How I Eliminated $200K in Procurement Waste

The Challenge​​:

Field crews could request a PO with little information and make purchases without consistent approval or documentation. This made it difficult to understand what was being purchased, why it was purchased, or whether the purchase matched what was ultimately delivered.
 

The problems showed up across the organization:

• No purchasing controls

• Duplicate purchases and invoice errors

• Poor visibility into job costs

• Field crews losing time due to poor material planning

• Accounting buried in reconciliation work
   

The financial waste was visible, but I found that the underlying problem wasn't simply spending. The process itself needed to be redesigned.

The Goal

I focused on four outcomes:

• Build a structured procure-to-pay process

• Eliminate unnecessary spending

• Deliver accurate job-cost data

• Get field crews the right materials faster
   

This meant changing both the system and how people worked within it, not just introducing another policy.

​

​MY Role

​I led the project end-to-end. That meant designing the process, configuring the ERP system, and most importantly, getting the field crews to actually use it. I reported to the CEO and CFO, but my real partner was the field manager Chris. Without his buy-in, nothing would stick.
 

What I Led​
I approached the project in four phases:
 

Discover

I mapped the existing purchasing process from beginning to end and spoke with stakeholders across leadership, accounting, and field operations. The goal was not just to document what people were doing. I wanted to understand why the problems were happening and where the process was breaking down.

Design

I designed a procurement model that separated stock items from direct purchases and introduced a three-way matching process: PO → Receiver → Invoice. This gave Accounting a much stronger way to validate purchases and reduced manual reconciliation.

Build

I helped establish the company's first item master using vendor part numbers in ComputerEase. I also worked through system configuration, tax codes, approval logic, workflows, item setup, and purchasing controls. When I found a tax configuration bug (local rates were not linked to state rates), I diagnosed the issue and fixed it alongside our system admin rather than just reporting it.
Lead the Change

The process would not succeed if the field did not adopt it. I partnered with field leadership to roll out the new process, created SOPs, conducted training, and worked through resistance from crews.

I stopped pushing the form and started pushing the purpose. I showed crews that the $200K waste was money that could fund raises and equipment. Then I partnered with Chris to make receiver submission part of their weekly meeting structure, so accountability came from their own team, not from the office.

Outcome

The numbers:

• $200,000 annual waste eliminated

• 100% of POs now require a documented quote

• 70% less time spent on invoice reconciliation

• 90%+ receiver compliance within 60 days
   

The bigger wins:

• The company has reliable job-costing data for the first time

• Vendors get paid accurately and on time

• Field crews stopped seeing it as "my process" and started seeing it as "how things work"

• A scalable foundation for future growth
   

​What I Learned​

Before this project, I assumed a well-designed process would sell itself. I was wrong. The three-way match was technically sound, but the field crews did not care about technical soundness. They cared about their time and their pay.

​

Adoption is not about enforcement. It is about framing. When I connected the change to something they actually cared about, raises and equipment, resistance turned into ownership. The workflow did not change. The framing did.

​

I also learned to verify system configurations before go-live. A broken tax table can silently undermine the whole process.