McDonalds have stated that they are offering total transparency to their supply chain and procurement. A recent article indicates that, following a survey, 65% of procurement professionals would do exactly the same. This is really interesting, particularly when thinking about public sector procurement. There is often the thought that buying organisations will use who they want, despite the tender process being used. If their procurement is more open, this should help alleviate this suspicion. It should also help Joe Public have faith in how their taxes are being used. It will be interesting to see if this concept is actually adopted in the purchasing world!

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We’ve just been reading an article online about how a procurement project has been recognised as the best cycling initiative in London. In summary, the project is proposing to make Transport for London’s contractors’ lorries safer with regards to cyclists.

There’s 2 clear benefits here. Firstly, it shows how far left-field procurement projects can be started from, thus providing more public sector tender opportunities . Secondly, and from a personal perspective, it’s great to see how far the awareness of road safety and cycling is being considered.

Recently, cycling and road safety has been highly publicised in the media. It is easy to not even consider how road safety can have a positive impact on supply chains and business growth opportunities.

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A recent article published online announced that the government had managed to save nearly £4 billion through more efficient procurement.

The article referred to Francis Maude’s announcement that: ”£1.6 billion had been saved by reducing the use of consulting and contractors, £800 million through better supplier relations, £1 billion through centralising procurement across the whole public sector – of which £600 million came from central government – and £380 million on advertising and marketing.”

It’s reassuring to see that focusing on improving and centralising the government’s procurement is clearly working.

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Another simple tip for your PQQs/ITTs etc is to think about evidence. If you are making a statement about your business, can you support it with evidence. This really links back to our earlier tip about providing full detailed answers, but to add even more weight to your answer, consider how you can support your statement. Examples may include factual figures, statistics or brief case studies, or even a testimonial. Easy stuff! You will have the information, so use it.

In a previous tip, we suggested that you provide as much information as possible. What you will need to consider is how your response will look to the reader. Again – a simple tip here. Add some structure to your response by using headings and sub-headings to break up your text. This will make your response more readable, as well as making it easier for you to answer. So, for example, if a question asks about how you manage sub-contractors, have a heading covering sub-contractors, followed by another heading to cover how they are managed. This really is a simple method that will help you tremendously.

Last week we provided 2 simple tips to help when completing a PQQ or ITT etc. The third tip we can offer is that you answer each question as fully as you can. Even if you already work, or have worked, with the buying organisation – make no assumptions. Give as much information as possible – backed up with any relevant facts and figures.

Our second tip to help you with your PQQ is simple – work out which questions are evaluated and which are for information only. So, for example, questions about your company name, insurances and business activities are likely to be for information, where as questions about your processes and procedures will be evaluated.

If you know which questions are evaluated, you will know how to organise your time and resources to ensure you produce a robust response.

Unless you are writing PQQs/ITTs etc every day, the whole concept of tendering can be daunting. Like anything – whether a work project or building a small garden wall for the first time, breaking the project in to bite size chunks will always help. Over the next few days, we’ll publish a few tips which will help you.

The buying organisation will always offer a time period where you can ask for clarification. Take advantage of this. Read through the document, and ask the organisation to confirm or clarify any areas that you are not clear on. Completing the PQQ will be much easier once you are comfortable with the questions.

Creating a winning bid starts earlier than you might think. Like any task – you will need to be organised! If you leave the bid to the last minute you will immediately reduce your chances of success. As soon as you are aware of the opportunity or are invited to tender, start planning! Look at the questions to see:

1) How much time are you likely to need to complete?

2) What information do you need?

3) Where are you going to get the information from?

For example, a 10 question bid will differ in planning to a 30 question bid. Tenders can be daunting but if you plan your bid – break it down in to bite size chunks – you’ll find the whole process much easier. If you need to be getting information  facts and figures from other areas in your business, make sure you contact your colleagues in plenty of time – giving them the time to get the data that you need.

A recent article published online subtly suggested a way by which you can improve your tenders. We are seeing, more and more, questions about how you, as a service provider and/or supplier, interact with voluntary organisations. This subject is often fairly alien to businesses, but it is something that should not be out of your reach. For example, in the Bolton area, there is an organisation who will collect waste cardboard and paper at no additional cost to you. As another example, there are companies who can recycle waste composite material for manufacturers using carbon fibre in their production.

The article indicates that you, as a supplier, need to start really working with these types of organisations within your own supply chain. So – in the matter of a tender, if you can say that you “work with a voluntary organisation on a monthly basis to recycle all your waste cardboard”, you will score higher than a competitor who responds with “we are looking at expanding our involvement with voluntary organisations”.

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