SharePoint vs OpenText: The Ultimate Purchase Order Automation Software in Glendale

In today’s competitive marketplace, firms of varying sizes must discover ways to enhance productivity and efficiency, while reducing costs wherever necessary.

A great place to begin is with business process automation (BPA). With BPA, you could simplify tedious and time-consuming processes, lessen the load on your staff, and upgrade your workflows by increasing productivity and boosting reliability.

There are several processes and business sectors that can take advantage of BPA. Among of the most prevalent adopters are Accounts Payable units who can utilize BPA to automate invoicing, purchase order processing, and payroll.

In this post, we’ll focus on purchase order automation - how it functions, why automation is a great solution for this area, and evaluate two of our preferred PO process automation software: Microsoft SharePoint and OpenText.

To begin, let us discuss what purchase order automation is and how it works.

What is Purchase Order Automation?

Automated purchase order solutions utilize business software integrated with robotic process automation (RPA) technology, artificial intelligence (AI), and machine learning (ML) to automate the purchase order process.

Through automation, purchase requisitions can be created in a few clicks from pre-formatted layouts, and routing capability can deliver authorizations straight to the supply chain contractor once the approval process is finished.

This removes the need for manual intervention, record filing systems, and makes the operation faster and more manageable.

The Purchase Order Process

While the purchase order process may look slightly different from one organization to the next, the following offers an excellent example of a conventional, manual purchase order process.

Step 1: The first step is creating a purchase order.

Step 2: Then another colleague will review and approve or reject the purchase order.

Step 3: Then, the purchase order must be sent to the contractor.

Step 4: Once completed, the company will then obtain its product or service.

Step 5: The organization will then get the vendor invoice.

Step 6: The invoice will need to be verified and approved, and payment is issued to the vendor.

Step 7: The last step of the purchasing procedure is to file or archive the associated records to create an audit trail.

This might not seem like a great deal of steps, but to make this procedure to run efficiently, all individuals from your AP team members, to sales agents, merchants, and executives, must all provide correct, timely responses. Most businesses can attest that this is way harder than it sounds.

There are many advantages to automating these steps, which we’ll discuss in the next chapter.

The Benefits of an Automated Purchase Order System

There are many advantages to implementing purchase order automation tools for your business. These include:

• Lower Costs

• Time Saved from Hand-Operated Tasks

• Real-Time Insight Into Activities

• A Quicker, More Optimized Purchasing Procedure

• Lessened Physical Error

• Better Utilization of Human Resources

So, now that we’ve established what purchase order automation entails, the elements of the operation that could be automated, and the benefits of purchase order solutions, let us now talk about a couple of our favorite automation tools, OpenText and Microsoft SharePoint.

SharePoint vs OpenText

SharePoint Overview

SharePoint is an enterprise content management solution (ECM) that in its base form, is a tool for monitoring, collaborating on, and sharing material.

However, with the inclusion of Microsoft PowerApps Power Automate, you can quickly adapt SharePoint’s features to incorporate automation to several of your AP operations.

Pros

• Excellent user experience and user interface (UX/UI)

• Moderate learning curve for new users

• Metadata search enhances searchability

Cons

• No local data capture or imaging feature

• Weak at meeting compliance requirements in a few industries

• SharePoint Online is not designed to handle Corporate ECM needs

OpenText Overview

OpenText is similarly an ECM platform but includes advanced add-ons that enable businesses to automate processes, augment business functions, and reduce the risk connected to administration and intellectual property.

Pros

• An excellent option for business with a high level of compliance

• Robust document management, classification, filtering, and access restrictions

• OpenText Documentum expands its features with case and inventory management functionality.

Cons

• Intricate UX/UI

• Typically requires specialist tuning to guarantee that it meets organizational needs

• Can get costly for enterprise capabilities and add-ons

SharePoint & OpenText Pricing & Features Analysis

How Wave Can Aid You in Implementing Purchase Order Automation in Glendale

The truth is physical processes in your accounting system simply slow your organization down, create bottlenecks and process inefficiencies, and sooner or later hurt your development and adaptability.

Prolonged payment cycles can also contribute to higher costs associated with purchase order management and invoice processing, reduce your insight and control, and can disrupt your vendor partnerships.

At Wave, we can assist you in streamlining your accounts payable (AP) processes end-to-end, including purchase orders, procurement, data entry, invoicing, payments, approval process, and even document storage tools.

We work closely with Netsuite, Microsoft Dynamics, SAP, Oracle, as well as ECM and ERP solutions like those we’ve mentioned in this post and also MFiles, Oracle, Xerox, and much more.

We can help you deploy your AP automation tool on-premises, in the cloud, or in a hybrid concept contingent on your organizational regulations, budget, and compliance requirements.

To discover more, connect with us right now for a free consultation.