Market Sounding ProspectusDecember 2016

This is not a call for tenders or a pre-qualification exercise. It is a market sounding exercise to provide advance information of requirements and open a dialogue with the supply chain. The results will be used to inform our procurement specification and strategy.

“This market sounding exercise provides a platform to enable the supply chain to inform and shape the procurement strategy, design and specification of leadership development for the University of Sheffield. It is also an opportunity to shape new approaches for the Higher Education Sector”

Steph HolmesHead of Procurement

Introduction

The University will be retendering the contract for the facilitation of its renowned leadership development offer, the Sheffield Leader, in 2017. The Sheffield Leader is market-leading leadership development, ahead of its time in fostering the concept of ‘leadership’ as opposed to ‘leader’ development from its inception in 2010. Other universities have approached us for advice and support in establishing their own provision over the past 6 years and we take great pride in our community-based and impactful approach. We want to continue to develop our provision with the input from world-class organisation development professionals.

This Market Sounding exercise aims to present our requirements to the market and invite professionals involved in all aspects of organisation and leadership development to respond to and inform the forthcoming procurement exercise.

Market Sounding and Consultation

On 4th November 2016, the University published a Prior Information Notice (PIN) in the Official Journal of the European Union to provide advance notice of this tender and launch a period of market sounding and consultation in advance of the formal tender process. We are interested in your views on the feasibility of this requirement, plus the capability and capacity of the market to offer a solution that meets our requirements. We are interested in information and innovation that could:

Contribute to achieving improvements in one or more aspects of the requirement Involve incremental improvements or a step change in the short, medium and long term.

Influence the future procurement by returning the Market Sounding Response form at: www.sheffield.ac.uk/procurement/suppliers-information/slprocurement by 31st December 2016.

The requirement for Innovation in Leadership Development

Higher Education is an increasingly volatile and complex environment. The University of Sheffield is rooted within and committed to the success and prosperity of the city of Sheffield. We are partners with some of the biggest names in global industry, with world-leading research led by our academics. Our student community is truly international. An uncertain and changing political and financial landscape necessitates leadership comfortable with ambiguity and risk, whilst protecting core academic principles.

We cannot afford complacency in developing leadership at all levels – this is one of our most important institutional objectives and has been at the heart of the university’s strategy since 2008. We need to have continued awareness of our leadership capability and capacity and the impact of leadership development, with flexible provision able to respond quickly to changing priorities.

We believe in ‘enabling a leadership community’ rather than ‘training leaders’. How do you empower, harness and mobilise leadership? How do you encourage people to step up, take risks and put their heads above their parapet, irrespective of their position in the hierarchy or the volume of work in their in-box? How do you inspire people to care enough to make a difference? These are some of the challenging questions we are seeking your input to.

Current Provision: Overview

The University has been offering the Sheffield Leader in its current form since 2012. It is leadership development for leaders at all levels across the University with a rich variety of activities forming the content of the Sheffield Leader Community. Leaders are nominated by their

December 2016 The Sheffield Leader

line managers to join the community, and can then access a place on a cohort, community events, newsletters, book clubs, leadership exchanges and a google+ community. The majority of this is managed and facilitated internally within the University, with the exception of the cohorts.

Cohorts are available at 4 levels, which are based upon an individual’s experience of leadership rather than being defined by their status or position in the hierarchy (although there is often a strong correlation between the two). Cohorts at levels 1, 2 and 3 are currently facilitated by both an internal and an external facilitator, whilst Sheffield Leader 4 has 2 external facilitators. It is this facilitation role that we are seeking to contract for through this process, although we also welcome ideas and suggestions for changes we could make to improve the impact of the wider Sheffield Leader Community.

To find out more about the Sheffield Leader please refer to our web pages.

Market consultation Workshop

Following the Market Sounding and analysis of responses, a market consultation workshop and site visit will be held on the 14th February 2016 at the University of Sheffield, Alfred Denny Seminar Room, Alfred Denny Building, Western Bank, Sheffield, S10 2TN

This workshop will be an opportunity for all interested parties to find out more about the University and Buyers Group, their requirements and contribute to discussions regarding the finalisation of the specification and the procurement strategy. At the workshop and throughout the market sounding and consultation we will engage with the supply chain as a whole in order to understand the appetite, capacity, and capability of the supply chain to meet our procurement requirements.

Procurement approach

The Forward Commitment Procurement (FCP) approach is being used. FCP was developed and adopted to support and enable innovation in the supply chain and manage the risk of innovation for customers and suppliers.

The pre-procurement Market Sounding and Consultation will enable the University to refine and develop an outcome based requirement and to develop a procurement strategy. The specification and strategy will be informed by the market engagement responses and will adopt FCP recommended practice, for example:

Use of outcome based specifications

December 2016 The Sheffield Leader

o The requirement and the ultimate tender specification are presented in terms of outcomes that the University wishes to deliver through the contract. This gives suppliers the freedom to offer innovative approaches.

Helping suppliers to help us Enabling suppliers to distinguish their offering on factors other than price.

Indicative procurement timeline

PIN published via In-tend with link to Market Sounding Prospectus & Form November 2016

Market Consultation Workshop February 2017Tender published on In-tend May 2017Award July 2017Contract placed August 2017

The University of Sheffield

With almost 25,000 of the brightest students from around 120 countries, learning alongside over 1,200 of the best academics from across the globe, the University of Sheffield is one of the world’s leading universities.

A member of the UK’s prestigious Russell Group of leading research-led institutions, Sheffield offers world-class teaching and research excellence across a wide range of disciplines.

Unified by the power of discovery and understanding, staff and students at the university are committed to finding new ways to transform the world we live in.

In 2011 it was named University of the Year in the Times Higher Education Awards and in the last decade has won four Queen’s Anniversary Prizes in recognition of the outstanding contribution to the United Kingdom’s intellectual, economic, cultural and social life.

Sheffield has five Nobel Prize winners among former staff and students and its alumni go on to hold positions of great responsibility and influence all over the world, making significant contributions in their chosen fields.

Global research partners and clients include Boeing, Rolls-Royce, Unilever, AstraZeneca, Glaxo SmithKline and Siemens, as well as many UK and overseas government agencies and charitable foundations.

For further information, please visit www.sheffield.ac.uk

December 2016 The Sheffield Leader