Why Regulated Industries Struggle with SaaS Procurement (And How to Fix It)

SaaS adoption is accelerating across every industry, but for regulated sectors like finance, healthcare, education, and government, that acceleration often comes with serious friction. What should be a strategic enabler becomes a compliance risk, a procurement nightmare, or worse, a failed implementation.

As someone who’s sold SaaS into for over a decade, I’ve seen where things break down. And I’ve built The Deady Group to help fix it.

Here’s why regulated organizations continue to struggle with SaaS procurement, and what they can do to finally move forward with confidence.

1. Procurement is Designed for Physical Products, Not Modern Software

Traditional procurement processes are often built for buying hardware, facilities, or annual service contracts. They’re not designed for usage-based platforms with integrations, user seats, SLAs, and complex data flows. This leads to:

• Rigid vendor onboarding processes
• Lengthy legal cycles over data ownership and security
• A disconnect between IT, compliance, and business units

The Fix: Work with partners who understand regulated SaaS procurement. A good partner can streamline due diligence, compliance reviews, and vendor collaboration from the beginning.

2. Security Reviews Are a Bottleneck (and Often Manual)

In regulated environments, security teams are swamped. Every SaaS vendor must pass internal reviews, and that process is usually manual, fragmented, and more often than not painfully slow.

Security doesn’t want to say no. But they can’t say yes without the right documentation, architecture detail, and compliance artifacts.

The Fix: Vet vendors who already meet your compliance needs, such as SOC 2, HIPAA, or NIST. Work with intermediaries who can surface that documentation early. This reduces friction while still maintaining oversight.

3. IT and Business Units Are Not Always Aligned

Sometimes the CIO is all in, but finance is nervous. Or HR wants to modernize, but IT is spread too thin to support the rollout.

This cross-functional misalignment creates delays, scope creep, and lost momentum. That’s especially true in the public sector or large institutions.

The Fix: A consultative advisor can help align business goals, compliance needs, and technical feasibility across teams. This is not just a sales process. It’s organizational change.

4. No One Has Time to Evaluate the Landscape

There are thousands of SaaS solutions in every category. Sorting through AI-enhanced claims, overlapping features, and contract traps is exhausting. And most teams are already stretched thin.

Procurement often defaults to legacy vendors or avoids making a decision altogether.

The Fix: Offload vendor evaluation to trusted experts. Someone who understands your environment, security requirements, and operating needs can bring only what fits. This saves time and avoids costly mistakes.

5. Too Many Vendors, Not Enough Accountability

When things go wrong after purchase, no one wants to take ownership. Sales moves on. Vendors point fingers. Internal teams blame procurement.

You’re left stuck with a partial rollout or a sunk cost.

The Fix: Partner with someone who stays engaged from vendor introduction through implementation. This leads to better outcomes and real accountability.

Final Thought: It Doesn’t Have to Be This Hard

You can modernize your infrastructure without compromising compliance or derailing procurement. It just requires the right partnerships and a more consultative approach to vendor selection.

That’s what we do at The Deady Group.

If you want to accelerate your next technology decision without stepping into a compliance or security minefield, let’s talk.

Ready to transform with clarity?