Month: June 2020

As software solutions for public sector functions become more and more ubiquitous, nailing down a software RFP template that is adaptable to all your software needs is more important than ever. 

Although public agencies may have previously seen government technology as a “nice to have,” the recent of impacts of COVID-19 are starting to chip away at that mentality. We found that, amongst our 400+ public sector clients, telecommunications competitive events had increased by 37% after COVID-19 first started impacting North America.

Before getting started on your software RFP template, check out these 4 tips that will help your RFPs capture the right data to make successful software purchasing decisions. 

Ask these security questions

For any organization, public or commercial, security is a top priority when implementing any software solution. We’ve compiled some basic questions that should always be included in your software RFP template, regardless of the solution you’re buying. They target the important areas of cloud-based deployment such as the location of data storage, data ownership, and how upgrades will be rolled out. We go more in-depth into the reasoning behind each of these questions in our 5 keys to buying software-as-a-service webinar.

• Where will my data be stored?
• What are your security policies?
• Do you use encryption in-transit and at-rest?
• Who owns the data?
• Do you back up data? How often and where?
• Which cloud provider do you use?
• Is your production environment separate from your development/testing/staging environment?
• What is your software development lifecycle? 

Prioritize client experience, not just support

At Bonfire, we took a look at first-party data to understand common criteria weightings in software RFP templates. On average, those criteria weightings are:

• 20% for the presentation/demo
• 10% for the implementation plan
• 10% for support/maintenance
• 50% for the technical specifications

Although many organizations put emphasis on implementation and support in their software RFPs, most don’t consider ongoing client experience, which ensures you’re getting the most value out of your investment. Client experience goes beyond implementation plans and technical support, including things like:

• An assigned Account Manager or Client Success Manager who will get to know your unique needs and challenges
• On-going training so that users can become experts in the product
• Support and training when new products or updates are released
• Self-teaching opportunities, like in-app product walkthroughs
• User conferences and meetups, in-person or virtually

Leverage national and local data and insights

When you create your software RFP template, you don’t need to start from scratch. As technology adoption and implementation continues to increase in the public sector, there is more data than ever before on how other organizations are structuring their evaluation criteria and weighting in their RFPs. Instead of searching Google for “software RFP templates” to get an idea of how your peers are structuring their solicitations, you can access best practice data from the start to ensure all your bids and RFPs are set-up for success.

But how do you gain access to the data that can inform your software RFPs? 

In our latest webinar, we introduced Bonfire Benchmarking, which provides procurement professionals with access to bid and RFP recommendations and templates surfaced from Bonfire’s library of 40,000+ competitive events. Bonfire Benchmarking provides procurement teams with national and local benchmarks on typical project timelines, evaluation criteria and weighting, vendor participation, and more. Watch the webinar to learn more.

We get it. Your first electronic bid solicitation (e-solicitation) is nerve-racking. Will vendors be able to submit? Will your evaluation run smoothly? Will you miss your paper process?

Yes. Yes. And absolutely not, to be frank.

But nerves are normal—implementing new tools and processes can be challenging without a plan. At Bonfire, we’ve helped hundreds of public agencies navigate the transition from paper-based procurement to Bonfire (and we learned some tips ‘n tricks along the way!).

While some organizations jump right into the deep end and immerse themselves in eProcurement, others dip their toe in, hesitant to take the plunge. Maybe you’re ready to get up and running right away, but your vendors and evaluators aren’t. We’re here to help.

The Bonfire Client Experience team customizes implementation for each client. From our experience conducting hundreds of custom implementations, we developed the following strategies to help organizations move procurement online, no matter where they are in their technology-adoption journey.

Notify vendors of your transition before your first e-solicitation

Before your first electronic bid solicitation, we recommend sending vendors an email explaining your transition to an online system. This email should include the link to register for your online portal and explain that registration is free and easy, clearing them from challenges associated with paper submissions, such as printing and shipping costs. Not to mention, most suppliers have experience with online submissions, maybe at another agency or in another state. 

Transparent and proactive communication will ease vendors into eProcurement with fewer hiccups.

If you’re getting started with Bonfire, ask your Implementation Specialist to learn more. 

Keep vendor registration simple

Vendor registration fields are a great way to capture critical information before your vendor submits a proposal or bid. Sometimes, however, complicated or lengthy registration setups can deter vendors from joining your database. 

By making it easy for vendors to register on your portal, you can receive all critical information about your suppliers (i.e. DBE status) without making the registration process tedious.

Mimic your paper-bid process for the first few e-solicitations

Bonfire lets you create a “checklist” for vendor submissions, ensuring you receive required documentation (the less vendor rectification, the better!). These checklists, called Requested Information, are where vendors submit their files.

While your vendors get familiar with Bonfire, mimic your Requested Information to how you accepted documents in a paper process. For example, if you requested vendors to split their submission into a “Technical” envelope and a “Pricing” envelope, create two requested information slots: One for the technical files, one for pricing. 

By keeping your requested information similar to your paper process, vendors can adjust to their new submission process while following familiar concepts.

Take advantage of Bonfire’s resources

Concerned about your evaluation committee learning how to use Bonfire? Have no fear, instead, your evaluators will cheer.

For example, in May 2020, only about 1 percent of our support tickets came from evaluators. That’s because Bonfire’s evaluation tool is intuitive and easy to use! When you invite your reviewers to a project, they’ll receive an invitation with a 3-minute training video that summarizes the entire evaluation process. 

But there’s more.

Every week we host drop-in training sessions (you can check out the schedule and register here). If your evaluators want a refresher, they can sign up for this live training, available for free.

But there’s still more.

Our clients love our Bonfire User Guides, available on-demand and accessed directly from Bonfire. For example, this guide walks your evaluation committee through creating their account, accessing vendor documents, and completing their evaluation, whereas this guide reviews how to score a questionnaire. With screenshots, text-walkthroughs, and videos, we’ve got it all. 

Prepare for ravin’ reviews

After your vendors and evaluators get the hang of this new “electronic submission” thing, you’ll be pleased (and not surprised) with how much they love Bonfire. Here are examples of the great feedback we receive daily from vendors, thrilled about online submissions through Bonfire:

“Honestly I was terrified to be forced to do the online bid, but after going through it I totally changed my perception of the whole process. Positive experience for me.”

“Bonfire is probably the easiest and most straightforward of all the online sites we submit to. Keep up the good work.”

“This is one of the easiest digital submission processes I have ever used.”

“This process was the best experience yet!”

“This is how the proposal process should be. Thank you, keep up the good work!”

“Actually, the entire process was excellent. Reduces costs for submissions. Helps to manage timelines vs. trying to manage around riskier logistics for paper submissions. Technology is smooth. Communication, including notification of successful submission, is strong. I am very pleased with the tools.”

“The Bonfire portal is by far the best procurement site I have ever worked with. It is intuitive to use. I wish all utilities issuing RFPs used Bonfire. It is a million times better than the other sites.”

Rest easy knowing the team is here to support you, your vendors, and your evaluators. Whether it’s through vendor invitations, our Bonfire User Guides or our Training Program, our resources, tips ‘n tricks will ensure a smooth transition to electronic submissions.

Amidst all the uncertainty of our nation’s post-pandemic outlook–given budget shortfalls and declining revenue streams–two things are certain to remain: procurement and grants processes. What’s also abundantly clear is that the status quo of manual and paper processes is no longer sustainable, especially in the era where governments have been forced to quickly move workforces, tasks, and processes alike to virtual environments.

Given the current reality, how do state, local, and tribal departments and agencies modernize government functions like procurement and grants management that seem as old as time itself? This article delves into why it’s essential to invest in tools to help virtualize procurement and grants management now and two ways to get started.

Why Legacy Modernization is Long Overdue

There are many good reasons as to why governments have remained on their legacy systems and processes, including time, concern for security, and cost savings. However, not only is cloud technology becoming more advanced by the day, more secure, and even more cost-efficient, but failing to modernize legacy technologies and processes is hindering public servants from being able to deliver essential services to their communities.

For example, a recent national survey from the Economic Policy Institute found that millions were unable to file an unemployment insurance claim. Upon examining this issue more closely, the last time states saw a surge of claims was during the Great Recession in 2009. While states later received funds to modernize their unemployment insurance systems and made some strides later in 2010, there were few jobless individuals actually applying for benefits. Their systems at the time were deemed “good enough” and remained largely untouched. Fast forward to today’s economic crisis, and many departments are now feeling the burden of legacy systems as unemployment claims skyrocket.

The moral of this story is that the era of COVID-19 is demonstrating the necessity of digital transformation across government. Never has it been more important or challenging for procurement and grant professionals to do their jobs.

How to Virtualize Your Procurement and Grants Management

Both eCivis (a leader in cloud-based grants management) and Bonfire (a leader in strategic sourcing software) understand what it takes to bring essential government processes online. Here’s how:

Taking Grants Management to the Cloud

eCivis helps state, local, and tribal governments reimagine the grants process by taking the full lifecycle of grants management to the cloud. Traditionally, governments manage grants through expensive legacy systems and disparate spreadsheets that are not only time consuming but also are more likely to lead to error, misused funds and audit findings.

By virtualizing grants management, grants professionals can automatically develop and track budgets by quickly importing cost data and excel spreadsheets all into one system. Teams can update these budgets and develop cost allocation plans in real time, calculate indirect cost rates on demand, and seamlessly manage their side of the grants in a centralized system (whether they’re on the awarding or receiving side of funding).

To help governments streamline the process of searching for COVID-19-related grants, eCivis recently launched a new COVID-19 Funding Toolkit. This digital toolkit has helped nearly 300 state, city, county, territory, and tribal governments maximize grant dollars through the CARES Act, with the ability to clearly delineate COVID-19 related grants through automated tagging.

Future-proofing Your Procurement Process

The role of procurement was already challenging, and with added pressures to deliver results faster than ever before amidst economic uncertainty and nationwide emergency supply shortages, it truly has never been more difficult for procurement professionals to do their jobs. Amidst all this, many public procurement teams have had to adjust to a new reality of working from home. As a function that tends to still rely heavily on paper-based processes, this was no easy task.

Bonfire helps procurement teams prepare for any future disruption to their business continuity by bringing the end-to-end sourcing process online. With tools optimized for collaboration and in-app access to RFP (Request-for-Proposal) insights and templates, Bonfire enables public procurement teams to drive greater agency impact, achieve better outcomes, and engage colleagues along the way.

After hearing client feedback on the role the Bonfire platform has played in ensuring emergency procurements get to the frontlines fast, Bonfire launched a program to offer its strategic sourcing software for free for 3 months. The program has already seen over 50 public agencies sign on to bring their procurement process online quickly.

Whether things may feel like they are finally starting to return to “business as usual,” or you’re still in the thick of COVID-19-related projects, it’s important not to fall into the mindset that this is a once-in-a-lifetime crisis. Procurement and grants management play a vital role in any national emergency, so it’s critical that your processes are prepared to handle any future disruption that comes your way. In today’s economic crisis, that means re-evaluating your legacy systems and bringing your essential government processes online.

For more information about bringing your grants management and processes online, reach out to eCivis at [email protected]

Schedule a demo to learn more about how Bonfire enables public procurement teams to future-proof their processes, collaborate better with stakeholders, and make data-driven sourcing decisions.