Market Assessment - for a new recruitment system and code review of existing bespoke system copy

Tender description

Summary of the work A Discovery to provide a recommendation to solve our problem with the data to justify it. This may involve: - market assessment of recruitment solutions; - Drupal 7 code review; - determining best fit hosting provider; - commercial analysis of different options and combinations from implementation into live support. Expected Contract Length Estimate 6 weeks for Discovery with the final agreed recommendation to be provided by 28/09/2018. Latest start date Monday 20 August 2018 Budget Range Bidders to suggest total cost based on requirements and JAC budget cap of £800 per day, per resource up to a total of £60,000 (exc VAT). The JAC have assumed the team will be made up of a Software SME (subject matter expert), Hosting SME, Drupal 7 code reviewer and Senior Business Analyst. The JAC are willing to consider an alternative team make-up to provide an accurate evidence based recommendation to solve our problem subject to the provision of clear rationale for the proposed capabilities. Why the Work is Being Done The recruitment system is the core critical business application for the JAC. It supports the delivery of judicial recruitment, delivers digital efficiencies for handling candidate applications, on-line shortlisting tests, references and communications with candidates. The contract with the supplier of the existing system expires on April 2019 therefore this review is essential for the JAC to make an evidence based decision from an independent source to identify the best solution for current and future needs. It's our intention that a competition for a replacement contract will be undertaken in 2019 which may be based upon the findings of this review. Problem to Be Solved Does the JAC upgrade or replace it's current system for managing Judicial recruitment? This needs to be answered taking account of the current bespoke Drupal7 application; the suppliers that can implement and manage the future platform; the supplier to host it on; the support it will need and the commercial analysis of each available option. This commercial analysis, as a minimum, needs to account for - creation/upgrade of the tool; - the testing of it; - the hosting of it; - the staff training to use it; - the live service support needs; and - continuous improvement. Who Are the Users Candidates - I want to apply for a judicial vacancy. Independent Assessor - I need to provide an assessment of a candidate. Staff Members - I need to process candidate applications. Panel Members - I need to evaluate and grade candidate applications. Citizens - I need to access information about the JAC and judicial opportunities. Senior Leaders - I need to determine the strategic direction and/or next steps of the recruitment process. Communications Manager - I need to raise awareness about opportunities and vacancies. Early Market Engagement None Undertaken Work Already Done The JAC have created over 170 high-level user stories, which will be shared with shortlisted suppliers at the proposal stage. A governance structure has been agreed with a clear decision making process. An approved project initiation document and high-level requirements summary has been produced. Access to user researchers and other technical support is being discussed with Ministry of Justice Digital team. Engagement with Government Digital Service has started for a service assessment. A budget is approved for this Discovery. (Separate to this contract there is an opportunity to help with capturing detailed requirements and support for procuring the future technology). Existing Team The existing team are the JAC Digital Team and other nominated JAC Staff. These teams are all Civil Servants. The individual names will be illustrated in the governance diagram provided to shortlisted suppliers at the proposal stage. Current Phase Discovery Skills & Experience • Provide recent and demonstrable experience for understanding user and business needs. (3%) • Provide recent and demonstrable experience for conducting off-the-shelf application assessments to meet user needs. (5%) • Outline recent and demonstrable experience for providing an assessment of a supplier (e.g. software and hosting maintenance) to meet business needs. (5%) • Outline recent and demonstrable experience for providing commercial assessments from the implementation through to live support services that meet business needs. (5%) • Outline recent and demonstrable experience for providing platform hosting assessments to meet business needs. (5%) • Providing references, evidence your experience of providing an evidence based recommendation of a technology solution. (8%) • Provide recent and demonstrable experience of conducting code reviews (3%) Nice to Haves • Provide recent and demonstrable experience for conducting recruitment technology solution assessments. (2%) • Provide recent and demonstrable experience of Drupal 7 code reviews. (2%) • Provide recent and demonstrable experience of defining customer journeys. (1%) • Provide recent and demonstrable experience of creating detailed user stories in accordance with the standards set out in the Government Digital Services' service assessment framework. (1%) • Provide recent and demonstrable experience of providing advice/support on a technology procurement within central government. (1%) Work Location Clive House, Petty France, London, SW1H 9EX (the 'Base Location') Working Arrangments On site for approximately 3 days for face to face meetings and clarifying needs. Use Agile working methods - daily stand ups, weekly sprint planning and reviews. Weekly progress report to senior stakeholders Use of on line collaboration tools such as Skype for remote working. Ideally, the JAC's Senior Digital Manager to be providing reviews, direction and clarification on progress to the Supplier on a daily basis. Security Clearance Baseline Personnel Security Check (BPSS) as a minimum. See https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/government-baseline-personnel-security-standard for further guidance. Additional T&Cs For any work performed at a location different to that of the Base location and London (outside of the M25), all reasonable travel and expenses costs shall be met in accordance with the rates set out in the MoJ travel and subsistence policy. All expenses will require prior approval from the JAC before being reimbursed. Please Note: The JAC may consider a slightly later start date to attract the right supplier to this opportunity and as long as this can be justified. No. of Suppliers to Evaluate 5 Proposal Criteria • Describe how you would work with off-the-shelf packaged vendors during this Discovery. Examples of where you have done this previously can be used. (5%) • Describe the method you would propose to use, referencing your experience on how you would conduct bespoke application development assessments to meet our user needs. (4%) • Describe the method you would propose to use, referencing your experience on how you would conduct secondary research to meet our user needs. (5%) • Describe the method you would propose to use, referencing your experience on how you would conduct primary research (e.g. user interviews) to meet our user needs. (5%) • Describe how you will ensure a high quality recommendation will be provided through your approach and methodology. (5%) Cultural Fit Criteria • Recent and demonstrable experience of working in public sector or highly regulated environment. (2%) • Explain how you’ll ensure collaboration at all levels of the project and programme delivery between users, team members and management. Give examples of where you have taken this approach. (6%) • Explain how you’ll ensure collaboration with vendors to understand how their technology aligns with our business needs. (5%) • Provide experience of working with small organisations who have niche requirements. This is because the JAC have c60 staff, and our recruitment method has some unique characteristics. (2%) Payment Approach Capped time and materials Evaluation Weighting Technical competence 65% Cultural fit 15% Price 20% Questions from Suppliers 1. Will you rule out bids that have some resources above the £800 per day cap? No. This is our cap and if you exceed it you need to provide some justification. Please note that price is 20% of the overall mark. 2. JAC: IMPORTANCE NOTICE TO SUPPLIERSWe are holding a Q&A session on the 11th July between 11.30 to 13.30. Suppliers should log in to view the teleconference details. . 3. Authority Published Question to assist Suppliers:What is the tender timeline? This is the proposed tender timeline:11th July - Requirements' Q&A with all suppliers24th July - Inform all suppliers who have been shortlisted to provide a detailed proposal30th July - Detail proposal presentation and Q&A to all remaining suppliers07th Aug - Final submission of the detailed proposals09th Aug - Individual supplier Q&A13th Aug - Inform suppliers of contract award decision17th Aug - Sign contracts20th Aug - Start projectThis is subject to change if there are compelling reasons. All changes will be notified straight away. 4. Authority Published Question to Assist Suppliers:Will completing this contract for a market assessment prevent the supplier from contracting for any other stage of the future solution (e.g. support on procurement or implementation)? No, however the nature of any future procurement is not yet known so we reserve the right to ask Suppliers to sign an ethical wall agreement. 5. Authority Published Question to Assist Suppliers:Are you open to different methods to solve this business problem? We would consider a different approach and method to solve this problem, than what is implied in this requirement, where the Supplier to able to demonstrate a better outcome. 6. Authority Published Question to Assist Suppliers:For the selection criteria what is specifically meant by "Recent"? We are focused much more on your experience of fulfilling the criteria, than how long ago it was. However, please provide the most relevant recent example to help us understand your length of experience. 7. Authority Published Question to Assist Suppliers:What do you mean by "commercial assessment"? The cost (including inflation etc.) and quality assessment to help us determine which solution best fits our needs. 8. The day rate cap seems to be fixed a little low. Considering the nature and time-box for the work, it might work better for suppliers to be able to allocate senior staff to the project over a shorter time, rather than junior staff over a longer time, in order to deliver within budget. Would you consider removing this cap, and focusing on value for money of the overall budget in proposals? Currently, this is the spend approval obtained. If we can provide strong evidence that this cap is preventing us from obtaining a quality recommendation, we may be able to re-review our spend approval. Where possible, a senior team to provide their experience within the timeframe would be preferable to a junior team over a longer period. This will allow us to maintain our executive board decision timelines. Please see our response to question number 1 and 5 to give further details to answer this question. Suppliers are reminded that price is 20% of the overall mark. 9. Questions from Q&A session via teleconference with the JAC on 11th July 2018Does the budget imply that an off-the-shelf application is already decided because you have requested a role for a hosting SME? No. We are looking for a supplier to provide a methodology to solve our business problem and are open-minded about any recommendation that may result.Bidders are to suggest total cost estimates based upon the requirements and JAC budget cap of £800 per day, per resource up to a total of £60,000 (exc VAT).We appreciate there are solutions which need to take hosting into account. There is no predisposition of what the end outcome will be.We may not need a hosting SME at project commencement and may only need one as we discover what tools meet our requirements. 10. Question from Q&A session via teleconference with the JAC on 11th July 2018Do we have JAC staff commitment, especially as this piece of work is estimated to be completed over a busy holiday period? Yes. The Product Manager will be available daily as this is his number one priority. We have governance and approval from the senior leadership team which includes the Head of Operations and her nominated members of staff for different functional areas. 11. Question from Q&A session via teleconference with the JAC on 11th July 2018Have you done any existing user research? Yes. We have captured high-level requirements in the form of user stories. These are mapped against operational staff owners and whether that requirement has been met from our existing tool. Therefore, it clearly shows which requirements need new functionality.All the high-level requirements will be shared with the shortlisted suppliers at the proposal stage. These high-level requirements include user stories, non-functional requirements and persona’s. Separately we have access to research collected from candidates and analytics on the candidate website. 12. Question from Q&A session via teleconference with the JAC on 11th July 2018Do you think you have enough user stories or will there be a need from the supplier to conduct more research? The requirements we have now will be sufficient for us to do this market assessment, but we anticipate further detailed user research will be needed so we can have further assurances at the procurement stage. 13. Question from Q&A session via teleconference with the JAC on 11th July 2018Is the candidate website in scope for the review? Yes. The key technology that we anticipate being in scope is the candidate website, the back-end business application for managing candidate applications, improving our reporting capability, an easier way to publish official stats and a better communications tool. 14. Question from Q&A session via teleconference with the JAC on 11th July 2018Is the Board’s approval included within the 6-week timeframe indicated in the budget? No. The 6-week time window is for the purpose of conducting research and writing a report with the recommendation. The Product Manager/ Project Lead will use this report to make a recommendation to the Board.Subject to approval of the recommended option we will go out to competition for the procurement of the upgraded/new tool which will include gaining spend approval.The timeline is an estimate; however, we're looking for the best methodology from the supplier to resolve our business problem. Furthermore, if the supplier’s methodology is outside of those timelines then justification should be included within the proposal response. 15. Question from Q&A session via teleconference with the JAC on 11th July 2018The working arrangements mention “3 days on site” is that 3 days a week or 3 days total? This is 3 days a week. This is an approximate and we will look for your indication of what is the most suitable for your methodology and working practices. Please also consider how we can work remotely if needed. 16. Question from Q&A session via teleconference with the JAC on 11th July 2018Was the existing research completed internally or by an external agency? The requirements were captured by JAC’s Product Manager and Project Support. The Product Manager has considerable experience with big system implementations. Thus, can capture high-level requirements. In addition, we are anticipating getting expert user research support for capturing detailed requirements. 17. Question from Q&A session via teleconference with the JAC on 11th July 2018Are you reviewing the operational processes alongside the decision of the platform? In addition, are there plans to change the operational processes for applying to the Judiciary? The Head of Operations has confirmed the operational processes are reviewed for each recruitment exercise, each year, and at a high-level they do not currently need changing. However, the constraints of our current system prevents some proposed improvements being made as we would wish. We are hoping, with the next phase of our system, to implement quite a number of low-level process changes that are highly desirable but not currently practical. These changes are identified as part of the high-level requirements which will be provided to suppliers who get through to the proposal stage.