role in driving marketplace.

Over the last few decades, public sector procurement has increasingly adopted innovations in multiple areas. This consists of policy making and management, procurement regulations, authorization and appropriations, and procurement functions in operations with a cautious approach to management and implementation of procurement policies. Due to increasing pressure on budgets, governments are looking at ways to better use the money they spend on public goods, services and infrastructure to achieve the best value-for-money for taxpayers and much emphasis has been placed on better and more strategic public procurement laws, policies and practices.

However, since it is traditionally considered an administrative function of governments, much public procurement initiatives and agendas have remained compliance driven and not highly innovative, compared to private sector procurement. In this, the most challenging part is the implementation of well-thought agendas and innovative initiatives.

Some of the key areas that government organizations can optimize to align seamless adoption of innovation and key initiatives to stay relevant and continue to provide value-driven citizen-centric services can be:

1. The Regulatory and Legal Framework

For public sector procurement officers and buyers, they need to be able to engage in a transparent, open dialogue with suppliers. The public procurers and buyers tend to be naturally risk-averse and often indicate that laws and regulations do not allow for such dialogue.

A solid legal and compliance framework is essential to ensure transparency, fair competition and non-discrimination practices are brought in and sustained in every procurement agenda, irrespective of scale and size.

ELIT is procurement software for Government sector that offers a robust regulatory compliance and audit workflow that tracks, monitors and maintains communications and processes throughout entire procurement lifecycle.

2. The Cost-Justification

Discussions centred around costs of procuring goods & services typically face considerable resistance to considering an item, solution or process that appears costlier than the business-as-usual alternative. From public sector’s point-of-view, this is in line with the principle of value-for-money, however, it is important to take a life-cycle or total-cost-of-ownership approach to a procurement initiative. Often, this is where, public sector entities fall behind in considering actual and realistic costs involved in procurement decisions and would need a strong technology-driven approach and methods to ensure the complete picture throughout the entire lifecycle is maintained.

What is essentially lacking is access to the right information that enables public sector agencies to make a better business case. If this information is not available, public-sector buyers and decision makers need to be able to use tools available to extract that information from the market via the bidding process.

ELIT eSourcing & eSupplier modules enable organizations to create, track, monitor, analyze and make informed decisions on cost-efficient and value-driven procurement. As one of the best-fit procurement software for public sectors, this helps to drive better discussions around costs, provide accurate and total picture on the actual spends and ensure procurement and delivery compliance for optimal business justification and value.

3. The Buyer Expertise

To ensure a resilient and justified procurement, public sector buyers need to ensure they are well-versed in the following key areas:

• Supplier Engagements
• Performance-driven tendering and supplier collaborations
• Order compliance based on effective supplier performance metrics.

ELIT, through is comprehensive solution suite of procurement software for government sector, provides the channel mix for an effective procurement lifecycle with:

• Real-time internal and external collaborations
• Performance metrics and Analytic dashboards
• Contract and regulatory compliance tracking

ELIT helps address some of the unique challenges in Government sector procurement in following key areas:

Effectiveness:

• Operational Transformation
• Strategic Sourcing & Supplier Management
• Category Management
• Supplier & Procurement Analytics

Engagements:

• Supply Chain Transparency
• Supplier Collaborations
• Logistics Management
• Real-time communications.

Efficiencies:

• Spend Analytics & Cost Reduction
• Category Utilization
• Supplier Performances
• KPI and Metrics Optimization

ELIT identifies three key areas where successful procurement functions strike the right balance between short-term cost reduction and long-term optimization to drive efficiency and profitability.