Case Study

How a Multi-Site Professional Services Organization Rationalized Vendor Spend and Tightened Procurement Oversight

Indiana | Multi-Site Professional Services | Vendor Portfolio Rationalization

30%

Vendor Overlap Eliminated

Control Categories Rationalized

Service Disruptions

The Situation

A Technology Environment That Had Become Too Expensive to Govern

The organization operated across multiple Indiana offices with a mix of infrastructure, security, identity, and collaboration vendors accumulated over years. Renewals were evaluated in isolation, overlap was invisible at the portfolio level, and internal staff spent more time translating between vendor pitches and budget constraints than improving operations.

Contract and renewal timing spread across vendors, making it impossible to evaluate spending as one portfolio

Capabilities layered across products, creating overlap in endpoint, email, identity, awareness, and networking

Internal staff spending more time translating between provider recommendations and budget constraints than improving operations

Platform selection logic not documented in a way that made future oversight easier

Vendor performance and accountability harder to compare because evaluation criteria were inconsistent

The Approach

Procurement as an Operating Discipline, Not a Purchasing Event

Forged treated vendor procurement and oversight as an operating-model discipline. The engagement focused on contract visibility, rationalization, procurement standards, and continuity-first transition planning.

Portfolio-Level Vendor Visibility

Organized the environment as one vendor-and-contract portfolio. Renewal timing, coverage overlap, support boundaries, and dependencies reviewed together for the first time.

Capability Mapping Against Actual Need

Evaluated each category against what the organization genuinely needed, not what a vendor pitch or legacy buying decision suggested. Emphasis on fit, supportability, and governance quality.

Rationalization and Procurement Standards

Defined procurement logic the organization could defend over time: where standardization created value, what criteria should govern renewals, and how to prevent overlap from quietly re-entering the stack.

Continuity-First Transition Planning

Where vendor changes were appropriate, implementation was sequenced around user impact, dependency risk, support readiness, and rollback considerations before any change moved forward.

The Results

Better Decisions. Less Sprawl. Clearer Accountability.

30% vendor overlap eliminated across identity, endpoint, email, networking, and awareness categories

Procurement standards established for renewals, vendor comparison, and future stack decisions — defensible logic the organization owns

Hidden coordination burden on internal staff reduced by clarifying support boundaries and vendor accountability

Full rationalization executed across multiple offices with zero service disruptions during transition

“We did not need a shopping exercise. We needed someone who could look at the full picture and help us make better decisions about what to keep, what to consolidate, and what to renegotiate. The result was a vendor environment we can actually govern.”

— Sarah L., CFO

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