Zoinks! Why do Cloud myths persist?
The Determine P2P Starter Kit, Part Two: Taking the mystery out of cloud procure-to-pay.
I recently completed a thorough study of myths by examining one of the most scientifically significant examples available — Scooby-Doo and the gang: Fred, Daphne, Velma, and Shaggy. You may laugh, but studying the adventures of Mystery, Inc. sheds a great deal of light on all kinds of myths, cloud procure-to-pay (P2P) included.
Myths and mysteries usually play on some combination of the following:
- Deep-seated, preexisting anxieties
- Lack of understanding or clarity
- A desire on the part of believers to accept the myth
- A touch of theatrics
In the Scooby-Doo TV series, the above factors typically drove the plot through the protagonist’s dark backstory or lingering guilt, the gang being stuck in the dark, and ridiculous costumes and special effects. Details are scarce, someone is chasing you, and your imagination takes over. Next thing you know, no one questions the reality that Uncle Jesse’s wonderful old theatre can’t be saved because it is haunted by a headless phantom stagehand.
P2P myths may be less dramatic, but they are no less dangerous because they prevent procurement from getting an accurate view of the situation at hand and selecting the best, most logical, path forward.
Myth: My process won’t be secure in the cloud!
This myth succeeds because most of us don’t truly understand the inner workings of the technology we’ve become accustomed to using in our personal lives. We press on because everyone else does too and because the alternative is inconvenient, but we aren’t that confident about it. If pressed about our choice to adopt a new technology, we’re going to have to shrug and admit, “I didn’t know I needed to worry about that.”
Now take that concern and combine it with the need for procurement to put their stamp of approval on a cloud-based enterprise P2P platform. If we are already worried when the stakes are raised and the lights go out, we may end up hiding in the big (convenient) barrel with Shaggy and Scooby. Zoinks!
What we need in this moment is Velma. Nothing gets past her thick glasses and sensible turtleneck sweater. “Wait a minute,” she says. Most of the technology used by global enterprises to conduct business relies upon the cloud. Take Customer Relationship Management (CRM) systems for instance. If sales can trust their data to the cloud, can’t procurement? You bet we can. The best P2P systems come with iron-clad security, and we’re already benefitting from it; we just don’t realize it. Jinkies!
Fast access to my data is compromised in the cloud!
Business must move at the speed of light. Transactions, contracts, purchases, deliveries by the hundreds or thousands scream through your P2P. If procurement can’t produce a requested detail quickly, we’re going to be perceived as bystanders to the spend management process. In an effort to feel in control, we cling to our local data access points, believing that if we feel in control then we must be in control. In the Scooby-Doo universe, that’s the caretaker wearing a swamp monster scuba suit. It’s just theatrics. There is no place in cloud P2P for feelings, only facts. Time to pull off the face mask and reveal the culprit underneath.
While it may feel more straightforward and accessible to manage data locally, it is really just a mess of files, devices and shared drives. No one is in control at all, and the whole thing is a single point of failure waiting to strike. Zoinks! That’s not better! Cloud P2P has the advantage in that all of the information is networked. Contracts, purchases, supplier data and payments are all linked together in one, centralized system that is more than backed up: it is self-reconciling and widely accessible.
None of this is to make light of the very real fear people often feel when adopting cloud P2P for the first time. When you suspect your fears are caused by something “supernatural” or a possible hoax, the answer is always investigation and unmasking. The facts are there, procurement just has to uncover them.
If you’re ready to take the mystery out of cloud-based procurement, download our P2P Starter Kit Part Two: Cloud Procure-to-Pay Myths Debunked, then schedule a no-obligation personalized demonstration of how you can accelerate your procure-to-pay process on the Corcentric Platform.