Gartner®: Reduce IT Sourcing Risk and Regret Through an Agile Procurement Framework
IT sourcing and Procurement leaders must consistently apply procurement practices proven to reduce buyers’ regret. Adopt Gartner’s GuIDED Approach for Satisfied IT Buyers and drive agile, collaborative approaches and achieve successful business outcomes.
Overview
According to the 2026 Gartner Technology Buying Behavior Survey, 73% of buyers reported they regret their latest custom technology purchase. Regret emerges when target business outcomes are not achieved because the buying process is flawed or the buying team lacks direction and cohesion. IT sourcing, procurement, and vendor management (SPVM) leaders need to change how their organizations identify, evaluate, contract, and manage IT solutions to consistently follow best practices. The GuIDED approach provides that framework.
Gartner’s learning and refining approach to procurement, shown in Figure 2, begins with defining the desired business outcomes. The buying team then explores different ways to achieve these outcomes by researching the market and potential solutions. Next, the team engages with identified vendors to understand what is possible and allow vendors to demonstrate how they can meet the business needs — through demos, pilots, or client references. This process helps the team discover solutions that may deliver even better business outcomes than originally planned.
Overview
Conduct a survey of the key business owner and key decision makers at the completion of IT buying initiatives, and ask whether they agree with the following statements:
- The IT solution or service we ultimately purchased is failing (or failed) to meet our expectations.
- We initially considered offerings that were much more ambitious than what we ultimately decided upon.
If the IT buyer answers affirmative to both, they have high regret; if negative to both, they have no regret; if affirmative to only one of the statements, they have moderate regret.
Use this metric in setting functional KPIs, aiming to decrease levels of regret by a meaningful percentage year over year.
Gartner Disclaimer:
Gartner, Reduce IT Sourcing Risk and Regret Through an Agile Procurement Framework, By Luke Ellery, Brett Sparks, Dawn Singer,
26 February 2026. Gartner is a trademark of Gartner, Inc. and/or its affiliates.
