Gender Pay Gap Digital Development

Tender description

Summary of the work We are looking for an agile delivery partner to provide a team to support the ongoing development and BAU management of the gender pay gap reporting and viewing services. Expected Contract Length 1 year Latest start date Monday 17 September 2018 Budget Range The budget for this work is capped at 1.62 million (including VAT) for 12 months from August 2018 to August 2019. Why the Work is Being Done The gender pay gap online service enables employers to comply with new regulations requring them to publish information showing differences in pay between women and men. During this second year of reporting, we need to develop the service to meet the needs of employers and thousands of other users by: • Harnessing the potential of the service as a tool for driving action to close the gender pay gap. • Improving existing reporting, actively encouraging and incentivising employers to publish action plans. • Continuing live service support as we work towards more effective administration and content management functions. Problem to Be Solved 1.Ensuring sufficient support and maintainence of the service. 2. Employers need to be better supported to meet their legislative gender pay gap reporting requirements and verify the accuracy of reporting. 3. Current and new features need to be developed using existing and ongoing user research to turn the service into a tool which will assist employers to close their gender pay gaps. Who Are the Users As an employer with 250 or more staff I need to report our gender pay gap data to the online government service on an annual basis so that I can meet my legal obligations. Additionally, I want to understand how we compare to other employers to inform actions we will take to close our pay gaps. As an employees I want to use the service to find out about my employer's gender pay gap and influence them to close it. As administrators and service managers we need to use the data and feedback from the service to inform policy development. Work Already Done The development of the service began in September 2016 with a six week discovery phase. This was followed by a two month alpha. Private beta started in January 2017 and the service moved into public beta in March 2017 in line with the gender pay gap regulations coming into force. There has been ongoing maintenance and service support. Cloud hosting has been supported by an in-house team. Research has been carried out, and should continue to inform future developments. Existing Team A blended team of permanent civil servants and external partners. Product Owner Delivery Manager/Scrum Master* Business Analyst* Senior User research* UR/BA* UX Designer* Senior Developer* Developer* Test development engineer* Content designer* Cloud hosting infrastructure team (Roles marked with an asterisk indicate roles supplied externally) Current Phase Beta Skills & Experience • Provide clear evidence of planning and delivering user-centred digital services that follow the Government Service Manual, corresponding service assessment process, and Technology Code of Practice. • Have experience in using Agile/Scrum methodology to iteratively architect/develop high quality government digital services to GDS open source standards. • Demonstrate experience of working as a joint team with commissioning organisation and operating within its governance. • Have experience of hands on management and the ability to conduct high quality handover and training sessions to ensure effective long term support and further development of the service. • Provide the following roles: Agile Lead, Scrum master, Full-stack Development, Front-end Development, Business Analysis, UX design and research all with demonstrable experience and excellent communication skills. • Have the ability to provide and flex Content Design resource as required in line with internal capability and capacity. • Have prior development experience of creating high and low level designs on Azure platform as a service, CMS design / development and supporting production applications. • Have experience of IAM and a good understanding of security for Azure. • Have experience of using C#Net Framework, ASP.NET and .NET core, SQL Server, Continuous Delivery (ARM), Redis cache and GIT • Extensive experience of development using the following technologies: HTML5; JavaScript; CSS3; WCAG 2.0 accessibility; OAUTH 2.0; Visual Studio Team Services; JSON and ARM Templates; Powershell; Azure Log Analytics • Have prior experience which includes using GDS Design Principles and Digital Service Standard and keeping up to date with Gov APIs, services, libraries and toolkits, GDS service assessments. • Service Design / UX Designer - prior experience to include but not limited to delivering high quality digital, user-centred services to GDS standards. • Content Designer - extensive experience of writing web and technical content in a succinct, clear manner and familiarity with gov.uk standards. • User Researcher - extensive experience of undertaking user research in line with the GDS Service Manual using a variety of research techniques to identify and analyse the user need. • Business Analyst - extensive experience including using agile/non-agile methodologies, proven communication, analytical, and problem-solving skills; analysing business, technical and user needs to agree detailed functional/technical specifications and plans. • Have the ability for all roles to work effectively and collaboratively with in house dev ops support and other internal and external delivery teams • Have the ability to quickly mobilise a skilled and experienced team, responding flexibly to peaks and troughs in demand. • Adhere to WCAG 2.0 standards. • Complete all development within the UK Nice to Haves • Demonstrate experience of providing on the job coaching in agile delivery and the specialist skills within the team. • Have experience of developing software that complies with Government security guidelines and current OWASP risks – including presenting compliance and necessary documentation showing that all suppliers are vetted. • Demonstrate good awareness of new technologies and services coming on line. • Demonstrate contingency and flexibility – demonstrate the ability to easily scale resources up or down based on project needs and substitute similar resources without any implication to the project. Work Location Government Equalities Office Sanctuary Buildings Great Smith Street SW1P 3BT Where travel to other sites is required, the GEO will meet expenses in line with the Departmental T&S claims policy. Working Arrangments Day to day delivery will be governed by standard agile delivery techniques. This will involve daily stand up and fortnightly sprint planning sessions which take a retrospective review on work delivered. The Product Owner will prioritise work for the next 2 weeks. The Delivery Manager will monitor progress and maintain proportionate project documentation. We expect all roles to attend stand ups and come together after each two week sprint cycle. Oversight of delivery will be provided by GEO's Gender Pay Gap Digital Governance Board. Security Clearance Evidence of BPSS clearance and annual certification on information handling and data protection are required for all contractors. Workers are not permitted to copy/remove or share any data owned by GEO, additionally suppliers will need to ensure that any system holding GEO data comply with the government security policy framework. Additional T&Cs • GDPR compliance • All contractors have completed security checks (BPSS clearance), completed information handling training, and data protection training prior to work commencing No. of Suppliers to Evaluate 3 Proposal Criteria • Demonstrate their understanding of the project’s ambitions and policy objectives. • How they would meet a key deliverable to develop features allowing users to manage their own accounts. • How they would propose to support GEO in reaching organisational leaders and helping them take action to close their gender pay gaps. • How they would meet a key deliverable of supporting GEO to maintain/increase traffic to the online viewing service. • How they would meet a key deliverable to develop a content management system. • How they would ensure they deliver services in line with user needs and GDS service standards. • How they would balance the requirements to deliver ongoing maintenance and service support alongside delivery of key functional developments at times of peak traffic. • How they would work with departmental Dev Ops, including identifying and assisting with any areas of potential cost savings or improvements • How they would produce and update documentation relating to any updates to the service. • Provide confidence that the team will have the right experience and capability to get up to speed quickly on the requirements and technical aspects of the service. • What risks and dependencies they have identified and their approach to managing them. Including security and protection of data, and risks to GEO’s reputation. • How they will ensure the GEO receives best value for money. Cultural Fit Criteria • Have the ability to work out of Sanctuary Buildings • Work collaboratively with GEO policy team and other suppliers to develop solutions • Have expereince of working with clients with low technical expertise • Have experience of working in a rapidly evolving policy environment with ability to respond quickly to urgent requirements. • Be willing to coach and mentor GEO staff to develop and build capability. • How will they interact with the in-house aspects of the team and wider GEO. • Have flexibility to work outside normal hours at critical times. • Proactively manage risk and identify potential issues and provide effective mitigations in a timely fashion. Payment Approach Capped time and materials Evaluation Weighting Technical competence 55% Cultural fit 20% Price 25% Questions from Suppliers 1. Who did the discovery, alpha and beta to date? Cadence Innova have been working with us from initial stages of discovery through to present public beta. 2. Which external agencies have you previously worked with for this project? Cadence Innova have been working with us from initial stages of discovery through to present public beta. 3. Please could you advise on the roles you require the successful supplier to provide? It is unclear from the asterisks in the existing team. The current team provide the roles set out below but we are open to suggestions for alternative team structures to meet the deliverables under the contract. We can be flexible with agreement of both parties. Delivery Manager/Scrum Master*Business Analyst*Senior User research*UR/BA*UX Designer*Senior Developer*Developer*Test development engineer*Content designer* 4. Can you clarify whether this work will be inside or outside IR35? Outside 5. Can you advise which suppliers form part of the blended team you mention? Also, which supplier(s) performed the earlier Discovery and Alpha work? Cadence Innova have been working with us from initial stages of discovery through to present public beta. 6. Is it the intention that the current Product Owner will continue in post through the course of this delivery? Our primary intention is to ensure that the team in place have the right levels of support and governance structures within GEO to deliver the contract. We will review staffing of the supporting roles in GEO, including Product Owner, in line with the new contract award. 7. Has a date already been set for a service assessment to move the service into Live operation? No. We are working with GDS to agree suitable timing for transition to Live operation. 8. If the VAT rate is increased during the course of this contract will there be a corresponding increase in budget for the work? Yes 9. Can you please confirm if the existing roles marked with an asterisk are being replaced by this procurement? Who currently provides them? Yes - Cadence Innova. 10. Who provided the Discovery, the Alpha and the Beta phases, please? Who has been providing on-going support to date? Cadence Innova have been working with us from initial stages of discovery through to present public beta. 11. Please could you confirm when the RFP proposal part of the response will be due from short-listed suppliers? Under the current timeline, we are planning to set a deadline of Tuesday 28 August for submitting proposals. 12. Could you please clarify the expected working arrangements? You've mentioned standups and end-of-sprint retros - once an initial vision has been agreed, would you be happy with the supplier generally working from their offices, with virtual daily standups, and face-to-face meetings every couple of weeks? The current team is embedded within GEO. Given the pace of the work to date, we believe all have found it helpful to work in such close proximity on a daily basis. This has worked successfully to date and we would be keen to continue such an arrangement. However, we are happy to consider alternative arrangements with flexibility to review. 13. Within the "Existing team" section there are multiple roles marked with an asterisk which are supplied externally. Could you please confirm who currently provides these roles and if they are being replaced by this procurement? Cadence Innova currently provide the roles marked with an asterisk but we are open to suggestions for alternative team structures to meet the deliverables under the contract. We can be flexible with agreement of both parties. 14. Would Ofgem be happy to see more than one illustrative example offered for a given skill & experience area (e.g. expertise in using specific technologies) if available and where of particular relevance? Regarding "experience of developing software that complies with Government security guidelines and current OWASP risks – including presenting compliance and necessary documentation showing that all suppliers are vetted" - please could you clarify the meaning of "suppliers are vetted" e.g. the vetting of individual consultants? To clarify in case of any confusion, it is not Ofgem but the Government Equalities Office who will be awarding the contract. We welcome multiple illustrative examples where this will help better demonstrate the skills and evidence.Evidence of BPSS clearance and annual certification on information handling and data protection are required for all contractors. 15. Regarding "experience of creating high and low level designs on Azure platform as a service, CMS design / development and supporting production applications" - , is your focus on CMS design/development and production support of applications running specifically on *Azure only*? Or is experience in CMS design/development and production support for services running on platforms other than Azure (cloud etc ) also of interest? The DfE are currently transitioning applications and services onto the Microsoft Azure platform so a good working knowledge and evidenced experience of IaaS, PaaS and SaaS provisioning and support is a necessity. In addition with a move onto the Office 365 subscription model and other Microsoft cloud-based services such as SharePoint Online and Dynamics 365, experience in design and development in these areas is essential. 16. Regarding "good awareness of new technologies and services coming on line" - to clarify, is your interest particular to technologies and services that may be relevant to government Digital Services? Or are there other particular areas and/or domains of interest to you? The focus will be primarily on Government Digital Services; their design, development, application and accessibility, including security. We are interested in horizon scanning beyond this that would be beneficial for supplier advice and support on technical options and suggestions for improvements.