Professional Services Business Process Outsourcing

Description

The impact of the Covid-19 pandemic has been felt by businesses across the globe. The British Council is not immune to this impact and needs to, streamline processes, use more digital tools, and introduce much greater standardisation to be more efficient and effective. A key potential lever being explored in for transformation of the professional services support functions, is greater use of third-party services (outsourcing) to leverage other organisations' capabilities. Currently, four key global functions/workstreams (including their corresponding operations delivered from the shared service centre in India) have been prioritised to explore opportunities for outsourcing. These include the Human Resources (HR), Finance, Procurement and Digital and Technology (D&T). Lot 1: This Pre-Procurement Early Market Engagement exercise that the British Council is conducting is focussed on informing internal and external assurance and decision making processes in respect to launching a formal tender for outsourcing of select business processes or services from the 4 key professionals workstreams (HR, Finance, Procurement and Digital & Technology) as well as to inform consultations with our staff and trade unions before any final decisions on outsourcing are made. These professional services support 10,000+ British Council employees spread across 100+ countries. This Pre-Procurement exercise will provide a brief overview on various aspects of these workstreams along with an initial view of the potential in-scope areas. The purpose of articulating these requirements to the market is to enable British Council to gain initial supplier awareness, engagement and opinion around market possibilities, risks and issues not previously considered and to inform our procurement strategy. Using this market perspective, we will then take a decision as to whether to proceed to a formal tender process. In the event that a formal tender is launched, it is likely that British Council will conduct a Competitive Dialogue Process in line with Public Contract Regulations 2015. Overview of the workstreams: Human Resources (HR): Human Resources currently incorporates approximately 300 FTEs and operates with a mix of centralised (including shared services) and regional/in-country support to the organisation. As part of this pre-procurement exercise, British Council HR function would explore options for the provision of a service provider who is fully integrated into the global HR function to enable the function to achieve its strategic objectives. Finance: The finance function is organised across 8 regions, comprising approximately 140 entities with 30 subsidiaries operating alongside our branches; in some countries there is a dual entity structure. The finance function is structured along functional lines, with the aim of embedding the 'three lines of defence' model at its heart, clearly separating the financial control (first line) and risk and assurance (second line) functions, with the aim to ensure the integrity of our results and the strength of our controls. Many regions have clustered finance, with remote delivery and we have a shared service centre operating from India. Procurement: Procurement operations in the British Council cover a wide variety of activity, and covers all areas of operations, from offices, to Exam's delivery and Teaching Centres, and Arts and Culture activities. As a function, Procurement currently incorporates approximately 90+ FTEs and operates in 5 Regions: United Kingdom, South Asia, East Asia, Sub-Saharan Africa, and Middle East & Northern Africa (MENA). There are an additional 3 regions (EU, Wider Europe, and Americas) without regional procurement cover. Whilst these 3 regions are subject to the global procurement policy, procurement events are managed within their own organisational structure. Digital and Technology (D&T): British Council is exploring options for the provision of outsourcing and staff augmentation for its Digital & Technology (D&T) services from a Service Provider who is fully integrated into their global D&T directorate. As a directorate, Digital & Technology currently incorporates approximately 400 FTEs across Digital, Global Information Services (GIS). This headcount is mostly concentrated within the UK, India and Poland. Service Providers should note that this document is for information only and does not commit British Council to launch a formal procurement in the market. Additional information: The annual contract value will be between GBP20m to GBP40m excluding VAT and the contract duration is expected to be 7-10 years