Category: Blog

In today’s competitive business environment, business leaders are constantly on the lookout for innovative new ways to reduce costs while maintaining quality and efficiency. No company can be expected to fulfill its goals on its own – this is where Cannon Group’s retained sourcing process comes in.

Our retained sourcing process analyzes the present state of your company’s expenditures. We monitor what you buy, from whom, and at what price. Then we make suggestions and hold vendor negotiations to ensure that your company has the services it needs and is getting exactly what it pays for. Retained sourcing happens before any purchase has been made and any contract is signed.

This process is extremely beneficial to business leaders who need to put their focus on other key initiatives within the organization and return to doing what they do best: building the success of their companies.

Let’s look further into what major benefits leaders can expect from the retained sourcing process.

Cost Reduction

It’s no secret that every business would like to be able to cut costs where it can. Retained sourcing gives ultimate visibility into the current state of the company’s spend while continuously taking complex factors into account. It eliminates the risk of the potentially high cost of opinion when making decisions. Businesses can expect to pay only for what they need after undergoing our retained sourcing process. Organizations can use this information to make more informed decisions about their cash flow and the services they are paying into. 

Employee expenditures can also be reduced or even occasionally eliminated, as there may not be a need for a full-time IT team in every organization. Retained sourcing allows for the consolidation of purchasing power to secure the best price available to the company.

Increased Knowledge

Sourcing services from outside an organization brings in the benefit of added expertise from the vendor. When IT is managed in house, a company’s IT services are usually put on the shoulders of one employee or a small team to complete. It’s difficult for one IT manager or team to be experts on everything that encompasses IT. Our retained sourcing process connects you with the right vendor, or vendors, to provide enhanced business knowledge in any relevant area. 

Minimized Risk

The retained sourcing process analyzes overall spend with current suppliers. Quality and financial risks are easily identified, and measures can be taken to avoid the risk. By building trusted relationships with vendors, organizations can ensure any problems are quickly identified and dealt with.

Continuous Improvements

This is a continuous process. As the retained sourcing process cycles, stakeholders learn about additional opportunities to improve and bring more value to the company. This helps leadership to identify future development opportunities that may not be apparent at first and ensures the company stays competitive in the market.

In today’s world, organizations of all sizes need a powerful sourcing process to stay relevant and deliver significant benefits to the business.

Looking to streamline your sourcing process? 

Fill out this form to request a quote and get started! We will get back to you within 48 hours. 

As business leaders, you’re busy and expect your contracts to give you the best resources while maximizing savings – we get that. That’s why Cannon Group follows a strategic process when dealing with your retained sourcing needs. We do all the market research, big requests, contract exchanging, and signature chasing for you. With our specialized process, you’re backed by our highly-knowledgeable, dedicated team of negotiators to ensure you always get exactly what you expect from your contracts. 

With our skilled team and proven process, we can confidently say that you will always see savings to your contract spend. You’ll have our dedicated team behind you throughout the entire process with Cannon Group.

Each retained sourcing engagement is led by a Senior Negotiator who acts as the point of contact between vendors and your dedicated Senior Analyst. To streamline the process, your project is always kept on track by a dedicated Project Manager. Finally, our executive team oversees everything and adds expertise as needed. 

Discovery

Because no two businesses are alike, helping you source your needs starts with learning about your goals and requirements. This step allows for the creation of appropriate criteria that will be used when selecting the right vendor. 

We do this by participating in a highly detailed discovery session. 

At Cannon Group, we pride ourselves on getting the most in-depth view to make the most informed decisions. We factor in your budget, current environment, where your costs are, what your current business initiatives are, where you’d like to be, and many other variables relevant to your sourcing needs. Learning about your business allows us to gain visibility into the resources you are currently paying for and where this spend is going. One we fully understand your needs, we use this information to outline the right criteria to select the best partner for your business. 

Strategy Session

People are often shocked by how in-depth and thorough our strategy sessions are. To get the best price, you have to act on the best information. 

We research where the current market is and why people are moving to it. We touch on your pain points, review your current vendors, and address the problems (if any) associated with them. A criterion is created from this information that vendors must fit into to be considered. Your sourcing strategy may mean changing vendors. Cannon Group offers guidance and suggestions in this area to assist you through the decision-making process.

Evaluation and Selection

The process of selecting a vendor involves multiple rounds of negotiations. 

Cannon group creates a bid sheet and manages the complete bidding process and communication with vendors – no matter how many rounds it takes. A request for proposal (RFP) may be sent out to potential vendors to create a “short-list”. Those vendors who are short-listed will be interviewed or asked for clarification as needed to further narrow down the list. 

During the retained sourcing process, multiple rounds of read-outs will take place. Cannon Group receives the bids, presents them to your stakeholders, and receives feedback to take to the vendors. Through this, our team guides you to choose the best vendor that fits the agreed upon criteria.

Contract Negotiation

Once all proposals are reviewed and a vendor is chosen, we then request contracts to be sent in from the selected vendor. Contracts are then thoroughly reviewed with key stakeholders. Through our years of experience, we know that these contracts are more than likely incorrect the first time around. Cannon Group never overlooks any of these factors. We handle all the back and forth with the vendor, engage legal, and redline the terms and conditions to ensure you are getting exactly what you need with full transparency. 

Signature

Once contracts are done, of course, they must be signed. Gone are the days when constant follow-ups are needed to secure a signature. Let our team do the signature chasing for you to get your contracts closed in a timely manner, allowing your organization to look forward and continue to thrive.

Trust Cannon Group

The goal of sourcing is to select the vendor that will become your business’ new partner—not only to help you achieve your goals but to elevate them as well. The sourcing process is time-consuming and confusing to those unfamiliar with the ins and outs of vendor negotiation. As you know, Cannon Group takes things off your plate. Trust us with all your retained sourcing needs, so you can get back to doing what you’re good at—helping your business succeed.

Request a Quote on Your Next Sourcing Project

Fill out the form below to request a quote on your next sourcing project, whether your sourcing needs are on a retained or a one-off basis. An expert in our sourcing department will review your information and get back to you within 24 hours asking to set up a meeting and discuss the sourcing project further in order to give you a more in-depth quote. Thank you.

Sourcing has become a critical tool for all businesses to reduce the time and money spent on operations. In turn, more resources can be dedicated to strategic business initiatives. Effective sourcing and negotiations play a crucial role in protecting the business from unfavorable contracts, high pricing, and support charges. Sourcing bridges the gap between strategy and execution. You can’t afford to get it wrong.

 Sourcing and negotiating your IT and contracts is a delicate task. The wide array of services offered within IT, such as telecom, hardware, routers, oracle applications, and software development, make sourcing for your IT needs a highly complex process. You want to be sure you’re finding vendors who will provide outstanding resources and service while staying within your budget.

This can become overwhelming when negotiating deals with vendors that have superior product knowledge and experience. This is where Cannon Group comes in.

We have a team of expert negotiators that will work on your behalf

Sourcing and contract negotiation shouldn’t feel like putting out fires. The Cannon Group team possesses expert knowledge of telecom, cloud technology, hardware, TEM, and data centers. With years of building trusted relationships with vendors, we can walk the walk and talk the talk, ensuring you get the best pricing and resources every time. With Cannon Group, you can expect market-leading pricing, terms, and conditions to ensure maximized savings. Our team guides you through a retained sourcing process that will ultimately match you with the technology solution you’ve been searching for. 

Our strategic process can be applied to multiple contract types 

We realize software, hardware, IT, and telecom deals all have their own set of characteristics, and so does your business. We’ve developed a standardized process that works across multiple areas. The retained sourcing process starts with a session in which our team conducts a series of interviews to identify the requirements of the contract. From this point, we match you with the necessary vendor with the right tools for your business. We then conduct a strategy session where we develop an action plan customized to your unique needs. After multiple rounds of read-outs and comprehensive feedback from both your team and ours, contracts are drawn, and Cannon Group takes care of the hard part on your behalf: vendor communication, legal, and finally, the signature chasing. Our team gives you visibility every step of the way, showing you the resources you will be given and exactly what you will be paying for.

When our team partnered with an Energy Industry Firm, we were able to complete the sourcing process 45 days sooner than was projected, positioning the client to quickly deploy the new software and portal platform to be used by their industry partners.

We deliver cost savings that you can count on

We bring results quicker. Companies that use Cannon Group for their retained sourcing process reliably score 20% savings on IT spend. Our team has a flawless eye for detail. If you worry you may not be able to spot errors when they occur, don’t worry: we will. Better contracts mean better fees, and more profit for your business.

The team at Cannon Group doesn’t promise to be an-end-all-be-all solution, but we do promise a dedicated relationship to help you find the right solutions for you and your enterprise. At Cannon Group, we believe in taking things off your business’ hands to focus on more strategic initiatives.

Trust your retained sourcing process to our team of experts at Cannon Group.