Post Office procurement – best practice with SMEs
Brian Deveney, Head of Managed Service & Sourcing
Today’s Post OfficeMore than 11,500 branches
93% of people live within 1 mile of a Post Office
14p in every £1 through our cash network
20 million customers – and half of the UK’s SMEs - visit our branches every week.
Modernising to remain relevant to communities in the digital world
Modernising the branch network
Post Office main branch, Falmouth
Post Office local branch, Aldershot
Refreshing around 6000 branches over the next three years
Brighter, more modern branches
Increased automation and longer opening hours
Significant investment into SMEs the length and breadth of the UK
Post Office network largely a collection of SMEs
Seeing it from both sides• Post Office is caught by full PCR Regulations for Procurement
• We are also expected to act and respond in the same manner as commercial organisations who do not have these restrictions
• Main challenges we face:
– Understanding future requirements (you don’t know what you don’t know)
– Engaging with, understanding and utilising innovation in the SME market
– Speed of delivery against non-restricted organisations
Small building works in 6000 Sub Post Offices over the next three years
10 new-style branches going live each working day
Carried out in the main by local independent businesses
Engaging with SMEs through our supplier strategy
This Investment is for the community, in the community, by the community
Competitive and Controlled
Major part of the spend (IT, Regulated Products, Security etc) is carried out by Post Office under existing frameworks
Transforming the Post Office network
IT Transformation project
Establish competitive frameworks across products and services
Enables speed to market and flexible response to tenders
Establish run towers to provide Prime suppliers and Sub-Contractors
Incentivise and target Primes around the use of SMEs
Create an “Agile Innovations” framework with SMEs to look at the future
Challenges and OpportunitiesThe mindset around Risk Averse Public Procurement needs to change
Remove the fear within the process and understand how to manage risk
How do we positively reinforce procurements focus on SMEs
Removing the process constraints but keeping the good practices
How do we incentivise larger prime suppliers to use SMEs
Encourage SMEs to create bidding consortia to provide the required scale
The Government needs to continue to demonstrate clear leadership in this area
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