Coupa Implementation

Barkers > Coupa Implementation

Coupa Implementation

Coupa Inspire 2023 Spartan award winners

We are recognised as a rising star within the Coupa partner ecosystem — one whose perseverance, demonstration of Coupa’s core values, and commitment to collaboration are unmatched.

Our team are Coupa Platform Certified

We are award-winning, certified and approved Coupa implementation partners, and the leading digital procurement transformation practice for SME and Mid-Tier markets in the UK and Ireland. Coupa’s Implementation incorporates a world-class, market-leading, cloud-based spend management technology that delivers exceptional results.

Increased efficiencies and improved bottom line due to enhanced visibility and control over spend.
A procurement function empowered, motivated and enthused to make a greater impact on the organisation’s profitability.
Exceptional cost-control, visibility and supplier management underpinned and enabled by class leading technology.
Complete control over spend with the opportunity to generate further sustainable value through Barkers’ procurement maturity assessments, recommendations and comprehensive change delivery programme.

Business Spend: See It. Understand It. Control it.

The Coupa Business Spend Management Platform features a transactional core of four key modules;

Procurement
Invoicing

Expenses
Pay

Coupa then leverages this transactional core to enable power users across:

Spend Analysis
Supply Chain Planning and Design
Strategic Sourcing
Inventory Management

Contract Management
Contingent Workforce Management
Suppliers and Risk
Treasury Management

Users gain heightened visibility to total business spend and are equipped to analyse this data, benchmarking it against trillions of dollars of business spend data through an AI enabled platform. This facilitates the optimisation of spend, reduction of risk and improved efficiency.

The technology is best-in-class, functionally rich and affordable. It offers the tools and methodology to replace clunky, old systems and the associated challenges they bring such as slow and labour-intensive processes which sap energy and enthusiasm, leaving little time for innovation. Find out more about Coupa’s Procurement Model

The Barkers Value-Add

Barkers will be your single point of contact making the process easier and quicker to execute.

Our senior team not only support the successful implementation of the Coupa technology, they take a holistic view of the organisation’s procurement function. We’re expert analysts who provide the following additional insight:

Procurement Maturity – Analysis of procurement maturity and a recommendation of how to develop your own capability to take full value from the tools.
Cost Analysis – Assessment of your current costs and the opportunity to reduce them.
Change Management – We secure enhanced user commitment through a change management process with behavioural science principles at its core.

The combined expertise of Barkers and the technology of Coupa provide the ideal opportunity to take hold of business spend, improve efficiencies, reduce costs and drive return on investment.

Why Choose Us

Intuitive User Interface Technology

Clients leverage a single, intuitive interface for all their spend activities across Procurement, Strategic Sourcing, Invoicing, Risk and Expense Management.

Industry Leading Adoption Rates

Coupa’s cutting–edge, user–friendly technology, when coupled with Barkers’ implementation expertise, makes for enviable adoption rates and an outstanding user experience.

Enhanced Strategic Decision Making

Our implementation team are comprised of senior procurement consultants who specialise in business strategy. Coupa clients benefit from this additional insight and guidance.

Comprehensive Platform

Coupa breaks down silos between areas of spend encouraging collaboration with shared data, insights and processes. This makes for smarter decision making and enhanced relationships.

Award winning implementation

Officially recognised by Coupa in 2023 for our demonstration of Coupa’s core values and commitment to collaboration, we offer an unmatched partnership with our clients.

Features of Coupa Digital Implementation

Overview

We offer a comprehensive Coupa digital implementation service with a value-focused approach. Our Barkers/Coupa model addresses three core stages which drive success for our clients:

Value Discovery
Value Acceleration
Value Maximisation

Our proven model for ensuring the long-term success of all our clients:

DISCOVERY

At Barkers, our expert team are experienced practitioners who boast a blend of global consultancy and procurement practitioner experience. We’re highly skilled in listening to client’s challenges, understanding their business needs and using our insight to recommend solutions that inspire success. We work collaboratively with clients to define business goals and success metrics, facilitating a transparent and measurable process driven by our honest and open values.

ACCELERATION

Configuration, integration and implementation is led by our team of Engagement Managers, Solution Architects and Technical Architects. Our team are certified on all core Coupa products and committed to a continuous training programme to ensure that they are always up to date with functional enhancements and the latest Coupa products coming to market.

But more than that, at Barkers we work with clients to ensure that a client’s business is equipped and prepared to receive the solutions that Coupa provide. We do this on two levels; on a practical, systems-based level, but also on a human level.

We work with clients to review their current systems to ensure integration is successful and disruption from day-to-day activities is minimised. Our mantra is that by taking the time to put the groundwork in, clients will reap the greatest dividends.

We excel in our relentless focus on the human element of digital transformation, so frequently overlooked by alternative suppliers. We understand that whilst technology is key, adoption and acceptance is paramount. Our team consist of behavioural science experts who use their outstanding knowledge in cognitive bias, personality traits and other behavioural science principles, to motivate, enable and empower procurement teams adopting new technologies.

The following diagramme sets out our approach to implementation:

MAXIMISATION

Once successfully implemented we go further in our drive for success. We continually review the effectiveness of the systems in place, searching for ways in which we can extract maximum value and opportunity for our clients. We regularly communicate with clients to discuss any new challenges that they may be facing, consider any recent circumstances affecting their organisation, and support them to find optimum solutions.

At Barkers we are committed to continuous improvement with a focus on the future. Our partnership with Coupa ensures that clients can be confident that the technology of today is ready to meet the challenges of tomorrow.

Outcomes

Fully comprehensive spend management system giving clients total visibility of their supplier expenditure in as little as 4 months. A class-leading timescale versus industry peers
Smarter, streamlined decision making
Efficiencies in system and process to drive lower costs and avoid unnecessary spend, positively impacting bottom line
Reduced risk through effective risk management and supplier onboarding
Increased control and compliance
Empowered, motivated and confident team
Improved supplier relationship management through improved purchase-to-pay, error-free invoicing and reduced supplier administration
Improved collaboration and communication across departments
Identification of further cost-saving opportunities through Barkers’ strategic assessments.

Meet the Coupa Team

Matthew Hardaker

Delivery Director

Luke Foster

Senior Architect

Luke Benson

P2P Architect

Stephen Bottomley

Solutions Architect

Shared Vision

The partnership between Coupa and Barkers is strengthened by the companies’ mutual commitment to sustainable solutions. Coupa aim to help businesses to leverage their spend to drive responsible and measurable impact. Supplier diversity insights enable businesses using the Coupa BSM platform to evaluate supply chain diversity and digitising processes supports a company’s pledge to lessen their environmental footprint.

Barkers are fully committed to delivering social value. We are renowned for our ethical procurement practices and are award winners in this space. Find out more about how we deliver social value

Achieve your business ambitions with Barkers

CASE STUDIES

We have been working with Barkers for nearly 10 months and they have successfully delivered Coupa to four divisions of our organisation which is going through huge change and the centralisation of many functions. This has created many obstacles for the project team to overcome, but all Barkers team members have taken this in their stride and dealt with difficult scenarios professionally. Their pragmatic, flexible and personable approach has been extremely valuable to our delivery, something much larger consultancy firms would not be able to accommodate. We are close to completing the fifth and final deployment of Coupa to a division which has many more nuances within its billing processes, but due to time constraints put onto the project team from outside of the project teams’ control, Barkers have again adapted their delivery to match the needs of their customer whilst ensuring what they deliver is still up to the highest standards. It has been a pleasure and a breath of fresh air to deal with a smaller consultancy firm whose employees ensure they get to understand their customers needs and offer solutions without charging extra for the privilege of providing their knowledge and assistance.

Paul Thwaites

Senior Project Manager, Vanquis Banking Group

The Barkers appointment has been a tremendous success; the teams' technical ability, flexibility, guidance and pragmatism has been first class. It is a true example of client and partner collaboration.

Steven Schools

Head of Procurement and Supplier Management, Vanquis Banking Group

Barkers approach to our challenge delivery impressed me. Jersey Electricity faces a lot of different challenges, and therefore it is tough to find the right people – especially people that would fit our requirements. Being a small and strongly diversified business in a geographically isolated environment, we needed a versatile specialist to come in and advise on multiple different topics. Barkers delivered just that. The consultant working with us was not only strong in the primary field of expertise (Procurement) but could as firmly ask challenging questions to technical people. Working in this way allowed Barkers to expand the primary scope and Jersey Electricity to receive valuable support.

Mark Preece

Operations Director, Jersey Electricity

I have worked with Barkers in the past and so was aware of both their strong procurement and commercial excellence as well as their relevant market sector knowledge. Once the team were briefed on the outcomes we required and the timeframe to deliver, we worked together on the feasibility of our plan to build something achievable. This allowed us to manage internal expectations and build trust in the plan. With any procurement project there are changes and unforeseen challenges that can impact timelines and this project was no exception. Barkers supported us through the changes, challenged them where appropriate, and amended the work where changes were necessary. Barkers always put the project and the outcomes first showing a high degree of integrity. The outcome Barkers delivered was timely, robust and showed a clear benefit, I would not hesitate in using Barkers again.

David Anderson

Head of Commercial, OVO Energy

The Barkers Led Procurement transformation at Argent had an immediate positive impact. The Barkers team positively engaged with the business and helped deliver procurement improvements to the indirect categories of spend. These changes enabled a step changed for how procurement was viewed across the business.

Nicola Dean

CFO, Argent Energy

An inspiring partnership, recognising and developing creative solutions to local social issues in the most effective way. Barkers and Bolton Family are a compelling example of people coming together from right across the community, with passion, authenticity and trust.

Lisa Charles

Director Of Business Services, Bolton at Home

We engaged Barkers to help us conduct an end to end review of Procurement. This included a tailored approach to our business objectives and our Procurement capability with a full set of recommendations that we have implemented over the past 12 months. The end result has been a successful programme of change, that has delivered a solid set of foundations to take our business and the function forward. Our lead partner on the ground was fantastic, and really stepped up to the challenges we faced and became an integral enabler of change.

Karen Lounds

Business Services Director, Tata Chemicals

We selected Barkers primarily for the depth of their procurement experience but also because their ethical approach and commitment to the creation of social value differentiates them from other consultancies. The Barkers team worked alongside our staff to enhance the team and accelerate our delivery of budget impacting savings and the creation of localised social value.

David Levy

Head of Strategic Procurement, Seven Force Strategic Collaboration