Overcoming User Adoption Barriers in Procurement: Why ORO Succeeds Where Others Fail

User adoption remains the critical success factor for any enterprise SaaS platform, but nowhere is this more evident than in the complex world of procurement technology.

Despite investing millions of dollars and many hours into sophisticated procurement platforms, organizations routinely struggle to achieve widespread adoption, often experiencing in the region of only a third of potential users actively adopting new platforms. Modern procurement orchestration platforms like ORO are breaking this pattern by addressing fundamental barriers to adoption.

Core Challenges Preventing Procurement Technology Adoption 

The Buyer–User Disconnect

The most significant barrier to adoption often lies in a fundamental mismatch between the individuals and teams selecting technology solutions, and the individuals intended to be the day-to-day users. In traditional procurement software implementations, IT departments and procurement executives make purchasing decisions based on feature checklists and compliance requirements, while end users – the employees that need to submit purchase requests, suppliers that must onboard onto the platform, and occasional users that interact with the system infrequently – find themselves struggling with complex interfaces designed for power users.

This disconnect creates what researchers often call “status quo bias,” where users resist changes due to their preference to stay with current tools and solutions. When employees are forced to use software that doesn’t align with their actual workflows, they naturally gravitate toward workarounds: email-based document sharing, and “maverick spending” that undermines the very compliance and efficiency goals that new software solutions were meant to solve.

Complexity that Overwhelms Users

Enterprise procurement software often suffers from what experts have coined the “mile wide, inch deep” problem. These platforms attempt to accommodate every possible use case and feature request, resulting in interfaces that are inherently complex and overwhelming. Users report feeling lost in navigation, struggling to locate basic functions, and spending more time fighting against the software than accomplishing their tasks.

Research consistently confirms that increases in interface complexity are directly associated with increased failure rates. For procurement platforms, this often means:

• Lengthy onboarding processes that take weeks or months
• High support ticket volumes from confused users
• Low feature adoption rates – even for core functions
• Employee frustration that leads to system abandonment

Insufficient Training and Change Management

Studies reveal that 70% of change initiatives fail due to employee resistance, and inadequate training is frequently the root cause. Organizations routinely underestimate the training requirements for procurement software, only offering brief onboarding orientation sessions conducted online. However, deeper research shows that organizations investing in comprehensive user training sessions and follow-up hands-on training increase software utilization by 70% or more.

The training challenge is particularly acute for procurement platforms due to the nature of a diverse set of users:

• Frequent users who need deep functional knowledge
• Occasional users who only visit the platform irregularly
• Suppliers that must navigate from outside the organization
• Approvers that need rapid decision-making capabilities

Traditional training approaches fail because they treat all users identically, creating either oversimplified experiences for power users or overwhelming complexity for occasional users.

Integration and Data Challenges

Procurement platforms must integrate with existing ERP systems, financial databases, and supplier networks, seamlessly. Poor integration capabilities create data siloes and workflow disruptions that frustrate users and reduce system effectiveness. When employees must manually transfer data between systems or encounter synchronization errors, they quickly lose confidence in the platform’s reliability and revert to manual approaches.

The complexity of data migration from legacy systems often results in data loss, inaccuracies, and supply chain disruptions that can take months to resolve, creating negative first impressions that persist long after technical issues are resolved.

Why ORO’s Procurement Orchestration Platform Succeeds

Intuitive Design that Requires No Training

ORO has fundamentally reimagined procurement software by prioritizing user experience over feature complexity. The platform’s AI-powered interface guides users through the right process every time, requiring very little training or documentation support. This approach directly addresses the core adoption challenge by making the software immediately accessible to all user types.

Key design principles include:

• Intent Detection. Users submit requests in natural language, and ORO automatically determines the intent and provides the most appropriate response.
• Smart Recommendations. The platform provides category recommendations, supplier suggestions, and buying channel guidance without users needing to understand complex organizational hierarchies.
• Unified Experiences: Through the orchestration of all procurement steps through a single interface, users aren’t required to learn multiple systems or navigate complex workflows.

Orchestration Eliminating Complexity

Rather than forcing users to adapt to rigid software processes, ORO’s orchestration approach coordinates people, processes, and systems to create effortless experiences. This orchestration eliminates the traditional barriers causing adoption failure:

• Process Standardization. Compliance is enforced automatically, without requiring users to memorize complex procedures
• Contextual Guidance. The platform provides step-by-step guidance tailored to each user’s role and experience level
• Exception Management. Unusual situations are automatically routed to appropriate experts, preventing user frustration

AI-Powered Automation that Supports Rather than Replaces Users

ORO’s recent release of additional agentic AI capabilities represents a breakthrough in procurement automation. Unlike traditional automation requiring users to adapt to rigid workflows, ORO’s AI agents work alongside users, handling routine tasks while escalating complex decisions to human experts.

The no-code AI Agent Builder enables procurement teams to:

• Create custom agents for specific workflows without technical expertise
• Deploy autonomous workflows that reduce manual work while maintaining oversight
• Ensure compliance through built-in audit trails and approval processes 

Proven Results: Grünenthal’s Transformation Success

ORO’s approach has delivered measurable results in countless real-world implementations, with one such case demonstrated by Grünenthal, a leading pharmaceutical company. Prior to implementing ORO, Grünenthal faced a highly complex supplier onboarding process requiring 7 different tools and coordination of more than 5 teams.

Through ORO’s AI-driven orchestration platform, Grünenthal achieved measurable results – a 70% reduction in effort for requestors across the organization, 85% user adoption tracked during the transition period, and successful global deployment across 20 countries. The implementation generated positive feedback from both internal and external stakeholders with minimal support requests, demonstrating the platform’s intuitive design.

As Rita Santos, Digital Procurement Transformation Manager at Grünenthal, explained, “At Grünenthal, we believe that digital transformation is not about technology, it’s about people. So, we put people at the center of our digital projects.” This human-centered approach aligned perfectly with ORO’s orchestration philosophy, resulting in exceptional adoption rates that far exceed industry averages.

Best Practices for Procurement Platform Adoption

1. Prioritizing User Experience from Day 1. Select a platform that prioritizes intuitive design over feature complexity, guiding users through processes without extensive training requirements.
2. Implementing Orchestration Rather Than Integration. Focus on platforms that orchestrate workflows rather than simply integrating systems, creating a unified experience, and eliminating the need for users to understand complex system relationships.
3. Designing for All User Types. Consider the needs of frequent users, occasional users, and suppliers; successful platforms adapt their interface and functionality to match user expertise and frequency of interaction.
4. Leverage AI for User Support. Implement AI-powered guidance that helps users navigate complex processes; modern platforms should use AI to reduce cognitive load rather than increase it.
5. Measuring Adoption Success. Track not just usage statistics but user satisfaction and task completion rates; true adoption success means users can accomplish their goals with efficiency and confidence.

The Future of Procurement Technology Adoption

As the procurement technology landscape continues to rapidly evolve, user adoption will continue to be a key metric for platform success. Organizations that continue to prioritize feature checklists over user experience will face ongoing adoption challenges, while those that embrace orchestration-based approaches will see dramatically higher success rates.

ORO’s procurement orchestration platform demonstrates that the traditional trade-off between powerful functionality and ease of use is a false choice. Leveraging AI, orchestration, and human-centered design principles, modern procurement platforms can deliver both sophisticated capabilities and intuitive experiences that drive natural adoption across all user types.

The key insight for procurement leaders is clear: the most technically sophisticated platform is worthless if employees don’t use it. Success in procurement technology adoption requires a fundamental shift from asking “What features does this platform have?” to “How easily can our users accomplish their goals?” Organizations that embrace this user-centric approach will find that adoption challenges become adoption successes, transforming procurement operations from compliance-focused cost centers into strategic business enablers.