Procurement strategy pointers: Optimizing the Q&A process

Questions, questions and still more questions. Once prospective bidders are registered and have received details about a project via an RFP or RFT, it’s a given they will want to request further and better particulars to help prepare their bid submissions.

Hence, every major infrastructure procurement exercise incorporates a comprehensive two-way question and answer session. It allows potential suppliers to ask for the additional information they need to develop a carefully costed bid that contemplates all contingencies.

Running this phase of a project more efficiently can save a project and procurement team thousands of hours and millions of dollars – and enable them to move forward into the negotiation phase weeks or even months faster.

That’s why it’s worthwhile exploring how technology can help before, not after, your latest RFP or RFT is released.

Struggling to respond to complex questions

Historically, Q&A has been an expensive, resource-intensive exercise for government entities – one that typically accounts for 70% of the average procurement. 

It’s usual for project teams to receive hundreds, if not thousands, of questions, each of which has to be answered comprehensively, reviewed for accuracy and completeness and approved by multiple parties before being sent back to the bidder or released as a formal addenda.

It can be an excruciatingly protracted process, particularly when multiple parties are required to contribute to each answer, as they almost always are. In fact 90% of questions about major infrastructure projects require at least six interactions, according to latest research.

And when duplicate questions are received, it’s not uncommon for project teams to expend an enormous amount of unnecessary effort answering the same thing over and over.

Organizing and keeping track of these thousands of interactions can be a Herculean task, if it’s done manually or via spreadsheet and email. There’s the ever-present potential for critical details to be missed, while maintaining version control and the clear audit trail needed to demonstrate the process has been conducted with the utmost probity is a near impossible ask.

Conducting a Q&A session in this fragmented, analogue fashion represents a security risk too. When information is being shared via email, it’s easy for a file to be inadvertently copied or forwarded to someone who’s not authorized to view it.

Getting an accurate picture of how a Q&A session is progressing is also challenging, in the absence of a ‘single source of truth’.

Tools to make the task easy

This is where technology can be a game changer for project teams. It injects unprecedented efficiency into the Q&A process, by streamlining much of the ‘back and forth’ that occurs when project personnel and subject matter experts collaborate on responses.

Using a single, secure online data repository that incorporates automated workflows and two-way Q&A functionality makes it easy to collect bidders’ questions, assign them to team members and have the responses forwarded to senior project personnel for approval.

Once that approval is obtained, questions and answers that are not deemed to be commercial in confidence can be made viewable in a single, secure location, to all parties with the relevant permissions. 

Selecting a solution with AI capability that can identify duplicate questions automatically and direct bidders to the already published responses can eliminate many hours of unnecessary effort and free the project team up to tackle other questions in the pile.

Deploying a virtual data room to drive your procurement strategy forward

Given the advantages that can ensue, it’s easy to see why public sector organizations are investing in virtual data rooms to help them drive the procurement process of major infrastructure projects forward.

The term is used to refer to a secure online space where confidential documents are stored and shared with authorized parties.

Virtual data rooms can help organizations revolutionize their legacy procurement methodologies; replacing outdated, manual, disparate ways with efficient, secure, auditable processes and practices.

Deploying one minimizes the complexity and mitigates the risk that’s historically been associated with managing complex procurements for major infrastructure projects. That’s why selecting and implementing a tried and tested solution should be part of the procurement strategy development process for every team that’s committed to delivering their project on time and on budget.

Supercharging your procurement journey

It’s easier to progress the procurement of a major infrastructure project with the right tools. A virtual data room will enable your team to run an accurate, efficient and auditable 2-way Q&A process.

Select a solution that’s been developed by professionals with firsthand experience planning, procuring and overseeing major infrastructure initiatives and you’ll stand the best chance of capitalizing on the benefits this transformative technology can deliver.

If you’d like to learn more about how virtual data rooms are helping public sector entities optimize their major infrastructure projects procurement, at home and abroad, Ansarada stands ready to assist. Get in touch with us today.