Procurement
Procurement
Personnel with knowledge, experience and commitment to Better Buildings need to be engaged at all stages of the construction process.
Client Role
The Better Building initiative is intended to assist clients in formulating briefs and selecting design and planning consultants. Clients need to take a lead in making sure that those involved in the project are aware of their aims in relation to sustainability.
Aims should be clear and could be provided in the form of a corporate policy statement and a clear project brief to consultants and contractors.
Consultant Role
Better Buildings provides information, guidance and signposting on policy, materials selection, information sourcing and best practice in order to assist planners and designers in their research.
The Better Buildings initiative is supported by available experience and resources within Leicester City Council and its partner organisations and though its network of external local and national organisations. The aim is to link these together.
Routes to Procurement
There are two key differences that mark out best-practice procurement from all other forms of traditional procurement.
- Pro-active role for the specialist supplier (sub-contractor, specialist contractor and manufacturer) from the outset of design development.
This means abandoning all forms of traditional procurement that delay the appointment of specialist suppliers until the design is well advanced. Traditional forms of sequential appointment are replaced with a requirement to appoint a totally integrated design and construction supply chain from the outset. This is only possible if the appointment of the integrated supply chain is through a single point of contact - precisely as it would be when buying any product from any other sector.
- The abandonment of lowest capital cost as the value-for-money comparator
In the selection process this is replaced with whole-life cost and functional performance as the value-for-money comparator. This means the industry must predict, deliver and be measured by its ability to deliver maximum durability and functionality (which includes delighted end users).
Partnering Approach
Procurement requires the adoption of a partnering approach whenever possible, i.e. a structured management approach to team working within the supply chain. Partnering is a particular model for team working and requires the partners to formally sign up to share objectives, to agree methods for dispute resolution and to work together to continuously improve measurable performance. It should extend throughout the supply chain rather than simply between the client and the contractor, as often happens now. There is a new standard form of contract for use in a partnering arrangement.
Rethinking the Way
Government policy is to promote the Rethinking Construction agenda aimed at improving the performance of the construction industry. Accordingly, public sector clients are increasingly required to embrace radical structural and cultural change in procurement practice. The Housing Corporation now requires all grant funded housing association development to comply with the Rethinking Construction approach.