6 ways Vertice drives ROI in your procurement process

Today, procurement is expected to do more than just save costs. Teams need to move faster, reduce risk, support better decisions, and give the business full visibility into what’s being purchased and why.

The problem is - most procurement processes aren’t built for that. Requests get lost or sit in inboxes, approvals get delayed, renewals are made hastily or without scrutiny. Often, teams might struggle to explain what’s happening or prove the value being added by a specific contract. 

This is where ROI can start to break down. Not because procurement isn’t adding value, but because there’s no reliable way to see, measure, or act on it.

This is what Vertice Intelligent Workflows helps solve. It provides teams with a clearer, faster, and more structured way to manage procurement from start to finish - so the value is visible, and nothing slips through the cracks.

Let’s examine how Intelligent Workflows drives ROI in procurement processes.

1. Cut cycle times

One of the clearest signs of procurement value is speed. Not just in getting deals done,  also in clearing bottlenecks without losing control.

Long cycle times usually stem from avoidable friction, such as:

• A stakeholder who doesn’t know who owns the next step
• Legal stuck waiting on information
• Finance needing context that’s buried in an email thread
• Procurement chasing different teams with no visibility

To remedy this, Intelligent Workflows orchestrates and helps automate the entire procurement process. Every step of the process is tracked in real time. Approval chains are automated, owners are clearly assigned, and actions are time-stamped. Teams can see where things are stuck and why.

Instead of waiting three weeks for Legal to pick up a contract, it gets routed as soon as the intake is submitted. Finance reviews happen in parallel. The stakeholder doesn’t need to ping procurement for updates because they already know what’s happening.

The result is faster movement through the procurement process without confusion, bottlenecks, or duplicated work.

2. Prevent last-minute renewals

When a renewal shows up two days before an auto-renew clause kicks in, the damage is already done. There’s no time to renegotiate, rethink the contract, or evaluate alternatives. It’s a missed opportunity, and a missed saving.

This happens not because procurement isn’t aware, but because there’s no system of record that brings everything together. Renewal dates aren’t made widely available, stakeholder context gets lost, and usage data isn’t surfaced in time to drive decisions.

With Intelligent Workflows, renewals are automatically flagged well in advance. Stakeholders are nudged with usage data, contract summaries, and prior pricing benchmarks. There’s time to revisit scope, consolidate tools, or open up a fresh RFP if needed. And with clear ownership captured at the point of intake, there’s no scramble to figure out who’s responsible.

As a result, renewal processes become less reactive and instead procurement teams are able to run proactive renewal motions. 

3. Assign clear ownership at every stage

When vendor ownership isn’t defined, procurement becomes the default - and the function ends up shouldering tasks it was never meant to own.

Is InfoSec chasing the Data Processing Agreement (DPA)? Is Finance waiting on usage validation? Is the stakeholder aware this renewal is even happening?

These questions create noise and confusion. And that turns into real cost - both in time and in missed accountability.

By capturing ownership directly at the intake, workflows give every task a clear owner. Every tool has a business stakeholder. Every approval has a named reviewer. Every stage has a timestamp.

That clarity cuts down back-and-forth, eliminates ambiguity, and ensures procurement is a strategic partner - not a babysitter.

4. Bring visibility to the full lifecycle, not just purchase

Most tooling in procurement focuses on the initial transaction: pricing, vendor onboarding, contract signature.

But the real cost drivers emerge after the fact, when no one knows where the contract lives, who’s using the tool, whether the terms are being met, or if renewal is even necessary.

Intelligent workflows create a continuous record that doesn’t stop at purchase.

Everything from intake to approval to renewal is logged and visible in one place. You see:

• When a tool was last reviewed
• Who approved it and why
• What usage has looked like since it went live
• Whether the vendor is hitting promised outcomes
  

That's how long-term value gets measured and that’s how procurement becomes more than a gatekeeper - it becomes a system of accountability.

5. Report the data that proves your value

For most teams, proving impact means manually pulling numbers from spreadsheets, email threads, and contract PDFs.

It’s time-consuming. It’s error-prone. And it’s the reason procurement ends up under-credited for the work it actually does.

Intelligent Workflows changes that by logging every action automatically — creating a live, structured record of activity across the process. That includes:

• Time to signature across categories
• Volume of requests completed
• Percentage of renewals renegotiated
• Average time to resolve blockers
• Stage-by-stage breakdowns of cycle time
  

When reporting is built into the work, value becomes visible by default. Finance doesn’t need to ask what procurement is delivering because the data is already there.

6. Reduce risk without slowing things down

Procurement teams walk a constant tightrope; they need to move fast enough to support the business, but carefully enough to avoid exposure.

When processes are manual or inconsistent, that balance collapses. Tools are purchased without compliance review. Contracts are signed before legal concerns are properly addressed—meaning potential risks get locked into the agreement. Vendors get onboarded without proper diligence. 

Without the right checks in place, risk starts creeping in early. Vendors are onboarded without proper diligence, legal concerns go unreviewed, and key terms slip through unnoticed. These gaps might not cause immediate issues, but they quietly chip away at the value of the agreement. Without structure or accountability, procurement ends up footing the cost later.

Intelligent Workflows embeds these controls from the start and restores the balance

DPAs, security reviews, and legal approvals are built into the automated workflow based on risk triggers. For example, a marketing tool might bypass InfoSec entirely, while a data platform automatically routes to security and compliance teams

This isn’t ticking boxes but gives stakeholders the path of least resistance - so they don’t find workarounds. The end result is lower risk, stronger compliance, and less friction.

Procurement ROI isn’t just about savings. It’s about structure.

Anyone can negotiate a discount. What’s often harder and more valuable is building a procurement function that drives clarity, efficiency, and accountability at scale.

That means moving past basic metrics and asking better questions:

• Are we making decisions fast enough?
• Are stakeholders engaged and informed?
• Are tools being adopted or just renewed by default?
• Do we know where our risk is hiding?
• Can we prove the value we add without scrambling?
  

The teams that can answer those questions are the ones showing real ROI.

The teams that are answering them are using Intelligent Workflows (link to case study).

Want to see how Intelligent Workflows can drive ROI in your procurement process? Book a demo >>