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The festive season?

1/2/2014

5 Comments

 
Posted by Jon
Two questions on my mind, as I start back at work in 2014:
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- what proportion of proposal people ended up working on bids over the festive season?
- and why on earth are very many procurement people so disrespectful of the staff working for their suppliers as to set deadlines at the very start of January?

I can offer my own perspective on the latter, from my days in purchasing (before I switched sides of the negotiating table, back in 1999). Running a very large (multi-hundred-million pound) global outsourcing deal for a major bank, our project plan included the eminently reasonable target of completing our RFP by the end of the year – before we broke for Christmas and the New Year.
What we then did surprised the shortlisted vendors: once the document was finalised (around the 18th, if I recall correctly), we refused to send it to them. Our rationale? Firstly, that we wanted the bid teams to be fresh and creative when preparing their responses. And secondly that expecting people to work over the holidays was entirely inconsistent with our stated aims of genuinely finding a ‘partner’ who could help us to bring about change to the way in which services were delivered to our organisation. That’s why our project plan was always clear: complete the RFP before the holidays; issue it at the very start of January, and then give the bidders sufficient time to respond professionally. Good for them – but, ultimately, helping to draw out the best propositions from the market for us.

I rather suspect that’s an unusual approach for a procurement manager to take – but, then again, this was a somewhat unusually forward-looking and strategic purchasing function, many of whose members have gone on to do other wonderful things in their careers since. Your more typical – junior, tactical, arrogant buyer – is far less likely to care, or even to think through the consequences (for them!) of their actions when issuing a Yuletide document.
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So, if you’re in a part of the world where this has been a holiday season, did you end up working flat out right through the end of December, or heading straight back into the office on the morning of 1st January? And, do you think the potential clients concerned got the very best of your organisation in the offer and proposal that you submitted as a result?
5 Comments
Lauren
3/25/2016 02:43:39 pm

Jon, this couldn’t have hit the nail on the head of what we are going through right now even more! We are working on a deadline on 2 pm tomorrow, and here it is less than 24 hours to deadline and the procurement team hasn’t even responded to vendor questions! Apparently, they haven’t been able to reach the right folks at their organization because of the holiday.

It must have been great working for such a smart organization, sending out an RFP after everyone gets a break!

Reply
Grace
3/25/2016 02:43:49 pm

At least 5 RFPs arrived in mid-December, but thankfully, the first deadline isn’t until January 10. While we didn’t have to scramble to submit responses during the holidays, we had to work steadily to get them teed up for the sales and technical teams to complete after the New Year. I had hoped to complete tasks of more strategic significance, like auditing stock content and coming up with ways to work more efficiently, but I had no such luck.

Reply
Ruth Lown Turman
3/25/2016 02:44:01 pm

The big government agencies seem to be the worst offenders on this side of the pond.

Haveto echo Lauren (we MAY be bidding on the exact same proposal! Due on Monday, still no answers to vendor questions). The ONLY holiday we weren’t working or “on call” this year was Thanksgiving and that only because of an 11th hour extension. A two day break in the middle of a proposal isn’t enough time to decompress much less recharge one’s batteries. And don’t EVEN ask about the last 24 hours before and the first 48 hours after my one vacation this year….

And must agree with Grace. We were really counting on some down time this year to work on professional development and process improvement. It simply didn’t happen. Don’t get me wrong; we’re thrilled to be working and successful, but we’re all exhausted; creativity and collaboration are definitely are among the first things taking a back seat to just keeping our heads above water.

Reply
Jon C
3/25/2016 02:44:14 pm

We once had a client who requested that their finished proposal document was submitted on January 2nd, after issuing the request on something like December 14th – I kid you not!

We eventually got a week’s extension, but we had to ask for it.

Reply
John E. Bredehoft
3/25/2016 02:44:27 pm

My co-workers and I were spared a Christmas/New Year’s ordeal, but one of my co-workers had to postpone a U.S. Thanksgiving vacation (ironically, *because* of an extension).

My suspicion is that many procurement officers would love to be forward-thinking, but if a procurement gets behind schedule, the officer is forced to worry about his/her own schedule, and can’t afford to worry about the schedules of the vendors.

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