Gartner Recommends CPOs Treat AI as a Dedicated Category Management Domain
Gartner is encouraging chief procurement officers (CPOs) to treat AI as a dedicated category management domain rather than merely another IT procurement function.
With AI embedded in services, infrastructure and software, CPOs can play a critical role in shaping how work is performed and where expertise resides in the future development of capabilities across an organization.
With AI spending often fragmented across departments and suppliers, it can be difficult for organizations to understand their investment, manage risk and determine whether AI is delivering value for their business. As AI assistants and autonomous agents become more integrated into day-to-day operations, CPOs have an expanded role in determining how capabilities are distributed among suppliers, employees and digital workers, prompting a shift toward a dedicated AI category management strategy.
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"Organizations are no longer acquiring AI through a single supplier market or spend category," Katarzyna Fonteyn, director analyst, IT services, in Gartner’s Supply Chain practice, said in a statement. "AI capabilities are being purchased across the enterprise, often without a unified view of how those investments relate to one another."
Gartner believes procurement leaders should take an enterprise-wide approach to AI, collaborating with business leaders, IT, HR, legal, security, and data governance and risk, thereby positioning AI for a more central role in the organization.
Gartner recommends that CPOs take the following steps as AI becomes an enterprise capability:
- Integrate enterprise-wide visibility into AI capabilities, spending, suppliers and use cases.
- View AI as a category management domain rather than just a technology.
- Launch enterprise standards for AI governance, data rights, risk management and acquisition.
- Compare AI investments with workforce impact and business outcomes.
- Use a blended approach to decide which AI capabilities to buy, build or manage.
“Treating AI as a dedicated category management domain helps organizations improve visibility, strengthen governance and make more deliberate decisions about where critical capabilities should reside,” added Fonteyn.
