Partnership Competency Review

Partnering is defined as:-

“Partnering involves two or more organizations working together to improve performance through agreeing mutual objectives, devising a way for resolving any disputes and committing themselves to continuous improvement, measuring progress and sharing the gains.”     

Sir John Egan

The move from traditional forms of contract delivery to the principles of Partnering often involves a change of culture with the way in which the Contract is managed with an emphasis on joint working and performance management.  

Before Organisations consider moving away from traditional forms of procurement to Partnering methods, they should consider undertaking a competency review to ensure they are fully prepared for modern methods of procurement and contract management including the following:- 

• Open Book Cost Management – understanding the principles of open book and target cost contracts.  
• Performance Management – placing an emphasis on capturing and managing performance to deliver improvements.
• Mutual Working – move away from traditional adversarial contract management.
• Roles & Responsibility – clear definition on Client and Contractor roles. 
• Contract – gaining and understanding of the standard forms of Partnering contract (e.g. PPC/TPC/NEC etc). 

Ideally this process should commence prior to the procurement process, but we have also undertaken similar projects for Clients that have already procured their works as an intervention to great success.