What can you do when you think that you are not getting the best performance from your contractors? Our Chief Executive Tony Bryan looks into some common misconceptions:
Our support in this area has ranged from minor contract or process change to the creation and management of significant turnaround plans. We have helped organisations to fundamentally re-shape their supply chain in order to improve service performance or significantly reduce cost.
Given the high profile nature of Repairs & Maintenance services and the potential impact that service failure can cause, we have gained the experience to provide an objective and practical role to help either pro-actively or re-actively manage the key risks of such fall-out. In our experience, the following is often true:
- Contractors suggesting that they are losing money on contracts when that is either not true or driven by their own inefficiencies (rather than low prices)
- Contractors commercially exploiting the housing provider due to ineffective processes, ambiguous contracts or poor commercial capability of the client
- Housing provider expecting the contractor to take the lead on Value for Money optimisation which can be unrealistic
- Housing Provider unsure whether their contract is fit for purpose, e.g. is their fixed price model really delivering the benefits that they thought it would
Applying sticking plaster to such symptoms or bringing in temporary staff may be missing the point if you need to create a step change which offers long-term sustainability. In over 50% of contract/partnership reviews we have found that the processes or behaviours of the client are also a root cause issue as much as the contractor’s performance. Therefore to assess whether your partnership contracts are delivering best value you may need to get a 360 health check to include your own working practices.
We have helped partnerships by ‘stepping inside’ the contractor’s operating model which, given our experience in setting up and running Direct Labour Organisations, enables us to make a true assessment of whether the contractor is performing. Contact us to find out more.