The Top 5 Mistake Bidders Make: No 4. Who is the client?

Having scored a few hundred PQQs and ITTs over time, one of my biggest frustrations has always been those submissions that tell you exactly what they will do for you – seemingly whether you want it or not.  The ones that have completely missed the point are even worse – they clearly haven’t understood the client requirements either due to a lack of planning, or care.  Sometimes they do this in an obvious way – shameless cut and paste sections detailing a different clients name to the one procuring for example!  However it’s also obvious when reading a submission from a company who clearly hasn't done their research, doesn't understand what is important to their potential client, and is therefore only able to provide basic answers.

Understanding the client is absolutely key to a successful bid.

Before you even put pen to paper on your response you should have listed out the key client requirements, and their potential drivers.  This is particularly relevant to the public sector clients.  They are process driven and dependent on bureaucracy, for good reason – after all, they are accountable for public spend.  And because of this, our public sector clients are also expected to meet a huge number of national, regional and local policy drivers - when you work in the public sector you will never be just building a building.  A good example of this is the Government Construction Strategy (GCS). Construction represents around 7% of the GDP, and is seen by government as both an indicator and a driver of growth in the UK economy.  For that reason the GCS was launched in 2011 with a huge number of stretching targets relating to the way construction is procured and managed incorporating things like BIM, cost benchmarking and so on.  For most construction clients in the public sector, much of this is likely to be not only complex, but somewhat overwhelming too.  It makes sense that a construction company who understands these requirements and targets, who can demonstrate how they will help their public sector client to achieve them in their bids, will score more highly in the procurement process.

Another, more simple, example – a public sector client asking for examples of where you have implemented lean construction is no doubt looking for a company that can demonstrate cost and time savings.  Why? Because they have strict instructions as part of the Comprehensive Spending Review to cut budgets by 20% minimum.

At the end of the day, a client is looking to ‘buy’ the services of a company that clearly understands their needs, can respond to them, and ultimately help the client meet their own targets and survive the scrutiny of the public sector. You must be able to demonstrate your understanding in your ITTs and PQQs.

The Top 5 Mistake Bidders Make: No 3. How to stand out from the crowd? Differentiate

Times are hard at the moment – no one is denying it.  The construction industry is incredibly competitive, with companies who wouldn't normally operate in certain markets invading the realms of the smaller suppliers.  To make matters worse the Comprehensive Spending Review challenged the public sector to slash their budgets, with targets in excess of a 20% reduction.  Unfortunately a lot of public sector organisations, rather than grasping the opportunity to work with their supply chain to streamline and increase efficiency, they have simply cut their budgets - expecting the same service for less.

The biggest complaint we hear about bidding at the moment, is that clients only want cheapest price and companies are prepared to ‘buy’ the work to retain turnover and keep going.    However if clients are only offered a group of companies who all basically do the same thing, offer the same service, provide the same quality i.e. average – then they can only differentiate on price.  Rather than seeing this as a problem, we believe it is a real opportunity. 

True product differentiation

You need to make sure that the service and products you offer are different (i.e. better) than the competition either through excellence or innovation.  This will give you a competitive advantage.  It is important the differences are something that your clients want or need, for example enhanced efficiency which allows a reduced build time without losing any quality. 

A new method, product or material – anything that drives improvement. 

It is important that your potential and existing clients can truly understand this difference – what it is that makes you stand out from the crowd you are up against.  Therefore you need to demonstrate and evidence this improvement in your bids as this will allow your client to score you more highly.

If you can demonstrate to your client that you go above and beyond what is required, provide exceptional service, innovate to improve, are able to demonstrate efficiencies and time/cost savings – then you are giving them something other than price on which to base their buying decision.  And with a bit of luck, they will buy you.

BIM: “Contractors with 51-100 employees report working on more projects utilising BIM tools than bigger contractors”

I’m really proud to have been involved in the research, analysis and drafting of the NFB’s ‘BIM: Ready or Not?’ report. The key message is that although many (but not all) contractors recognise the business case for BIM, fewer SMEs (businesses with less than 250 full-time employees) appear to have the necessary technical skills to take up BIM, have considered how to implement it on projects or are planning to invest in training. Amongst those who don’t perceive there to be a business case for BIM, there is a call for more evidence in order for them to be able to make an informed decision. Fair enough. On the basis of these findings, the NFB calls for stronger communication and discussion of the business benefits for SMEs and support for those who think there are business benefits to be had to think more practically about the implications for their projects.

However, one of the most interesting results for me was the finding that contractors with 51-100 employees reported working on more projects utilising BIM tools than their larger counter-parts. It appears this might be down to the greater degree of subcontracting in this group than in the 101-250 employees group. In other words, you’re more likely to have experienced a BIM-enabled project if you subcontract to a large main contractor that has already adopted BIM than if you’re a large SME tier-one supplier that hasn’t adopted BIM. Sounds logical. Explanations aside, I think it’s worth shouting about this important group of smaller contractors that is bucking the trend, will be learning-by-doing, and may well be helping lead the BIM way in future.

Is it a bird, is it a plane – no it’s the Infrastructure Act!

Yesterday (31^st October 2012) the Infrastructure (Financial Assistance) Bill received Royal Assent and has now passed into law.  Designed to enable them to guarantee up to £40bn of investment in infrastructure, and up to £10bn of new homes, the government believe this will help in their quest to deliver “the vital infrastructure that the country needs to boost growth.”

The Bill passed through parliament in just 55 days and is designed to underpin the UK Guarantees scheme which authorises HM Treasury or a Secretary of State (with HM Treasury’s consent) to incur expenditure in relation to the provision of guarantees and other suitable forms of financial assistance for major infrastructure projects that may struggle due to the current economic climate.  The Scheme which was launched in July has already received over 60 enquiries.

With recent reports pointing to a small but positive shift towards growth in our economy – is this really the solution to all of our problems in the Construction Industry?  Has it come soon enough to save those smaller supply chain companies who are fighting for survival, or is it simply a case of too little too late?

The Top 5 Mistake Bidders Make: No 2. Sell yourself – and prove it

In this third part of my blog series ‘Top 5 Mistakes Bidders Make’ I am looking at importance of creating your key messages and providing your buyer with evidence. 

It’s important to remember that bidding is just another step in Sales process.   For many reasons companies actually forget that bidding is an opportunity to sell what’s good about their company, they are too busy just trying to get the job done.  They forget their strengths, and more importantly even when they remember to put them in, they don’t provide any evidence. For example just telling your client you provide a quality service is meaningless.  Backing it up with evidence of externally accredited standards such as ISO, as well as client recommendations delivers a much stronger message.

When I work with companies to assist them with bids the first thing we do is hold a brainstorming session with as many of the team that can be spared.  Ideally this should include site, technical, commercial, and admin representatives as well as any business development staff.  The first step of this brainstorm is to detail what is good about your organisation – what should we be selling in the bid, where do you meet the clients’ requirements?  These are your key messages and should be developed as the theme throughout your bid documents.

The next step is to determine what evidence we have in place or what we require to put in the bid regarding our key messages.  The idea being, that between us we can come up with numerous examples of excellent practice to demonstrate to the buyer.  The team are then on hand to provide the evidence needed, or go out and find it.  Too often the bid process is under the ownership of just one or two individuals – but this should a team effort.  In my experience when everyone has contributed to a bid it has more chance of success.

What makes good evidence?  Anything that is third party accreditation is the strongest – externally accredited standards achieved, awards won, chartered memberships are all invaluable.  Qualitative evidence such as client commendations help to give credence to specific claims against achievement in identifiable projects.  Measures such as KPIs, time and cost targets are also excellent as they are a quantifiable demonstration of success.  Then you need to include your visual evidence – the photos, logos, charts, tables – anything to make your bid look pretty whilst also adding value!

So - as a team decide what it is that you need to sell about your company – your excellent service, your innovation, your people – and then demonstrate it in the form of hard evidence.  

Procurement at a Crossroads

This week’s NFB Principal Contractors’ Group Conference has been really interesting – Chaired by Roger Black MBE (an entertaining, if not entirely Construction-focused speaker); keynote by Paul Morrell (the feeling amongst those I spoke to was that his will be hard steel-toe-capped boots to fill when he steps down from his post next month) and a speech from nubie Chloe Smith MP (Parliamentary Secretary to the Cabinet Office). These were just a few of the distinguished presenters. And to avoid writing a who’s who of key figures in construction, I won’t name any of the others.

'central government has no control over Local Authorities'

If there’s one thing I took on board from the conference, it was the point made recurrently by the presenters: that central government has no control over Local Authorities. The theme of the conference was Procurement, with the NFB launching their ‘Procurement at a Crossroads’ Report, which the title of this blog quotes. One of the more striking findings was that over 40% of respondents to their survey spend a month each year completing tenders. The government has already attempted to reduce the burden of procurement on small businesses by introducing PAS 91, the ‘standard PQQ’. But although its use in central government is mandatory, central government has no power to force local authorities to use it. And so it appears that they don’t. One interviewee reportedly “saw barriers to PAS 91 from the procurement executives within local government who used the uniqueness of the PQQ process as a way of justifying their job”.  So maybe this is one reason why "Use [of PAS 91] at the local authority level,.. is so low as to not be measurable."  So what’s the answer? Your comments please…

To contact the author of this blog email vicky.hutchinson@room4consulting.co.uk

The Top 5 Mistakes Bidders Make: No.1

No 1. Allow time and make a plan

Following from my previous blog (link) I promised some more detail on the mistakes that I see most frequently either whilst helping companies to improve their bids, or evaluating submissions on behalf of clients as part of the procurement process.

These days it seems that despite the numerous time saving devices and technological advances, people have less time than ever to do their day to day job.  Having recently delivered several Time Management seminars, I noted that one of the main issues seemed to be managing other peoples’ problems, but basically there just doesn’t seem to be enough seconds, minutes and hours in the day for us.  This seems particularly true of construction people.  They never have enough time in the day to put out all the fires they seem to be contending with. 

Unfortunately this means that proactive ‘wining work’ activities tend to be put at the bottom of the priority list, so that the PQQ/ITT is completed at the last minute and without enough resource being ploughed into it.

So I will tell you the secret to time management – change things. 

The only way to get better at managing time is to do things differently, it’s all about forming good habits.  After all, the old adage goes – always do what you’ve always done and you’ll always get what you always got!  Construction is all about good project management, so treat your PQQs and ITTs in the same way.  Winning the next job should be one of the most important things you do – make some time, assign resource and plan to do it properly.  Here are some quick and easy steps to follow before you start a PQQ/ITT:

·         Dependent on the size, complexity and importance of the bid you will need to involve other members of the team/company in the planning process – this is not a one man/woman show.

·         Consider three key questions:

1.       What is the client looking for, what are their key drivers and measures of success?

2.       What are my company’s key selling points? What story should I be telling the client?

3.       What evidence can I provide to prove the above? 

·         Set out a programme for completing the PQQ/ITT – make sure you plan to have the final draft completed at least 24 hours before submission, sooner if it needs to go to an external printer.

·         Include time in the plan for a proof read, preferably by an external/independent person.

Work through this process a few times and it will start to become second nature, and will take up less time.

For help in putting this process into place at your company contact me – katy.harris@room4consulting.co.uk

The Top 5 Mistakes Bidders Make

I have been working in procurement for about five years, and have spent even longer working in the construction industry supporting companies who want to become better – whether that is in winning work, managing their staff, increasing efficiency or responding to their clients requirements.  During that time I have found that when completing their PQQs or ITTs many companies are making the same simple and easily rectified mistakes.  So here’s my top 5, and over the next few weeks I will expand on what you can do to stop yourself from doing the same:

1. Allow time – construction people are always the busiest, most highly stressed individuals I meet. There never seems to be enough time in the day to put out all the fires they seem to be contending with.  Unfortunately this means that proactive ‘wining work’ activities tend to be put at the bottom of the priority list, so that the PQQ/ITT is completed at the last minute and without enough resource being ploughed into it. Winning the next job should be one of the most important things you do – make some time, assign resource and plan to do it properly.
2. Sell yourself – and prove it. Sounds simple? It would appear not.  For many reasons (see above) companies actually forget the bidding process is an opportunity to sell what’s good about their company.  They forget that their strengths, and more importantly even when they remember to put them in, they don’t provide any evidence. For example just telling your client you provide a quality service is meaningless.  Backing it up with evidence of externally accredited standards such as ISO, as well as client recommendations delivers a much stronger message.
3. Differentiate – the biggest complaint we hear about bidding at the moment, is that clients only want cheapest price and companies are prepared to ‘buy’ the work to retain turnover and keep going.  However if clients are only offered a group of companies who all basically do the same thing, offer the same service, provide the same quality i.e. average – then they can only differentiate on price.  However if you can demonstrate to your client that you go above and beyond what is required, provide exceptional service, innovate to improve, are able to demonstrate efficiencies and time/cost savings – then they will buy you.
4. Understand the client – for me this is absolutely key to a successful bid. It’s obvious when reading a submission from a company who clearly hasn’t done their research, doesn’t understand what is important to their potential client, and is therefore only able to provide basic answers - or in some cases completely miss the mark. Before you even put pen to paper on your response you should have listed out the key client requirements, and their potential drivers.  For example – a public sector client asking for examples of where you have implemented lean construction is no doubt looking for a company that can demonstrate cost and time savings.  Why? Because they have strict instructions as part of the Spending Review, to cut budgets by 20% minimum. At the end of the day, a client is looking to ‘buy’ the services of a company that clearly understands their needs, and can therefore respond to them.
5.  School boy errors! I have saved all my frustrations on the stupid mistakes I have seen over the years for the last point, here goes: Not reading the question properly, answering the question you want to answer - not the one the client has asked, spelling and grammatical mistakes, missing key signatures, not including appendices referred to in the text, no page numbers, missing pages, obvious sections of copied and pasted text, reference to the wrong client name, lack of consistency, poorly presented document, not submitting as per instructions, going over word/page counts, lack of proof reading…..

To avoid making some of these mistakes and more contact me at katy.harris@room4consulting.co.uk

Is there any use for Social Media in Construction?

Room4’s Tim Whitehill attended the first meeting of Constructing Excellence’s Social Media Task Group yesterday. Some of the early issues raised by the group were that Social Media is often something that is misunderstood in the construction sector. Is it simply a tool for the marketing department only, or is it something that can improve the way we provide service to our clients and possibly engage with some of the technological advances in our sector, for instance Building Information Modelling. Paul Wilkinson of pwcom.co.uk led the meeting, giving an excellent presentation, which gave an informative insight in to the vast array of media platforms, and the potential for how they could be used in construction.

The group also spent some time sharing experiences. Tim told of his experience on a recent trip to London on Virgin Trains, where he was struggling to gain access to the on board Wi-Fi. After venting his frustration on Twitter which included  Virgin Trains’ handle @virgintrains, within minutes he received a reply offering an apology and a solution. This was a ‘penny dropping’ moment.

From the ubiquitous Twitter, Facebook and Linkedin to the lesser known platforms of NING and KLOUT, the world of social media is without question growing at a pace. Coupled with the sharp rise of smart phones (now overtaking laptops and pc’s for our everyday access to internet), it’s now clear that as a sector, corporately and individually, we have to understand and identify the usefulness of Social Media.