Yet Another Countdown...

Tuesday, January 3rd, 2012. Government offices are back to regular working hours again. In Procurement, its the calm before the storm. Just like the mad rush of shoppers on Christmas Eve, Government year-end spending comes just before March 31st every year. Returning from winter holidays means there are merely 12 weeks and 3 days for the public sector to commit (spend) any remaining budget funds they may have.

Although the budget approval process starts in September the year before (ie the business plans for capital and programs are submitted in the Fall prior to the start of the new budget year) you will find procurement is only 'called' at the moment the program area is ready to go to RFP.

Timelines will be short, as the RFP needs to be "on the street" from 2- 5 weeks, depending upon the complexity and value. Evaluations will take another 2-3 weeks depending upon the schedules of the evaluators, and the number of responses required. In order to commit the funds, the contract needs to be signed before the year-end and delivery made.

So, dear vendor, at this time of year, when you send in a request to extend the closing date of the RFP - don't be offended, when the request is summarily refused. What I would suggest, rather than stating you need more time, explain WHY it is necessary that the marketplace has more time to provide complete materials that will shorten contract negotiations and expedite delivery, in a manner that would 'save time, money & scope creep' for the buying organization.

Surprise, surprise we've issued an RFP!

I was working with an IT Team for an RFP where one of the stakeholders (formerly a consultant) stated that in his former company, "if they found out about an RFP when it hit the street, they wouldn't bother responding". The vendors didn't feel they had enough time to understand the buyer's needs AND to build a comprehensive response to the RFP (traditionally they don't get enough time to do so). As well, they figure their people needed to build a relationship with the buying organization to 'truly' understand their needs.

The buyer's view was in order to be fair, no discussions should be occuring in advance of the posting. To keep a level-playing field, everyone must receive the information at the same time, and that means when the RFP is posted. Back-door discussions with vendors would taint the process, and could create mis-perceptions of bias.

But what is fair? Complete & utter secrecy until the RFP is public, or giving vendors a chance to prepare for an upcoming competition?

I don't want to start agreeing with vendors who try to 'get in the back door', scoping for info their competition doesn't have, but I do believe vendor relationships are strained (at best) if they are surprised by an RFP. It's bad enough most organizations spend months building a business case for buying a service, then 4 weeks drafting a solicitation document to end up giving the vendor community the minimum amount of time to respond "because they are in a rush". If you cannot give the vendors enough time to respond (they should get the equivalent amount of time it took you to build your solicitation), then at least give a public heads-up so they are prepared for the timing of the RFP.

Why? Take a look at this example of a relationship gone wrong, "Disagreements unravel popular music festival" the RFP was a complete surprise to the incumbent vendor; template language was obviously used if the vendor saw his 'intellectual rights' were to be handed over; and end-result: no-one responded and the media is talking about it. Finger pointing doesn't solve the issues.

So, no, don't disclose your criteria, nor solicitation details, nor meet with 'potential' vendors, but please consider giving a heads up when you need to do a competitive process - it'll make your process more successful.

Related articles

• RFP Tips: Being Clear on Closing (psbdelegation.com)
• RFP Closing Days (psbdelegation.com)
• RFP Templates (psbdelegation.com)

RFP Templates

Image via WikipediaI dislike templates 'usually' because I've seen too many people ignore defining their requirements and instead 'cutting & pasting'. That being said, templates serve a purpose of consistency and providing some 'legal' protection of the process through the use of standard terms & conditions/administrative requirements for the process.

I'm currently assisting a client with developing an RFP template to be used by skilled and experienced procurement staff. Not a difficult assignment since I know the end-users understand the process so will need less 'prompts' in the template. This will be more about making their job easier and more consistent. It's also the first time I'm NOT having a template dictated to purchasing by the legal department!

In past, I've found the legal department develops the template terms and conditions and puts them up-front in the document, leaving procurement to fill in their requirements around it. Legal's point of view is to keep the legal information front and centre. From a technical writing perspective, the MOST IMPORTANT information should be front & centre.

So I ask you, what is more important in an RFP document - legal boilerplate or project scope/requirements? Please comment/email me or comment on twitter - I seek viewpoints from both the buying and selling sides!

Last-Minute Proposal Craziness

Image by rickz via FlickrI've seen my share of 'last minute' craziness for vendors to get their proposals accepted (here's the most common & why they don't work):

1) Speeding down the highway - I don't recommend putting lives at stake for a proposal - besides the potential accidents/tickets, if you get there even 1 second late - you'll have wasted all that gas for nothing. Legally, I can't accept your late proposal, no matter how mad/frustrated you get. Regardless of the threats of calling your MLA, I will not put my organization at risk of being sued by everyone else that did submit on time.

2) Calling with excuses - I've heard my share of sobstories, and I feel for your adorable little nephew who recently came down with leukemia - but again, it's not my cold-heart telling you I cannot accept your proposal after the closing, it's the courts. A bid even one second late is non-compliant (see #1 above).

3) E-mail - our legal department decided that email isn't legally binding, so I cannot accept your emailed version of the hardcopy proposal that is enroute via courier. There are 'some' organizations that accept emails, but unless it's written in the RFP as an accepted method of delivery, the email proposal is non-compliant.

4) Faxes - yes a faxed signature is legally accepted in Canada. However, the issue with fax machines is missing pages, paper jams, a single phone line for multiple uses - so generally, no, we won't accept a 50+page proposal via fax...again, any exceptions will be noted in the RFP document, but as a general rule, only tenders/bids/quotes of 1-5 pages are accepted by fax.

5) Bad Weather - I've worked with various public sector organizations in BC since 1999, and in that time, they've NEVER extended the closing date of an RFP due to bad weather conditions on the day of the closing. In fact, I've been told, the only time the BC Purchasing Commission extended the closing date of proposals due to bad weather was during the "1996 snow storm" (it shut down ferries, collapsed roofs, etc). So if you're having difficulties due to weather on the morning of the RFP closing, it is unlikely you will get an extention - especially if the organization already received proposals yesterday from the people who paid attention to the weather channel.

Measuring Success Rates on RFP proposals

Image by Camilla Ferrari via Flickr

Another topic of discussion on LinkedIn...

Response Rates to an RFP

I assume we have all responded to an RFP in the past. I am interersted in hearing from you what your success rate has been with the RFP's that you have responded to this year.

My response: I'm on the buying side and while I believe it is good to measure your 'success rate', I hope you are measuring a few other parameters to put it into context (ie not just looking at how many RFPs you responded to vs how many you were successful on) because this year was a little different.

1) are you checking how many opportunities in your field have been available (whether you responded or not) - ie did you notice there were less RFPs for your field this year than in previous years (in BC, definitely there were less consulting opportunities due to spending freezes)

2) are you finding out how many people are responding to each opportunity? Not that every buying organization will disclose this, but I can say for a fact we've had MORE companies respond than in past years... for example in the early 2000s, I would normally receive about 12-14 proposals to each of my RFPs, then about mid 2005/2006 I was only getting about 5-6 and some only got 1-2 responses (everyone was busy), now we're back up to 15-20 proposals per RFP....

So, if you don't take these other factors into consideration, you may find your success rates 'look' lower this year