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The procurement plan is often treated as the document that allows a process to start. Its more important function is to establish a controlled position that remains usable after release.

The Department of Finance describes procurement as a lifecycle that begins with an identified need and continues through market engagement, evaluation, contract award, delivery, payment, contract management and, where relevant, disposal. Planning therefore has to do more than secure approval to approach the market. It must establish choices that can be carried through the complete lifecycle.

Define what planning must control

A useful planning baseline identifies:

  • the outcome or capability required
  • the decision to be made and the authorised decision-maker
  • the scope, assumptions, exclusions and interfaces
  • the procurement method and market-engagement approach
  • the evaluation logic
  • the proposed commercial and contracting model
  • material risks and their intended controls
  • approvals, delegations and probity arrangements
  • the evidence required to demonstrate value for money
  • how the contract will be mobilised and managed

Each item should be specific enough to guide later documents. A general statement that the procurement will be competitive, risk-based or outcome-focused does not tell the drafting team, evaluators or contract managers what control is expected. The Commonwealth Procurement Rules keep value for money at the centre of that record.

Planning choices should be expressed in testable terms. If schedule certainty is material, the plan should state which milestones, dependencies and evidence will be requested and evaluated. If technical-data access is important, the plan should identify the rights and deliverables required. If supplier capacity is a concern, market engagement and evaluation should test it directly.

Make the requirement evaluable

A requirement is evaluable where tenderers can understand what is being requested and evaluators can distinguish the relative merits, risks and costs of the responses.

The requirement, response structure and evaluation criteria should be developed together. For each material requirement, the team should ask:

  1. What must the supplier provide or demonstrate in its response?
  2. What evidence would distinguish a strong response from a weak one?
  3. How will the evaluation team record and moderate the finding?
  4. Where will the successful position appear in the contract or delivery baseline?

This traceability avoids two common problems. The first is asking tenderers for extensive information that does not affect evaluation. The second is evaluating a claimed strength that never becomes an enforceable obligation, deliverable, acceptance setting or performance measure.

The ASDEFCON suite illustrates the connection between conditions of tender, response volumes, statements of work and draft contracts. Tailoring should preserve that connection rather than treating each document as a separate drafting exercise.

Develop the commercial position with the process

The commercial model should not be left until the technical requirement is considered complete.

Risk allocation, pricing, intellectual property, technical data, acceptance, incentives, liability, insurance, change and exit settings affect market interest, tender response, evaluation and negotiation. They need to mature with the requirement.

During planning, the team should identify:

  • which risks the Commonwealth can control, retain or mitigate
  • which risks a supplier can reasonably price and manage
  • the price structure needed for the proposed delivery model
  • the evidence required to test price and whole-of-life implications
  • the rights needed to integrate, compete, transition or sustain the capability
  • the proposed acceptance and payment logic
  • anticipated change and the mechanism for authorising it

These choices should be tested through market analysis or controlled industry engagement where appropriate. Finance’s procurement process considerations provide current whole-of-government context. The aim is not to negotiate the procurement before release. It is to identify assumptions that would otherwise produce an unworkable request or a false sense of competition.

Treat governance as part of the procurement design

Governance is not a separate overlay added after the plan is approved. It determines how the procurement will use evidence and authority.

The plan should state:

  • who owns the requirement
  • who approves the procurement approach
  • who evaluates technical, commercial, financial and risk matters
  • how conflicts are identified and managed
  • how clarifications and material process issues are controlled
  • how findings are moderated
  • who can approve negotiation positions and concessions
  • what material goes to the delegate or other authorised decision-maker

A process can be administratively compliant and still produce poor decisions if roles, evidence standards or escalation paths are unclear.

Governance also needs to be proportionate. A small number of forums with distinct functions is usually stronger than multiple overlapping groups. The objective is timely movement of reliable evidence to the person authorised to act.

Control change after approval

Procurement planning is based on assumptions that will change. The control requirement is to make change visible and authorised.

The planning baseline should identify which matters require formal update or re-approval. Examples may include:

  • material change to scope or outcome
  • change in procurement method
  • altered evaluation logic
  • significant change to risk allocation or commercial model
  • affordability movement beyond approved tolerance
  • changed market conditions
  • schedule movement that affects competition or delivery feasibility

A change log should record the original position, the proposed movement, evidence, impact, approving authority and consequential document updates.

Without this discipline, the approved plan, released request, evaluation method and final contract can describe different procurements. The record then becomes difficult to defend and harder to hand over.

Plan for contract mobilisation before market release

Contract management should influence the procurement before release.

The team that will manage delivery should help test:

  • whether obligations and deliverables can be assigned to owners
  • whether acceptance criteria are measurable
  • whether performance information can be produced and verified
  • whether proposed governance fits available delegations and systems
  • whether variation and waiver controls are workable
  • whether the Commonwealth can exercise key commercial levers
  • what evaluation assumptions and negotiated commitments must transfer into mobilisation

Finance’s procurement lifecycle guidance connects planning to contract management. Fit-for-purpose arrangements are easier to establish where the procurement has been designed with operation in mind.

A procurement handover record should be planned before release and completed at signature. It should capture material assumptions, evaluation findings, negotiated positions, residual risks, commitments, approvals and immediate mobilisation actions.

A practical release test

Before an approach to market, the procurement team should be able to demonstrate:

  • the requirement, response structure, evaluation criteria and draft contract are aligned
  • each material information request has a clear evaluation or delivery purpose
  • the commercial model has been tested against the market and delivery model
  • evaluation roles, conflicts, evidence standards and moderation are defined
  • negotiation authority and approval pathways are understood
  • material planning changes are recorded and approved
  • contract-management representatives have tested operability
  • the value-for-money record can be assembled from the planned evidence
  • the handover into mobilisation has a defined owner and format

The test is not whether every uncertainty has been removed. It is whether material choices, assumptions and controls are visible enough for the market to respond and for authorised client personnel to make and later explain the decision.