Adaptive Ofgem

Description

Summary of the work We will work with a delivery partner to: - support our teams to trial/iterate adaptive ways of working and learn where/how to apply approaches - upskill teams and leaders - trial improvements to enabling services, removing barriers for agile teams - full training (provisional, subject to need) Expected Contract Length 6 months Latest start date Monday 2 December 2019 Budget Range The overall budget is £300,000. Why the Work is Being Done Ofgem's strategic narrative states it will deliver adaptive regulation and adopt new ways of working to be responsive to the transforming energy market. The drivers are: • increasing pace and radical nature of market changes • unexpected/changing priorities requires prompt responses and effective collaboration • changing responsibilities requires new Ofgem services to be ramped up quickly • digital can help maximise value for money for consumers through effective delivery To best deliver its outcomes, Ofgem will trial adaptive ways of working across regulatory and delivery teams to learn how best to embed new ways of working to be responsive and adaptive. Problem to Be Solved Ofgem is at the early stages of adopting agile approaches across regulatory and policy teams. We have not yet learnt how best to apply an agile mindset and approaches (e.g. user-centred design, Agile, service design, lean process improvement, automated tasks) to all of our work or where we should start to trial new ways of working and improve enabling services. Our teams do not always have the agile skills/knowledge to deliver their work in an adaptive way or the right agile coaching to help them deliver successfully. Who Are the Users The users are Ofgem staff (roughly 550 in London and 300 in Glasgow), and those we collaborate with to deliver outcomes: - teams working/wanting to work in agile ways - leaders and the executive - teams providing enabling services - delivery partners Needs include: - Teams: Agile delivery support/coaching to understand agile tools/techniques and trial ways of working in regulatory/policy/delivery teams - People: Understanding the agile mind-set and best practice e.g. GDS service standard - Leaders: Learn where and how to set-up and lead multi-disciplinary/agile teams - Teams: Learn where and how to start iteratively improving business-enabling services Early Market Engagement N/A. Work Already Done A short discovery phase ran in February 2019 and explored what people understood by an adaptive organisation, identified where teams were already working in agile ways and explored the challenges to working in new ways. The executive leadership and managers have started to explore what it means to be an adaptive organisation, what the challenges and opportunities are, and what actions they can take to support becoming an adaptive organisation. Some teams and leaders have done agile training and further training is organised for leaders, teams and practitioners (delivery managers and product managers). Existing Team Delivery Manager and access to Senior Leader Team and other subject-matter experts. Current Phase Discovery Skills & Experience • have experience in providing agile/agility coaching to senior leaders and teams • have experience in providing agile training to teams • have experience in enabling organisations to scale out agile approaches • have experience of delivering agile adoption in a similar organisation • evidence your understanding of what defines adaptive organisations • have experience of end to end delivery of transformational change projects • demonstrate how you have applied agile approaches • demonstrate how you have delivered organisational change incrementally/using agile lifecycles • be able to provide bespoke training for team leaders and practitioners in an organisation of this size • evidence how you have applied GDS standards and lifecycle to service delivery • identify constraints to becoming an adaptive organisation and incremental approaches to reducing them • demonstrate successful co-delivery with an internal team • confirm you have sufficient resources available to commence in late November • demonstrate how you apply the principles of continuous improvement Nice to Haves • demonstrate relevant experience of working with a UK Regulatory Authority • demonstrate relevant experience of working with a UK Central Government Department • demonstrate evidence of an active diversity/equality plan • demonstrate their policy, with examples, on building social value into their work Work Location Ofgem’s London and Glasgow offices Working Arrangments The supplier's team are required to be co-located with teams at the Ofgem office, to enable agile ways of working. Flexible working arrangements are in place. Some travel between London and Glasgow may be required. Security Clearance Baseline Personnel Security Standard clearance required. Additional T&Cs Ofgem shall have the right to terminate the Contract at any time, by giving 4 weeks written notice to the Supplier, and Ofgem’s liability thereto shall be for costs reasonably incurred by the Supplier up until the termination date. Suppliers must confirm acceptance of this term. No. of Suppliers to Evaluate 6 Proposal Criteria • Suitability of approach to designing plans to meet the required outcomes (Discovery). • Suitability of approach to alpha phases to meet the required outcomes • Suitability of proposed training option/s • Suitability of approach to supporting and upskilling of different teams and leaders • Suitability of approach to removing blockers and understanding of these. • Suitability of proposed delivery plans and inputs • Understanding and application of GDS service standards • Capability of delivery lead and team to design, iterate and build products and services using agile practices (including resource levels) • Relevance of identified risks, dependencies, and offered approaches to manage them • Relevance of proposed continuous improvement targets • Relevance of proposed social value targets Cultural Fit Criteria • Demonstrate capability of working with teams with mixed levels of agile maturity • Demonstrate capability of influencing internal senior stakeholders. • Demonstrate cultural diversity fit • Have a sound approach to knowledge transfer • Have a sound approach to integration with Ofgem team • Take responsibility for delivering successfully Payment Approach Capped time and materials Evaluation Weighting Technical competence 55% Cultural fit 20% Price 25% Questions from Suppliers 1. How do they intend to measure the success of this engagement? Following discovery and alpha work (assuming alpha is the discovery outcome), we hope to have identified and tested approaches to working in agile ways and iterated them across teams. As a result we will understand where and how to apply agile approaches to a wider range of our work. We will have started to improve our business-enabling services to better enable agile teams and we will have a greater level of agile skills and knowledge across our teams and leaders.During the discovery, we will identify measures for success. 2. What other activities have been included in the change program?Part Answer: See Answer for continuationTo start exploring agile delivery approaches, a small number of teams were set up to work in agile and user-centred ways, supported by agile practitioners to trial and iterate agile ways of working. These teams have supported other teams to work in new ways and we are trialling how and where to apply new approaches to our full range of work. Senior leadership have been communicating with the organisation to share their vision of an adaptive organisation and supporting teams to work in agile ways. Communities of profession e.g. delivery management, have been sharing best practice around applying agile approaches to our work and we have run agile training with those working in new ways (and those wanting to) to build knowledge and skills across teams.The leadership team have taken part in sessions on becoming an adaptive organisation and their role in this. 3. What activities do you anticipate the supplier providing? The supplier will provide hands-on agile delivery coaching to the organisation (for teams and the leadership) and bespoke training for teams to work in new ways (e.g. team training, leadership training). They will support us to identify barriers to agile ways of working in these teams, iteratively testing improvements to our business-enabling services. 4. What education and communication program was run prior to and during the shift to agile?Part-answer: See Answer for continuationA select number of teams were set up to work in agile and user-centred ways, supported by agile practitioners to trial and iterate agile ways of working. These teams have supported other teams to work in new ways and we are trialling how and where to apply new approaches to our full range of work. Senior leadership have been communicating with the organisation to share their vision of an adaptive organisation and supporting teams to work in agile ways. Communities of profession e.g. delivery management, have been sharing best practice around applying agile approaches to our work and we have run agile training with those working in new ways (and those wanting to) to build knowledge and skills across teams. 5. Is further technical (process and tools) training with the scope of this requirement? We expect the priority for training to be agile training for teams (how to apply agile and user-centred approaches to their work) and leaders (how to develop and lead agile teams). We expect any practitioners within teams to share best practice on appropriate agile tools e.g. jira. We may learn during the discovery that further training is required. 6. What agile training have they received to date? To which groups? To date we have provided a range of training which includes:- Introductory agile mindset training to teams (5 teams)- 3-day agile for teams training (to 30 people)- Delivery Management training (to 12 people) 7. What agile model approach are they using? Our teams are using a mixture of agile approaches to deliver their work, selecting the most appropriate approaches for the type of work e.g. scrum, kanban, user-centred design, service design. 8. Where should we include project planning and resourcing information please? We only request responses to the initial 14 points, in order to make a shortlist down to 6 suppliers to invite to submit Written Response. These areas will be covered in the Written Response. 9. Where should we include pricing and timescale information please? We only require responses to the initial 14 points, in order to shortlist down to 6 suppliers to invite to submit Written Response. These areas will be covered in the Written Response. 10. We note that you have left 'Additional Assessment Methods' blank. Could you say more about what your plans are here? We will evaluate on the Written Response only. Any clarifications required to the Written Response will be requested in writing. It is anticipated that up to 3 suppliers will be interviewed for final clarification/understanding in order to make a final selection, but interviews will not be scored as part of the evaluation.No References or Case Studies are required in Written Proposal, so make sure examples given in 1st stage selection are as relevant to Ofgem as possible. 11. Will partnership / consortium bids be considered? Yes, but any contract will need to be signed by a Lead Bidder on behalf of other members of the Consortium/Partnership. 12. Is there an incumbent in place? No. 13. Are there any key areas that were identified as part of the discovery phase? During the discovery we identified a range of user needs that we have started to address. The main focus has been to address the needs for increasing agile capability (skills, knowledge and expertise) across teams and leaders, communicating a vision for becoming an adaptive organisation and providing guidance for teams working in new ways. We identified needs such as how we set up new teams, how we empower teams and how we reward teams, that we can use to iterate and improve our business-enabling services during these phases of work. 14. Will the London office be the main office and occasional travel to Glasgow? Teams are often split across sites. The supplier will be expected to work across sites and maximise technology to facilitate effective cross-site working. London has the majority of staff, but training will be required at both sites. 15. Do you have an expectation of the balance of work between London and Glasgow locations? Teams are often split across sites. The supplier will be expected to work across sites and maximise technology to facilitate effective cross-site working. London has the majority of staff, but training will be required at both sites. 16. How many "people" are you actually seeking ? – and what is the realistic split between Glasgow & London We are looking for the supplier to propose the recommended number of people and approach to best deliver these phases of work within the budget based on the size of the organisation and desired outcomes. Teams are often split across sites. The supplier will be expected to work across sites and maximise technology to facilitate effective cross-site working. London has the majority of staff, but training will be required at both sites. 17. Does the £300k maximum budget cover additional discovery work or a complete end to end program of interventions for 850 employees? We will prioritise our interventions so that we spend the budget in the right areas. We aim to identify the right areas and approach in discovery. Our end goals is to provide training to the whole organisation 18. What state to they hope to reach at the end of this piece of work? Following discovery and alpha work, we hope to have identified and tested approaches to working in agile ways and iterated them across teams. As a result we will understand where and how to apply agile approaches to a wider range of our work. We will have started to improve our business-enabling services to better enable agile teams and we will have a greater level of agile skills and knowledge across our teams and leaders. We will work towards the outcome of being a better, more equipped organisation to handle our remit. 19. If there is any Training and Tools required to implement Agile practices across the team, will the supplier pay for it in addition to the SOW. We expect the supplier to provide agile training as described in the advert. Any additional costs for training and tools will be assessed and prioritised when the need arises. We currently use tools such as jira to support agile teams so they may already be in place. 20. Is there any Early market engagement presentation slides and the Q&A document? No early market engagement has taken place. The work done to date has been organised in-house. 21. Are expenses incurred when working between London and Glasgow inclusive of the budget indicated? Yes, Written Proposals from shortlisted suppliers will be asked to include a provision and breakdown for travel costs, which will be evaluated as part of the Pricing and Quality assessment. Expenses for travel will be chargeable in line with Ofgem travel policy and necessary journeys/accommodation may be arranged through Ofgem Travel contract. 22. Is this role inside or outside of the IR35 legislation? Outside IR35. 23. What metrics will be measured in order to gauge successful adoption of Agile ways of working? There are no firm metrics in place. We would envisage metrics around the number of projects working in an agile way, adoption levels for new initiatives, workforce satisfaction/feedback and roles that are attributable to the DDaT framework to enable flexible resourcing of future initiatives. Shortlisted providers will be asked for views on key metrics as part of their Written Response. 24. You mention that some teams and leaders have undertaken Agile training. Can you confirm that those already trained only require additional coaching? Training so far has been a combination of in-house and GDS style training. Additional coaching may be required to ensure a baseline of an approach if that were to differ from that already conducted within the organisation. 25. How do you see the split between training and coaching during the period of the contract? We would welcome recommendations on a split for an organisation of this size and would expect it to be apportioned to the leadership of the organisation and the teams working on projects. 26. How low or high is the general desire of the staff to adopt new ways of working culture currently? It is low to medium based on findings from the initial discovery conducted. There is a desire to work in a more adaptive way, yet it is not fully understood what this will mean for projects and staff. 27. How low or high is the level of self-awareness from middle management on the benefits to adopt agility? It is low to medium based on findings from the initial discovery conducted. There is a desire to work in a more adaptive way, yet it is not fully understood what this will mean for projects and staff. 28. Is the business on-board with changing waterfall mind-sets into more agile ones? The business has set out that it will move to a more adaptive (agile) approach in the Strategic Narrative. It is to be one of the key enablers in the current plan of work. 29. Does the technology used rely vastly on legacy systems or is there already a digital transformation journey bringing the adoption of cloud-native solutions?If there is, what is the long term timescale for that transformation and the vision? There are legacy systems in use however there are programs of work to bring the solutions to the cloud that are underway.We would expect this transition to be ongoing but likely to last for some time as per the digital transformation agenda. 30. Is there any information of the number of regulatory and policy teams and their composition? We have around 650-700 individuals working in or across regulatory and policy teams. These are teams working on regulation and policy relating to systems and networks, consumers and markets and delivery of government energy schemes. Ofgem’s organisational structure can be found here https://www.ofgem.gov.uk/publications-and-updates/ofgem-organisation-chart 31. For avoidance of doubt is the £300,000 budget to cover 6 months work? The budget will cover the discovery and alpha phases and training. We will identify the best approach for alphas during the discovery. The desired timescale for this work is 4 to 6 months. 32. Did the February Discovery, establish either a specification or the roles that Ofgem need to procure now? If so when will this information be shared? The discovery identified the needs to provide teams with agile expertise to help them trial new ways of working, such as coaching on agile delivery and user-centred design, and targeted training (e.g. for teams and leaders). Specific roles were not identified as a result of our discovery (but should support the needs identified) and we would welcome recommendations from suppliers shortlisted to provide Written Response. 33. To what degree do Ofgem perceive the work to be done a typical Discovery phase (limited to establishing user needs), as opposed to a supplier iteratively working to enable Ofgem teams over a 6 month period? We would envisage at least a limited discovery period which would then inform the alpha stage as specified by the tender document. We are happy to review alternative proposals, however our preference remains for a discovery to be conducted. 34. "A short discovery phase ran in February 2019", will suppliers who qualify through the initial evaluation phase be provided with outputs of the February Discovery phase? We will provide further information about the discovery outputs to suppliers shortlisted to submit Written Proposals. 35. Do any of the teams consist purely of regulatory or policy people, where digital (software) is not an output of their work? Our teams produce a range of products and services, some of them involve technology and digital, and many will involve data. Some teams will produce products relating to policy and regulation that do not involve software as an output of their work. 36. "Ofgem is at the early stages of adopting agile approaches across regulatory and policy teams.", is this initiative limted to regulatory and policy teams? Ofgem has digital, data and technology teams that have already adopted agile ways of working to different levels of agile maturity. We have less experience of applying these approaches to regulatory and policy teams so this is a priority area for us to test and learn. 37. A supplier is required to "support our team to trial/iterate", is there an approximate indication of the size of each team in scope? Team sizes vary across the organisation. We have been running team training for between 10-15 people but we have smaller agile teams too. Teams are often split across sites. London has the majority of staff (roughly two thirds) with the remainder in Glasgow. 38. What is the procurement timetable and steps beyond 23rd October? We intend to invite shortlisted bidders to submit Written Proposals on 28 Oct, for responses by 11 Nov. These will be evaluated with the intention to award by 20 Nov, with start close to 25 Nov. 39. Will Ofgem be providing more information to suppliers who proceed beyond the initial evaluation? We will provide a detailed specification containing all information needed to provide a Written Response, with a further opportunity to ask questions submitted in writing. 40. Will scoring from the evidence stage be taken through to final evaluation scoring? As opposed to being used solely for the purpose of shortlisting. The 1st Stage scoring will not be taken through to the Written Response stage. Evaluation criteria for Written Proposals will be focussed on the project, suitability having already been established in Stage 1. 41. Does capped time and materials mean, time and materials within a capped budget, or the DOS interpretation where suppliers are require to complete all work at their own cost? We will ask for firm prices for discovery and training proposals, and a budget ceiling (based on proposed inputs) for agreed Alphas. We expect a fair allocation of risk between the parties and flexibility to re-assess work to keep within the budget ceiling, so do not anticipate rigid application of the DOS Time and Materials within a Max Cap definition. 42. "Some teams and leaders have done agile training and further training is organised for leaders", please outline what sort of training has been provided? To date we have provided a range of training which includes:- Introductory agile mindset training to teams (5 teams)- 3-day agile for teams training (to 30 people)- Delivery Management training (to 12 people)- Agile for leaders training set up for Nov (8 people) 43. "Some teams and leaders have done agile training and further training is organised for leaders", who has provided this training? Training to date has been through Government Digital Services and by internal staff. 44. How much time will be expected to be worked in Glasgow? We are looking for the supplier to propose the recommended number of people and approach to deliver these phases of work within the budget based on the size of the organisation and proposed approach. Teams are often split across sites. The supplier will be expected to work across sites and maximise technology to facilitate effective cross-site working. London has the majority of staff, but training is likely to be required at both sites. 45. How many additional members of staff require Agile training? To date we have provided a range of training which includes:- Introductory agile mindset training to teams (5 teams)- 3-day agile for teams training (to 30 people)- Delivery Management training (to 12 people)- Agile for leaders training set up for Nov (8 people)We will look to train staff and teams based on the outcomes from the discovery so this will determine priority. 46. Can you share any of the outcomes of your discovery phase? E.g. the problem statement you have developedDo you consider your discovery phase complete, or would you now expect a more detailed discovery?Part-answer see follow-on in Answer sectionWe would envisage at least a limited discovery period which would then inform the alpha stage as specified by the tender document. We are happy to review alternative proposals, however our preference remains for a discovery to be conducted. The discovery identified the needs to provide teams with agile expertise to help them trial new ways of working, such as support on agile delivery and user-centred design, and targeted training (e.g. for teams and leaders). Specific roles were not identified as a result of our discovery (but should support the needs identified) and we would welcome recommendations.Ofgem’s strategic narrative provides information about the needs of the organisation to be an adaptive organisation. 47. Can you confirm the response required for the question "confirm you have sufficient resources available to commence in late November". Should this be a "yes/no" response, or follow the suggested format of an example with "what the situation was, the work the team did, what the results were"? Closed question acknowledged, Confirmation is acceptable, but any response which includes more relevant detail is likely to score higher than a simple 'Yes' response. 48. Do you currently have any teams working with adaptive practices (e.g. Agile) or have you trialled this anywhere in your organisation? Can you share any of your findings?Is there a goal or deadline for when you would like to have embedded new ways of working by to support your strategic narrative? We have projects that are working agile with multi-disciplinary teams, sprints and product backlogs in place. These projects have largely been in digital services and data. We envisage working in an agile way across the organisation so there is more work to be done for non-software teams.We would expect the initial discovery phase and training sessions outlined in responses to indicate a likely timeline for adoption of agile working. 49. We understand the size of the team is approx. 850 staff that require upskilling – what proportion of this as leaders / managers approx? Ofgem has around 45 senior leaders who are managing (multiple) teams. We also have around 80 managers responsible for a team. 50. Currently we can only view and complete the 'skills and experience' section. When will we be asked to fill in the 'how suppliers will be evaluated' section please? This is the second stage of the Procurement process, after we have shortlisted to final 6 suppliers from the long-list of initial responses. We will issue a document with further details and invite a Written Response from shortlisted suppliers. We will evaluate those responses on the published criteria in the initial advert. 51. How low or high is the level of self-awareness from senior management on the benefits to adopt agility? Low to Medium. Senior management are aware of the benefits of agility, yet it is not fully understood what this will mean from projects and staff.