I don’t get angry often. The energy anger takes can always be used in a more positive way, but something happened this week which has set me off and I wanted to share it here.

We recently bid for a piece of scoping work for a Management and Leadership programme. The requirement was pretty clear:

• Engagement with key officers to refine the brief;
• Agreement and creation of delivery timetable;
• Agreement and setting out the deliverables, capturing and confirming the objectives;
• Engagement with key stakeholders (likely to include key Workforce officers and a sample of managers who would be undertaking the training;
• Design of a management development programme, with costings and options for the organisation to consider (we hope begin the delivery of this programme by April 2025 and therefore would like all of the design phase to be complete by mid March 2025;
• Advice on delivery options;
• Project Closure.

It was a good bid; we know it was competitive, comprehensive and had a good chance of success. We’d heard nothing and, as so prompted a question about what the timetable was. We heard back this week that the scoping we had been asked to produce needed to be clarified.

We are seeking assurance on the exact deliverables contained within your proposal.

Please can you confirm that your proposal includes a detailed session plans for each mandatory and elective module as set out in the brief?
Please can you confirm that your proposal includes session PowerPoint presentations for each mandatory and elective module?
Please can you confirm that your proposal includes workbooks, where relevant, for each mandatory and elective module?
Please can you confirm that your proposal includes the accompanying module training resources such as case studies, individual or group activities for each mandatory and elective module?
Please can you confirm that your proposal includes the assessment material (if relevant) for each mandatory and elective module?

I’m angry for three specific reasons.

Firstly, the budget which was being suggested is, in no way, suitable for the piece of work which is being asked for. To produce all the elements above across a likely course list of 20+ modules is going to be three or four times what the original scoping budget was. This is an appalling “bait and switch” adopted by the purchaser.

Secondly, the idea of producing a programme which can adapt to the flexibility of the needs required has been lost. To want a vendor to produce to the level of detail of all he workbooks and exercises which will be relevant to the cohort in the space of time available is unachievable. What will happen is we will see vendors take the same old things they’ve used before and refold them to try and make them relevant to the audience. We all know this won’t be satisfactory, loads of people will find the programme ineffective and they’ll have to restart again when it’s not worked.

Lastly, it restricts SMEs from attempting to try and get business like this. We deliberately went for this work because it wasn’t of a value which larger vendors would be interested in. It was pitched at the right value for micro and small enterprises to bid towards. To then change the rules of the process is dishonest.

I’m not going to name the organisation; if people search it out they’ll find them, and by writing this I’m probably in breach of the tender process. I don’t care – I’m angry.