Project Selection Process S020

S020 - Advertise

DEFINITION

A public advertisement of the client’s requirements, to invite potential vendors to register their interest and/or capability.

SUMMARY

Advertisements are placed in suitable media to publicise the client organisation’s interest in acquiring new systems and to invite potential vendors to make themselves known.  The advertisement may call for specific information or even a statement of capabilities such that it can be used as the first step in narrowing down the potential vendors.  It may be appropriate to divide the application process into stages, eg:

• advertise basic details requesting an initial expression of interest,
• send out detailed information requesting a statement of capability and/or information about the vendor’s solution.

In some cases, the respondents might be sent an invitation to pre-qualify - see Process S050.

PATH PLANNING GUIDANCE

This process is optional.  It is normally performed only where required by the client, for example to follow public sector procurement rules.  It may also be used in unusual circumstances where there is no market information available from normal public sources.

DEPENDENCIES

Prerequisites (Finish-Start):

• definition of basic scope and requirements for the project

Dependent procedures (Finish-Finish):

• Establish “long list” (S030) (if applicable)
• Pre-qualification (S050) (if applicable)
• Issue Invitation to Tender (S080)

RECEIVABLES

• Project’s scope and terms of reference
• Definition of Requirements

DELIVERABLES

• Details of interested potential vendors

TOOLS

• (none)

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF TASKS

Basic Approach

This process is often required by public sector bodies where procurement rules dictate that the opportunity must be made known in a fair manner to all potential vendors.  Although fair, this can lead to a large number of vendors applying for consideration.  These will need to be dealt with and assessed by the project team.

To minimise the work involved, the process can be divided into stages with the intention of reducing the applicants to only the serious contenders by the time that the project team starts to assess them.  Vendors would be given sufficient details to allow them to opt out if they feel their solution is unlikely to be chosen.

A typical example of a two-stage process would be:

• advertise basic details requesting initial expression of interest,
• send out detailed information requesting statement of capability and/or information about the vendor’s solution.

In addition, or as an alternative, to requesting the statement of capability and vendor information, it may be necessary to perform a formal pre-qualification stage (see Process S050).  This is typically the case in certain public sector organisations where all stages of the selection process must be open and subject to formalised fair competition.

It should be clear in the documentation sent out that this process is only a preliminary step before the issuing of a full Invitation to Tender otherwise vendors may misunderstand the level of detail that is required and might be uncooperative when asked for a further tender.  The documentation should set out the intended sequence of stages in the selection process.

In some cases, client organisations will deliberately make the process hard and/or expensive in the hope that this will reduce the number of bidders.  Unfortunately, this can often deter good vendors who know that their statistical chances of winning do not warrant the investment. In extreme cases, usually in specific market environments, there may be a requirement for financial bonds to be placed by the bidders (if so, specialist assistance may be required).

Advertising

In many cases a simple announcement in relevant journals might be placed.  The details should be agreed by the client organisation.  In some cases, it might be appropriate to use professional specialists to help with the preparation of the advertisement, for example,  where the client organisation is particularly keen to enhance its public image.

There is a choice of tactics regarding the naming of the client organisation and the address to submit responses to.  The main options are:

• advertise solely in the client organisation’s name - ensures proper attention is paid to the true customer but can involve an unwelcome amount of contact from salesmen,
• advertise in the client organisation’s name but with a Consultant as the only named contacts - avoids the problem of too much contact from the salesmen and shows the selection process will be serious and fair; it can, however, distance the true customers from the process,
• advertise in Consultant’s name with the client remaining anonymous - completely avoids the problem of unwelcome contacts but makes it difficult to give the vendors a good level of information about the organisation and its needs.

Typical media in which to place the advertisement may include:

• journals specifically designated for such purposes, eg the EC Journal,
• specialist IT newspapers, journals and magazines, eg Computer Weekly
• general “quality” newspapers, eg Financial Times
• industry and/or trade specialised journals, eg the Times Educational Supplement.