Case Study

London Boroughs select the AWARD® solution to support their collaborative Public Cultural Partnership project

The Boroughs of Brent, Ealing and have deployed AWARD® to support their collaboration on one of the largest and most innovative procurements in the Public Cultural Services Sector to date. The Procurement Challenges Client Profile The neighbouring of With a large estate, the project covered In order to meet deadlines, it was crucial Brent, Ealing and Harrow have a seven leisure centres, three sports for the joint project team to be in place combined population of over 800,000— centres and 25 libraries. as soon as possible. Once established, it had the challenge of developing the area is one of the largest and most In carrying out the procurement the specifications from different perspectives culturally diverse communities in the UK. authorities agreed to adopt a common and for different locations - meeting set of principles with a shared 2018 The Boroughs are focused on each individual authority’s requirements, vision: “To ensure residents and visitors collaboratively transforming the lives of alongside the overarching goal to delivery of all ages and abilities can access high their local communities alongside their a final joint service. own individual priorities. Of importance quality, well managed, and sustainable to the third largest London Borough, Leisure and Library facilities.” Based on a shared contract management model, a three stage exercise was adopted Ealing, is securing jobs, homes and public Soft market testing began In 2011 with - a Pre Qualification Questionnaire (PQQ) services for its residents. Its neighbouring the aim of gauging interest in attracting phase followed by an Invitation to Tender Borough, Harrow has one of the lowest providers to work with a multiple­Borough (ITT) and finally a Best and Final Offers homelessness rates in London, and its collaboration. main concern is to promote united and end stage which allowed for an element involved communities. Brent Council, Key outcomes of the procurement were: of negotiation. As each Borough had a meanwhile, is focusing on its large leisure portfolio, the process had to • To provide improved community be divided in to three Lots—this presented transformation agenda and has a vision services that offer value for money the additional challenge of managing for safe and sustainable neighbourhoods. • For each council to retain its leisure each Lot and stage on time and in a All share a common goal to continually and library services controlled manner. improve the quality of life and cohesive • To increase satisfaction rates for With varying sections that needed to be community for residents. both leisure and library users assessed by a diverse team of Borough The Project • To create apprenticeships, work officers, evaluating criteria from their placements and jobs for local people The authorities entered into a joint own viewpoints, it was crucial for partnership to procure Leisure and • To provide physical activity everything to be efficiently joined up Library Services. By working together, opportunities to increase levels of and centrally managed. participation from children, young they found that not only could they ® people and under represented groups “AWARD enabled us to design, enhance community services, but they implement and manage a complex tender could also make efficiency savings of • To make a positive impact on evaluation process simply, efficiently environmental sustainability by ® over £20m. and effectively. Without AWARD the reducing utility, water usage, land administrative burden of this project The project involved the selection of an filling and pollution would have been horrendous. Using external provider to deliver a range of • To involve the local community in expert technical assistance from leisure services for a period of up to 10 leisure centre programming Commerce Decisions, we were able to years. Ealing and Harrow also wished to redesign the evaluation process to suit include their requirement for the the project requirements. The flexibility of the system was its strongest attribute.” management of their Library Services for up to five years. Mark Johnson — Project Manager — Furthermore it was critical that the About AWARD® AWARD® Benefits evaluation process ensured that the ® AWARD is a comprehensive supplier AWARD® delivers a transparent required service standards and outcomes evaluation solution that delivers an efficient audit trail that underpins the bidder were clearly defined, and that the approach to strategic procurements that debriefing process and manages any successful suppliers could meet the involve multiple stakeholders, high levels challenges to the outcome of the selection criteria based on: of risk, and significant budgets. The procurement. solution has supported £multi billions of • Originality and innovation of the ® procurement projects across all sectors AWARD is highly flexible, enabling full proposals and diverse areas of business. integration of the tender requirements • Operational viability of the proposals and policies. AWARD® enables teams to follow a robust • Deliverability and sustainability process through multiple procurement AWARD® enables project users to be • Financial viability. phases, from short listing of bidders managed centrally, optimising the time through to evaluating final submissions, spent on evaluating suppliers. and finally negotiation. The project team Managing the Procurement Process ® was therefore able to benefit from the AWARD is delivered via a security­ Working closely with a Commerce confidence, efficiency and defensibility accredited hosted service. Users can ® Decisions’ consultant, the configuration provided by an AWARD® deployment. access AWARD from any workstation of AWARD® was led by the project team. with an internet connection and web Commerce Decisions provide a range of Each project stage was set up in the browser. AWARD® project packages, from self service system, together with the delivery model to full service solutions. The AWARD® Powerful reporting capabilities allow criteria. AWARD® was used as a centralised system and our services deliver cost- a range of selected reports to be repository for all the project information effective delivery of best practice methods generated quickly and tailored to and documents, and was the hub matched to the needs, requirements and your project. around which the project was built budgets of different project types. and managed. Enhanced controls allow better Combining our broad and deep management of tender stages leading Cooperating and Collaborating procurement expertise with the efficiency to efficiencies and on time project ® In addition to enabling the Boroughs to and defensibility provided by an AWARD delivery. deployment, our approach ensures that communicate effectively throughout the AWARD® provides a structured and procurement, AWARD® also effectively our solutions will accommodate a wide range of procurements, all benefiting from compliant approach to the execution of captured and managed supplier clarification a procurement. requests. The system provided a robust the confidence, efficiency and defensibility ® and secure mechanism for suppliers provided by an AWARD deployment. to communicate directly with the project team. In Summary “We approached this project in a very different way to most procurement With over 12 years unrivalled experience projects but impressively, the in working with project teams on strategic system had the flexibility to adapt UK Public Sector procurements; Commerce and be configured according to our Decisions was selected by the three London requirements. I would highly recommend Boroughs to provide the AWARD® solution. the use of AWARD® for the evaluation of A primary driver in this selection decision any complex procurement project.” was the need to ensure that they could collaboratively and efficiently manage a Mark Johnson — Project Manager — complex lot-based multi-phased project. London Borough of Harrow

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