Buying Professional Services

Public and private sector organisations are spending huge amounts of money buying professional services, and most are doing it badly, without sufficiently rigorous procurement processes or an adequate understanding of the marketplace, resulting in wasted money and disappointing outcomes.

Even among those organisations with formal procurement processes and techniques, many are applying them inappropriately and therefore achieve similarly poor results. On the other side of the fence, many professional services firms don't understand how the increasing application of procurement processes could affect the way they get business and work with clients, the way they charge and ultimately, their profitability. Furthermore, while they are working together, both professional service providers and their clients too often behave in ways to reduce the potential benefits to both parties.

Using real examples from a range of private sector firms, government departments and the professional services firms themselves, this book explores what users and providers of professional services need to do to ensure that users' money is well spent and the providers' earnings are well earned.

• Part 1: Why is buying professional services different?
1. The professional services sector
2. Why organisations buy professional services
3. The challenges of buying professional services
4. The supplier perspective
• Part 2: The role of the purchasing department
5. Aligning the purchasing approach with the business strategy, structure and culture
6. Requirements and specifications
7. Acting as an intermediary
• Part 3: Purchasing approaches
8. Governance, influence and demand management
9. Category management
10. Frameworks and approved suppliers
• Part 4: Choosing the right supplier
11. The selection process
12. Selection criteria
13. Scoring bids and tenders
• Part 5: Negotiating and contracting
14. Negotiation
15. Understanding structures and costs
16. Payment and commercial models
17. The contract
• Part 6: Managing the service provider
18. Contract and performance management
19. Supplier relationship management
20. Sustainability and corporate social responsibility
• Part 7: Conclusions
21. What makes a successful assignment
22. What could possible go wrong?
23. The future of professional services

This is something as odd as how to purchase professional services, written for the purchasing department and senior management of the buying company. Admittedly, it has a certain Anglo-feel, but I believe it may be useful in other parts of the world as well.

With that said, I think even seasoned consultants can get some value by reading this, as it is so broad and may even give some ideas on how to approach customers.

All in all, there is nothing revolutionary in the book, but it has its values.