The low hanging fruit in achieving "Better for less"

We’ve been attending a few conferences lately focused on the current government initiative “Better for Less” and had plenty of discussions with prospective clients. The predominant theme is, as a tax payer myself, very welcome. Public sector departments and organisations are being actively encouraged to make smarter procurements and to look for the best value from all sources with a particular emphasis on the innovative solutions that can be procured through SME’s at a local level. Great for UK PLC and for us as citizens.

For far too long, in my opinion, the procurement function of the public sector has been dominated by inflexible framework agreements and only been assailable by the large systems houses. Any scraps from the table have been generally given to preferred partners and the contracts associated with delivery so challenging as to deter all but the most desperate and those who want the business at any cost.

But, as Mr Dylan says “The times they are a changing” and it has been refreshing to hear Stephen Allott and his associates outline the new order.

One nuance that I would like to pick up on is the emphasis of the programme on new procurement. Although not excluded, the opportunity to make existing infrastructure work more efficiently and the opportunity to improve current productivity seem to have been partially overlooked. I am all for the future and the use of the most effective platforms for new projects but we shouldn’t overlook the low hanging fruit that would allow us to make massive savings and to use the infrastructure we have to achieve more without the need for complete change.

With the pressure on departments to deliver more or reduce costs then the use of cost effective tools to monitor and alert, allowing existing staff to concentrate on moving forward, rather than constantly checking the status quo, would release a huge amount of time and resources and remove considerable risk contingency.

The old adage “Work smarter not harder” is more pertinent now than ever before although perhaps “Work smarter and harder” is more of the underlying message.