We all know that collaboration is often put in the ‘too hard pile’. It’s held back by a tight knot of issues which we need to unravel over time.
Part of the solution has to be expanding the range of reusable things that any go-ahead council team can start using immediately. That could include entire products, reuse libraries, collaboration patterns… or procurement clauses.
Help with your next procurement
Suppliers have told me that collaboration is a great idea, but few councils ask about it. We obviously need to do more to stimulate demand, and this suggestion might help.
Recently Craig Barker at Cumberland Council and I have been talking about winning over more suppliers to collaboration. Both Craig and his manager, Kate Hurr, are forward thinkers. Cumberland has paid voluntary LocalGov Drupal subs since day one, and funded several LGD modules.
To add to their list of contributions, Craig has developed a few collaboration-friendly clauses that can be added to any procurement – and they’re free for you to pick up and use.
| Item | Tender clause wording | Explanation |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | The Supplier must describe in their tender response how their software architecture, licensing model, and development practices facilitate and actively encourage collaboration between multiple councils. | We always recommend including this clause because it helps understand whether the supplier’s approach supports collaboration with other councils, shared development and reuse of common components, rather than locking each council into isolated and duplicated work. |
| 2 | Upon request, and at least annually, the Supplier shall provide the Council with a detailed, non-confidential, forward-looking product roadmap for the solution covered by this contract. | We always recommend including this clause because it gives the Council visibility of future product direction, helping to assess whether the system is likely to remain fit for purpose and whether future upgrades, integrations or service changes can be planned with confidence. |
| 3 | The Supplier should describe any existing user community, collaborative governance arrangements, shared roadmap process, working groups or sector-wide development forums available to customers. And outline the formal mechanisms by which councils can provide feedback and influence the development priorities on this roadmap. | We always recommend including this clause because it helps understand whether customers have a meaningful route to share feedback, influence development priorities and benefit from wider sector learning after the contract has been awarded. |
| 4 | The Supplier must describe how the solution can support, align with or integrate with government-backed collaborative digital projects, shared open standards and reusable sector platforms. | We always recommend including this clause because it helps test whether the system can work with wider public sector collaboration initiatives, avoid unnecessary duplication and support shared approaches that may reduce cost, improve interoperability and increase long-term value. |
The best suppliers I’ve worked with will have this information to hand. Some may already publish it on the internet – here’s the LocalGov Drupal roadmap, although it probably needs a little TLC. You can also see our current development priorities.
Inspired by LOTI
Craig’s work was inspired by the London Office of Technology’s tender wording for data access and API requirements. I can see plenty of great people were involved in its development too.
This is a must have conversation with your service and procurement colleagues. Reviewing and adopting these clauses is a great small thing to be doing while we’re waiting for the LGR review to conclude. If you can’t do this work, have a think about the barriers and try to address them instead. Please tell me how you get on.
If every public sector body included clauses for collaboration, data access and APIs in tenders, we would start to see a difference over time. That could be built on by council pioneers across the country, the emerging combined authorities, and digital teams in government and the NHS.
As always, these views are wholly my own. Separately, my two new contracts are going well and I’ll post more news soon.