Business growth may feature heavily in your plans and bidding for tenders is an ideal way to achieve those goals.
But, how can you ensure your tender bid stands out over your competitors?
Here are our top tender tips:
Have a clear contract strategy
Finding and developing your contract strategy is a great way to home in on exactly which bids will align with your overall business and growth plans. That’s why we offer a bespoke consultation service to develop this strategy with you, so we get to know your organisation from the inside out. It is the culmination of a team effort – strategic thinking, investigative research, clarity and focus. It also means you won’t get distracted by lucrative bids that are not a good fit for your business and the direction you want to take it in.
2. Analyse any potential contract opportunities
When a tender or contract opportunity presents itself, carry out an opportunity analysis to make sure it not only aligns with your business goals and contract strategy, but that you have the resources and skills to deliver the contract if successful. If you don’t, what do you need to put in place? Will that make the contract financially viable? Or will you be at a loss once you have invested in more people and equipment?
3. Assemble a tender team
Responding to a tender, particularly an NHS or public sector contract, can be a long, thorough process. Think hard about the information you need to gather and who can help you to do this. Also assign a project manager so there is someone leading and coordinating the whole process and providing a clear timeline of the project.
4. Understand the requirements
Thoroughly understand the requirements outlined in the tender document. Identify key deliverables, timelines, evaluation criteria, and any specific qualifications or documentation needed. This will form the structure of your bid and demonstrate to the client that you have a clear understanding of their needs.
5. Don’t rush the writing
It sounds simple but you need to ensure you answer each question fully. Every answer needs to present the correct information be compellingly written to score the highest points possible. As part of our tender writing management process, we have an open dialogue with clients, ensuring that no critical detail is missed. Make sure you also adhere to any word count limits or special directions regarding layout.
6. Emphasise experience and effectiveness
Where there is an opportunity, you need to showcase any relevant experience or achievements. Include case studies, testimonials and qualifications or certificates. Also emphasise cost-effectiveness or any other commercial, environmental or social benefits a potential client will gain from working with you over someone else.
7. Review and refine
Proofread your bid several times checking for accuracy, grammar and that word limits and criteria have been met. Ask colleagues to also review your bid. Do they have anything to add? Could you remove any words that don’t add anything to the submission to sound more concise? When we work with clients, we also ensure the sign-off process fully aligns to our client’s internal quality assurance and governance protocols. Uniquely, where appropriate, we also utilise specialist expert advisers to perform an additional panel review.
For more information or to discuss how we can work with your organisation to help you craft winning tender bids, contact us today on 0330 1331 041 or info@klowconsulting.com.
Every industry is experiencing major changes as we continue to adapt to a new way of life thanks to the Coronavirus pandemic. Unsurprisingly, this has had an impact on the amount of tender opportunities that are currently available.
For example, lots of tender opportunities that were expected to come out in March and April have been delayed until mid-May.
But all is not lost, and there is still a lot you could be doing to get ‘tender ready’ for when the opportunities are eventually published.
Bidding for a tender takes a considerable amount of time. From undertaking research and collecting evidence, the tender process can be long, complex and require a lot of attention. So, the most important thing organisations can do now is to make sure they use this time to prepare for future tenders as much as they can.
Remember, if you are not spending this time doing preparation work, your competition might be!
How to get ‘tender ready’ What you can do now will depend on your industry. To begin with, consider the information and resources that you will need for any upcoming contracts and your probable tender submissions. You can then work through activities and start to collate information that you are very likely to need. These may include:
Designing your delivery model and mobilisation plans
Meeting any compliance requirements and ensuring related policies are in place
Completing research
Addressing weaknesses and collating supporting evidence
For example, we are supporting a number of clients that have all successfully passed the selection questionnaire for HealthTrust Europe’s (HTE’s) Total Workforce Solutions 2 Framework. The second stage ITT, has been delayed until mid-late May. By taking the opportunity to perform preparation tasks and the draft ITT questionnaire, we are effectively extending the tender submission window which will lead to better higher quality scoring bids.
Review your previous tenders Take this time to review your previous bids and refine them. Ask yourself: ‘Where could we have scored better marks?’ Identify any weaknesses in your business or your tender bid and tackle them.
Gather evidence Collect examples of associated works that you have done, or are doing, that demonstrate best practice. Use this time to consult and engage with those you work with. Ask service users or clients for testimonials and any feedback or other information that may be useful. Think about the evidence you may need to give as they can form the questions you could ask your service users. The answers could also help you to make any improvements to your services, communications or processes. Also look at how you can prove your delivery model with statistics.
Get expert help We might be biased here, but it can really be the difference between a ‘yes’ and a ‘no’ if you employ the services of a professional consultant. Consultants – like us – can help providers with a variety of different processes. For example, we can identify potential holes in the delivery of a contract and can review policies and look for any gaps. Our expert team can anticipate what is needed from a contract and what you need to do to get ‘tender ready’. We identify gaps and weaknesses and can produce a clear plan on what you need to do. We charge on a consultancy basis but can also offer a free advice service.
K Low Consulting is unique in that we don’t just write tenders – we offer a four-stage process to help our clients:
Winning the bid is only one part of the tender outcome. We work with you to help break down and manage complex contract mobilisation and implementations, delivered against manageable work streams.
If you need help with tendering, get in touch today to see how we can assist you. Contact info@klowconsulting.com or give us a call on 0330 133 1041.
Primary Care Networks are still in the early stages of formation and many people may be unaware or have little knowledge of them.
Primary Care Networks were introduced in the NHS Long Term Plan in 2019 and since then, there has been the beginning of many formations to collaborate healthcare services for the benefit of patients and their healthcare.
Since the introduction of the NHS’s Long Term Plan, practices have organised themselves into their Primary Care Networks as of 15th May 2019 and all except a handful of GP practices in England have come together, resulting in around 1,300 geographical networks (Kings Fund, 2019, https://www.kingsfund.org.uk/publications/primary-care-networks-explained).
Aiming to collaborate a workforce and form a more inclusive work environment to better the needs of patients, the particular challenges, risks and successes of these formed Primary Care Networks can be evaluated.
Questioning ‘are primary care networks a challenging collaboration?’, this article will provide a holistic overview of primary care networks, the potential risks and challenges and finally, the successes.
What are Primary Care Networks?
A Primary Care Network is one or more general practice’s working collaboratively together. This usually consists of networks of doctors and other healthcare providers such as dieticians, pharmacists and nurses.
As stated on the King’s Fund, networks are geographically based and cover all practice within a clinical commissioning group boundary.
It is not a requirement that primary care networks are formed, but if practices choose not to join, they will lose out on significant funding. It’s also important to note that occasionally, a single practice can function as a network if they meet the size requirements. PCN’s will receive funding to employ additional health professionals such as pharmacists and paramedics to enable a greater formation.
Why were Primary Care Networks introduced?
The NHS were facing issues with increased demand in healthcare services. Patients were living longer, with more complex and long-term health conditions. These issues were also coupled with an understaffed workforce.
As a result, the introduction of Primary Care Networks aimed to alleviate the strain on healthcare staff, allowing them to work together to deliver primary care services.
Primary Care Homes (introduced in 2015) were an approach to strengthening primary care. The model brings together a range of health and social care professionals to work together to provide enhanced personalised and preventative care for their local community.
Healthcare professionals were encouraged to work together, in networks of 30,000-50,00 patients, which built on the Primary Care Home model. Following this, in February 2018, refreshed ‘NHS Plans for 19’ was introduced. This plan set out the plans for CCG’s, encouraging every GP to be part of a PCN so that these could cover the whole country as far as possible by the end of 2018/2019.
As part of this contract, the DES announced that PCN’s must appoint a clinical director as their named leader, responsible for delivery. The network agreement states the rights and obligations of the GP practices within the network, how the network will partner with non-GP’s, and a patient data-sharing requirement.
Here are some key legislative dates as mentioned above:
2015: The National Association of Primary Care (NAPC) launched the Primary Care Home model at their annual conference April 2016: NHS England introduced GP Five Year Forward View 2nd February 2018: NHS England introduced ‘Refreshing NHS Plans for 19’ 7th January 2019: NHS Long Term Plan introduced 31st January 2019: GP Contract 2019/20 (outlines what PCN’s will be) 15th May 2019: Practices have to organise themselves into networks and submit signed network agreements to their clinical commissioning group (CCG). 1st July 2019: NHSE expects the network contract to provide 100% geographical coverage
Benefits of Primary Care Networks
As previously mentioned, PCN’s were introduced to allow GP and primary care services to scale up by grouping. As a PCN, workforces can team up to deliver as a larger entity and pull resource where needed.
PCN’s have the potential to substantially improve patient experience. One of the many benefits is that the accessibility of healthcare services increases, allowing them to have access to extended services.
In terms of other benefits, each PCN will encounter their own set of benefits individually. As provided below, success stories present two different sets of benefits for patients and staff.
Examples of these benefits as outlined in the success stories are:
Better work relationships and collaboration
A stronger focus on patient care and experience
Easier to identify key issues within the community through collaboration
As health.org.uk and Nuffield Health outlined, there are a particular set of risks and challenges associated with PCN’s:
1. Speed
One of the most prominent risks of PCN’s is the speed of implementation of these collaborations. With such a tight set of deadlines associated with PCN’s, it may be difficult for people to familiarise themselves with PCN’s and then form their practices into networks within these time restraints.
As Nuffield Health illustrated, these tight deadlines could mean that failure was inherent form the policy design. It could be said that these timescales are unrealistic and ambitious, not giving professionals enough time to adjust to the rapid changes.
2. Funding
In terms of deciding not to join a network, practices will miss out on the sources of funding. However, even if there is a formation of a PCN, there is a risk that there will be a removal of other sources of income for practices.
In addition to this, NHS England has promised to meet 70% of costs of employing most additional staff need for the PCN, meaning networks must cover the remaining 30% of the cost associated with this. This could be particularly costly for those practices that cannot afford this.
3. Workforce and workload
A particular risk associated with PCN’s is that they may decrease the amount of GP time available.
Additionally, there is no proof that the NHS is supplying 20,000 additional health professionals as stated in their plan. Increasing this workforce also means accommodating for these new staff members, which may pose a particular challenge for some GP’s where workspace is limited.
There could be a lack of operational support to realise the amount of PCN roles that need to be filled in this short time period. Additionally, some practices may not have the funding available to appoint new staff members.
4. Lack of collaboration
There is a risk that PCN’s may not be able to form effective organisations.
The knock-on effects of the lack of collaborations between practices are that there are disputes which could result in isolation and resist, creating further issues amongst networks. Thus, this could result in a lack of collaboration and the failure of an effective network model.
As stated on the King’s Fund website, the research found that collaboration in general practice was most successful when it had been generated organically over several years and if it was reinforced by trust, relationships and support. On the other hand, research has shown that a lack of clarity of purpose and engagement or over-optimistic expectations resulted in less effective collaborations. This suggests that collaboration and focus should be coupled together to form an effective PCN.
5. Lack of focus
There are a large number of objectives for PCN’s. The number of objectives that professionals must fulfil, may be unrealistic and put further pressure on them.
In 2020/21, there are five out of seven service specifications expected to be delivered. This heightened pressure on healthcare professionals may result in intolerable pressure resulting in a lack of focus.
Protecting Risks and Challenges of Primary Care Networks
Although, as Primary Care Networks are still in the early stages of development, these risks and challenges could be easily rectified at this early stage.
Nuffield Health provides a series of possible solutions to these problems, some of which are provided as examples below:
Issue: Lack of collaboration/ not able to create effective organisations
Possible Solutions:
Create a new vision for primary care: defining what an effective PCN looks like and what can be achieved.
Carve out time (using paid backfill, ideally from CCG’S/STP’s) to build a shared organisational vision
Draft vision statements as practical documents
Create clear roles for each of the different levels of the local system
Issue: Lack of focus
Possible Solutions:
‘Work with CCG’s and commissioning support units to undertake multi-level approaches to tackling population health and general operations’
‘share learning across practices and governance levels in a neighbourhood to create a sense of shared ownership’
Issue: Speed
Possible Solutions:
‘Policymakers should acknowledge that an organisational plan can take up to two years, and outcomes 5-10 years to realise’
‘STPS/ICSs and CCGs should work closely with PCNs to agree roles, responsibilities, development plans, timelines and funding arrangements until 2025’
‘PCNs leads and practice liaisons should jointly agree on the purpose of new roles and their contractual terms and conditions’
‘CCGs should examine where their management support should be best placed- this role has had little attention to date in primary care workforce planning and funding’
Issue: Workforce/ Workload
Possible Solutions:
‘create a shared physical space for the PCN and bring people together during their working day to talk about what they want to achieve’
‘help clinical directors to improve the capacity and capability of their network by focusing initially on small, achievable initiatives that help or reduce workload in individual practices and build trust’
‘Appoint leaders who have skills to make sense of the environment and set the direction, as well as managing the many different aspects of the organisation’s functions’
Successes of Primary Care Networks
Despite the foreseeable risks and challenges to PCN’s, there have been a number of success stories which illustrate the impact that they have already made.
They sought to identify the problems that their patients had and work towards rectifying these issues as a PCN. One of the issues identified was that they had a considerably high percentage of older patients and they had to be attentive when caring for those patients, especially those who were on a terminal decline. Thus, they appointed a care co-ordinator and benefitted from the PCN team across the network.
Alongside this, a Parkinson’s nurse was appointed, a partnership with the York Teaching Hospital has been formed and a rapid cancer diagnosis pathway is underway.
Dr Evans, one of the doctors in the Yorkshire Primary Care Network stated: “The care of our patients is a lot more organized and anticipatory, and [there is] less crisis. But actually, more important, it works”
There has been a substantial impact of this PCN, details of such are as followed:
‘They have been identified by an independent audit on behalf of NHS England as an exemplar of best practice’
‘They use a 0365 platform to share project information and documentation. This has provided visibility of project progress and support collaborative and agile working in the absence of shared file arrangements- dedicated programme support’
‘Dedicated programme support has enabled the work to move at pace, providing a structure for everyone to feed into and embrace’
‘CSU expertise within the programme management provided valuable support in sharing best practice across the network, using case studies to support current and future opportunities in collaborative working’
‘created a robust governance structure has enhanced working relationships and provided visibility and clarity on roles and responsibilities across the network’
Their shared vision is: “Working together to deliver high quality, innovative and sustainable healthcare for our community with commitment, compassion and integrity”.
Successes of Primary Care Networks: Self Evaluation for Staff
As exemplified by the National Association of Primary Care, Figure 2 presents the outcomes of a questionnaire for staff. It shows the self-assessment by PCN supervisors, of how networks have improved the workplace. As shown, there is a lower demand for primary health services and patients are engaging more and benefiting from healthier lifestyles.
Figure 5 (as presented on NAPC.co.uk) also presents that improved self-management, healthier lifestyles and patient engagement has increased pre vs. post PCN.
Contact Our Team Today
If you need help on a tender, contact our experienced team of writers today on 03301 1331 041. Alternatively, send an email to info@klowconsulting.com for more information and details.
As the PDPS Contract becomes more prevalent, it’s important to be aware of important information.
We recently attended NHS England’s market engagement event in Leeds; the event provided updated information about the contract. This article, therefore, will act as a commentary following on from on our first PDPS blog post.
This article is aimed at those who intend to tender for NHS APMS GP contracts in the future.
Aims of the day
Mark Smith, NHS England – Assistant Head of Primary Care Commissioning, opened and chaired the event. Making it clear aims of the day were to run a split AM/PM session for Commissioners/Providers respectively.
With the contract notice going live on the 1st December and the PDPS going live in Jan/Feb 2020, it was clear that unless there was large Provider take-up, Commissioners without a mandate would not use the framework and would still proceed with the current procurement procedure.
Why Is the PDPS Contract Needed?
The main reasoning behind the introduction to this framework is to create commissioner and provider efficiencies. In turn, this will enable APMS contracts to be commissioned swiftly so that the service disruption is minimised, and patient care can continue to be delivered appropriately.
At the moment across all areas, commissioners are finding less interest from providers across the country to bid for APMS contracts. APMS procurements take around 6 months, and there is no guarantee that they will be successful. The past two years have shown a 10% failure rate in 2017/18 and an 8% failure rate in 2018/19.
Potential Issues with the Contract
One of the main foreseeable issues with this contract is the lack of notice and awareness that GP providers have of it. The NHSE attempts to address this by centralising and standardising the contract channel. However, by locking out non-framework providers, there is a danger that this may have the opposite effect.
It has been evident from our conversations with GPs at the recent Best Practice exhibition, and from the worryingly low numbers in the room that GP providers are unaware of this critical change to the way their contracts may be commissioned.
A big question is how are GPs supposed to know about the framework? Other than the usual contract notices, the answer is given that the message was pushed through local CCGs, who may or may not be passing on the message. It appeared those in attendance had registered either by chance or following their own contract monitoring activities.
How GP’s can be aware of the PDPS Contract and Do You Need to Apply?
The portal to be used for the procurement will be EU supply: https://uk.eu-supply.com/. This will host FAQs and any further updates ahead of hosting the actual PDPS tender process.
The initially proposed 6 rounds of the framework will have around 5-month lead times from entry to award. Please see the timescales captured below:
To Re-Iterate,only those Providers on the PDPS will be invited to tender for any contracts ‘called-off’ via the framework. Therefore, it is highly likely that unless a Provider applies for the PDPS six months in advance of a call-off being made, that they will miss the opportunity to bid.
Market Response for the PDPS Contract
To mitigate the potential impact and reduction in market response, attendees suggested:
NHSE should reconsider the length of the rounds, shorten the timeframe and make them monthly.
NHSE should publish all APMS contract expiry dates. Whether they will definitely be recommissioned or not, providers could make a decision themselves whether to or not, invest the time to get onto the framework, and do any initial research and model development in advance of the ‘call-off’
NHSE supports workshops where practice representatives come in and are supported to complete the PDPS application.
At the very least, they need to find a way to make this public knowledge to all GPs. Some form of mandated communication, explaining the very limited time commitment and simplicity of the application, should make it an easy decision for GPs to fill out the application and ensure they are not locked out for the next 4 years!
Digital First- A Risk to Local Providers?
A matter raised within the meeting was that there may be a potential risk to local provision. This is due to the fact that there appears to be an opening to digital-first delivery models. Providers can be accredited to all regions across the country. Some people may point to this as the reason why the fundamental procurement shift has been so under-publicised.
Contact Us Today
To enquire more about how to apply for this contract, contact us today on 0330 133 1041 or info@klowconsulting.com.
Accessibility in healthcare has been described as a ‘global challenge’. As a prominent challenge that many healthcare providers face, developing and maintaining an accessible service for patients is an ongoing issue across the healthcare industry.
Regularly, healthcare tenders have a question centred solely or partially around accessibility. Therefore, answering this question to demonstrate how your healthcare service is providing accessible healthcare for your patients is crucial.
This article will focus on what accessibility in healthcare is and why it is important, how it can be improved in practice and most importantly, how to answer an accessibility question on a tender.
What is accessibility in healthcare?
The definition of accessibility is given in the name itself; it is all about providing accessible healthcare for all.
Having accessible healthcare services available for those who need them is critical as it allows people to get the appropriate healthcare resources in order to help maintain or improve their health.
In a human rights context, accessibility is described by the World Health Organization as: ‘health facilities, goods and services must be within safe physical reach for all sections of the population, especially vulnerable or marginalized groups, such as ethnic minorities and indigenous populations, women, children, adolescents, older persons, persons with disabilities and persons with HIV/AIDS, including rural areas’.
Healthcare accessibility is a broad scope and relates to many different aspects.
Accessibility, therefore, may mean:
Access to buildings
Communications with healthcare staff
Management of appointments
There may be a variety of reasons as to why patients cannot access healthcare services. Some of the reasons may be:
Lack of transport links. Those living in an urban area may particularly struggle with transport
Health-related conditions. Certain health conditions may mean that an individual cannot travel to the property
Financial barriers. Primarily for transport or service charges (e.g. dental or eye tests)
Organisational barriers
Why is accessibility in healthcare important?
As mentioned above, accessibility in healthcare is key because an individual who is restricted from healthcare access can suffer from further or more serious health-related issues. Consequently, it could lead to serious complications such as disease, disability and even premature death.
Healthcare Accessibility Questions on a Tender
A healthcare tender will usually involve accessibility in one form or another. Before answering this question, think holistically about the healthcare service that you are currently providing to patients.
Asking questions such as “what are we doing to make our healthcare service more accessible for patients?” and “what do we plan to do to improve accessibility in the future?” will help direct your answer.
When writing your answer, you may want to focus on these specific elements:
1) Location and Transport
The location and transport links to your service will need to be carefully considered. Are you located in a central part of the city? Do you have transport links to your practice?
Presenting that you have bus routes, car parks or express buses available for your patients, all feeds into the accessibility of your healthcare service.
If you have free parking bays nearby, or even a ‘park and ride’ option, stating this within your answer will show that your service is accessible to patients.
2) Appointments
For healthcare to be accessible for all, there needs to be appointments available for those who need them. Offering on the day appointments is ideal for those who need urgently seen to.
Appointments available out of hours, for example, 6-8 pm, or weekend appointments, will be made accessible for those who can’t make the standard appointment times. Again, having these additional services enables ease of access for those who work full time or have other commitments that mean they can’t get to the standard appointment hours.
Making these appointments easily available, via online booking systems or through telephone lines, is also imperative. If patients are unable to get through to the line, this is an indication that this healthcare service isn’t readily accessible for them.
3) Equal Access
Considering equal access to healthcare services is a crucial implementation within your answer. This will also enable you to present that your service adheres to best practice and the Equality and Diversity (2010) policy.
For this answer, implementing your Equality and Diversity policy and providing details of the training provided to staff which relates to Equality and Diversity, will be beneficial when demonstrating best practice. We have an article centred around Equality and Diversity that has further information about this.
Equal access ensures that those who are part of a minority, are vulnerable, have protected characteristics or particularly ‘hard-to-reach’ groups are being treated fairly and non- discriminatory.
Providing details of any additional work that you do within the community to help those that are disadvantaged or within a minority will add value to this answer. This could include work undertaken with the homeless or the elderly.
Asylum Seekers or individuals that are limited in their ability to communicate also form part of this group. Having a translation organisation in partnership with your healthcare service will again, improve the accessibility for those groups.
4) Domiciliary Appointments
Although domiciliary appointments may not be stated within the contract, providing these appointments to those who cannot get to the service, will demonstrate that you are considering these groups and have additional measures in place for them. Reflecting this within your answer, will again, be highly beneficial.
5) Demonstrating your patient care service
Indicating that you aim to provide an excellent patient-centred service will be rewarded when answering this question.
Showing that you have various methods of feedback in place and that you actively strive towards improving feedback points, presents that you are trying to provide the best possible patient experience; this helps patient experience and accessibility.
If patients are experiencing any problems in terms of accessibility, asking them what their problems are will help you make the right steps to improving this. Feedback can be done in a variety of ways, our last article outlines some methods of feedback and how to improve patient experience overall.
6) Accessible Information Standard
The Accessible Information Standard states that from 1st August 2016, organisations providing NHS care and/or publicly funded adult social care are legally required to follow this standard. Being aware of this standard and reflecting that your service aligns with best practice is essential.
Ask people if they have any information or communication needs and find out how to meet their needs
Record those needs clearly and in a set way
Highlight or flag the person’s file or notes so it is clear that they have information or communication needs and how to meet those needs
Share information about people’s information and communication needs with other providers of NHS and adult social care when they have consent or permission to do so
Take steps to ensure that people receive information which they can access and understand and receive communication support if they need it
Contact and be contacted by, services in accessible ways. For example, via email or text messages, receive information and correspondence in formats they can read and understand, be supported by a communication professional at appointments if this is needed to support conversation.
Contact Our Team Today
If you need help on a tender, contact our experienced team of writers today on 03301 1331 041. Alternatively, send an email to info@klowconsulting.com for more information and details.
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