Out to Tender Commissioning a Web site

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Out to TenderCommissioning a Web site

• Martin Belcher
• University of Bristol

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Outline

• Background
• Rationale behind presentation
• Why put things out to tender?
• Developing a tender specification
• Advantages and disadvantages

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Background

• Internet Development Group - consultancy arm of
  the ILRT
• Web development, usability, design, training
• Local, national, international clients
• Educational focus

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Rationale

• The benefits of using third parties
• Guidelines for commissioning third parties
• Help and guidance for offering external services
• Service specification for in-house delivery
• Better end products and services

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Why use third parties?

• Access to specialised skills
• Concentration on strengths
• Excess demand on your time and resources
• Better delivery times
• More cost effective?
• Joining things up in the most effective way

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Developing a tender specification

• Interface design, build, service delivery,
  usability research, hosting, etc.
• User needs analysis
• user consultation, user/task/environmental
  analysis
• Service level specification
• support, iterations, meetings, communication
  channels, delivery dates, penalty clauses

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Advantages

• Access to specialised skills otherwise not
  available
• Access to certain skills NOW
• appropriate skills, not necessarily better
• Concentration on strengths rather than jack of
  all-trades
• Cost effectiveness

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Disadvantages

• Up-front time and effort
• Expensive third-parties
• Internal resistance
• Which third-party do you trust?
• Additional management and administration
  overheads

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Additional benefits

• Detailed service specification for improved
  in-house build
• When replying to tenders
• Better user needs analysis
• increased usability of Web sites and services
• Phasing and timetabling of projects
• Increased quality of IW services

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Summary

• Commissioning aspects of a Web site should be
  considered
• access to appropriate skills
• cost
• different ways of working
• Useful side effects for overall improvements in
  service delivery

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Any questions?

• Thank you