The Complete Guide to

Team Bid Evaluation

A Bentley White Paper
Tim Schmidt
eSourcing Software Consultant

Published:
August 2017

www.bentley.com

In public procurement, the
evaluation of proposals must
follow an unbiased, fair, and
consistent process.
Introduction
In public procurement, the evaluation of proposals must follow an unbiased, fair, and
consistent process. To meet these standards, procurement teams use an objective set
of criteria and follow a predetermined scoring method to evaluate responses. Most
bids are scored by a team of evaluators, where each team member is chosen based on
their area of expertise.
The advantages to team evaluation are numerous, but structuring the process requires
careful planning and care to avoid common mistakes. This guide explains the team
evaluation process, from the formation of the team and the development of evaluation
criteria, to the selection of the most appropriate evaluation method. The guide shows
common pitfalls in the evaluation process and highlights technology solutions that help
procurement teams avoid these issues.
How to Form a Team of Evaluators
Forming the evaluation team should be your first step, even before the RFP is
developed, because you need the expertise and buy-in of the evaluators from the start.
The selection of the evaluation team must be done with an eye to avoiding bias
and corruption and bringing added value to the evaluation process.1 First, select
the evaluation manager, which should be someone highly experienced at project
management and who can oversee the entire process. Additionally, all stakeholders
should be represented in the evaluation process.
The evaluation team should comprise three to six members.2 Individual team members
commonly fall into two primary categories of evaluators: technical and financial.3 While
each team member should be familiar with a portion of the RFP criteria, not all need to
be familiar with every criterion listed in the RFP. Instead, each team member will lend
his or her own experience and expertise to the overall evaluation.
Often, there is a separate committee that acts on the final decision or recommendation
submitted by the evaluation team.4 Sometimes the secondary committee is
responsible for making the final decision or initiating further negotiations with the
selected supplier. These teams, known as project steering committees or source
selection authorities, are most common in government procurement or procurement
in large organizations.
1 Smith, P. 2017. Evaluation In Procurement – Why The Moderation Process Is Important. Public Spend Forum.
http://www.publicspendforum.net/blogs/peter-smith/2017/03/14/evaluation-public-procurement-bid-evaluators-moderation-process
2 State of Maine. 2015. Guidelines for Consensus Scoring and Proposal Evaluations.
www.maine.gov/purchase/files/Guidelines_for_Consensus_Scoring.doc
3 RFPSolutions Inc. 2010. Bid Evaluation Orientation Guide.
http://www.RFPsolutions.ca/files/BE_Orientation_Guide.pdf
4 Rumbaugh, M. 2015. Why Does Source Selection Take So Long? Contract Management.
http://read.nxtbook.com/ncma/contractmanagement/november2015/whydoessourceselection_feat.html
The Complete Guide to Team Bid Evaluation 2
 How to Structure Questions and Develop Evaluation Criteria
Each member of the cross-functional evaluation team should play a role in crafting the
criteria for the RFP and the evaluation. This will provide a variety of expertise to ensure
the criteria are relevant to the needs of the organization. The RFP criteria and the
scoring and weighting guidelines should be established prior to contacting suppliers.
When determining the criteria, there are other aspects to consider beyond the features
and functionalities of a supplier’s product.5 Since many features and functionalities are
standard across suppliers, additional considerations should be evaluated. For example,
if a procurement team was evaluating software, they might consider:
• Ability of supplier to deliver and support the product/service
• User-friendliness of the product platform infrastructure
• Ability of the platform to integrate with current infrastructure
• Integration of applications
• Implementation process/resources
Each member of the
• Whether training and knowledge transfer are provided and how they are delivered
cross-functional evaluation
team should play a role in • Whether ongoing support is offered
crafting the criteria for the • Vendor maturity and vendor fit (how well the organization can partner with
RFP and the evaluation. the vendor)
Though it is important to ask the right questions, it also pays to be concise.
Procurement teams should consider the number of criteria included in the RFP. Each
criterion will receive a score and a weight from each evaluation team member. Then,
each criterion will be discussed when the team meets. The more criteria, the longer the
process takes. Therefore, it is important to limit the number of evaluation criteria to the
most critical.

Choosing the Right Evaluation Method for Your Needs

It is common to evaluate proposals based on cost and technical suitability. There are
several methods that attach a score and a weight (level of importance) to each of
these factors. The following are some evaluation methodologies commonly used by
government and private organizations. These include:

5 Bocklun, L., Hinton, B., Morey, M. 2011. Optimizing Technology Selection: Build strong requirements and
simplify the process. Contact Center Pipeline.
http://www.strategiccontact.com/articles/Optimizing-Technology-Selection-Aug2011.pdfnn

The Complete Guide to Team Bid Evaluation 3

Basic Scoring
Each proposal is given a score, generally from 1-10, for each of the criteria.6
For example, when considering a software project, the following is a basic scoring of
the proposals:
CRITERIA SUPPLIER A SUPPLIER B SUPPLIER C

QUALIFICATIONS 3 6 7
FEATURES 4 8 7
PRICE 7 5 9
SERVICES 6 6 5
TOTAL 20 25 28
This is a very simple approach, but it is not preferable in most situations. Since
each score carries the same weight, the implication is that all criteria are of equal
importance. This is rarely the case.

Combination of Scores and Weightings

In a combination method of evaluation, each criterion is scored on a different scale,
giving some criteria a higher weight than others. Using the software project example
above, the outcome is different when the criteria are weighted:

CRITERIA MAXIMUM SUPPLIER A SUPPLIER B SUPPLIER C

SCORE
QUALIFICATIONS 20 11 15 16
FEATURES 15 8 13 10
PRICE 5 5 3 4
SERVICES 10 6 8 7
TOTAL 50 30 38 37

While it is preferable to assign varying weights to different criterion, this method is

prone to confusion and error because of the individualized scales used for
each criterion.

6 Supplier Select. 2014. What are the standard RFP scoring methodologies?
http://www.supplierselect.com/faq/article/87/

The Complete Guide to Team Bid Evaluation 4

 Distinct Weightings
In the distinct weightings method, each criterion is given a score based on a standard
scoring scale. Once the scores are assigned, each criterion is then assigned a weight
value. The total score for each criterion is calculated as the standard score multiplied
by the weight. For the software project, it would look something like this:
CRITERIA MAXIMUM WEIGHT SUPPLIER SUPPLIER SUPPLIER
SCORE A B C
Raw Weighted Raw Weighted Raw Weighted

QUALIFICATIONS 10 2 3 6 6 12 7 14
FEATURES 10 3 4 12 8 24 7 21
PRICE 10 1 7 7 5 5 9 9
SERVICES 10 2 6 12 6 12 5 10
TOTAL 37 53 54

When an RFP is particularly
complex the criteria needs to
be grouped into categories
and sub-categories.
This allows for easy scoring, with the benefit that important criteria are given more weight.
Hierarchical Structures
When an RFP is particularly complex, the criteria needs to be grouped into categories
and sub-categories. The criteria in each category can be assigned scores and
weights, as above, but each category or sub-category is also assigned a weight. The
overall weight of each criterion must contribute to the total weight of its category or
sub-category. This ensures that each criterion is assigned a score and weight that
accurately reflects its significance within the organization.

Lowest Cost Compliant

With the lowest-cost compliant method, the proposals are first evaluated on technical
requirements.7 Each proposal must meet a minimum pass mark and meet all minimum
technical requirements to be considered. For the software project, it would be as follows:
CRITERIA MAXIMUM WEIGHT SUPPLIER SUPPLIER SUPPLIER
SCORE A B C
Raw Weighted Raw Weighted Raw Weighted

QUALIFICATIONS 10 2 3 6 6 12 7 14
FEATURES 10 3 4 12 8 24 7 21
PRICE 10 1 7 7 5 5 9 9
SERVICES 10 2 6 12 6 12 5 10
TOTAL 37 53 54

7 Mak, J. 2010. Increased Transparency in Bases of Selection and Award Decisions.

http://www.RFPsolutions.ca/articles/Jon_Mak_IPPC5_Increased_Transparency_Basis-of-Selection_22July2013.pdf

The Complete Guide to Team Bid Evaluation 5

Those that pass this stage of the evaluation are then assessed for cost. In this case,
if the pass mark is 40, Supplier B and Supplier C would move forward. The supplier
that offers the lowest cost would be chosen and awarded the contract. This method is
best used for the purchase of basic products, rather than complex products or services
where the technical requirements can be of equal or greater importance than the cost.

Price or Cost per Point

With the cost or price per point technique, technical criteria are determined in advance
of putting out an RFP, and evaluators score the proposals based on these technical
criteria. The scores are then averaged to arrive at a combined quality score. Next, the
proposals are assessed based on cost or price per quality point. In most cases, the
proposal that meets the technical and quality thresholds and offers the lowest price per
quality point is awarded the contract.

Best Value
Again, the best value method of evaluating proposals accounts for both technical
scores and price, but they are weighted differently. The weighting of the technical
score vs. the price is chosen by the evaluation or procurement professionals, but are
generally 80 percent technical vs. 20 percent price, 70 percent technical vs. 30 percent
price, or 60 percent technical vs. 40 percent price. Meeting the technical criteria is
generally given higher weight than price, which is important when considering complex
products and services.

Accounting for Outliers and Consensus Scoring

Each of the above methods can be conducted by an evaluation team, where each team
member scores and weighs each of the criteria individually. Traditionally, this is done
by entering scores, weights, and comments into a spreadsheet. The scores are then
averaged to determine the best results. However, these averages can be skewed if
just one evaluator disagrees with the others to a large degree. It has been customary
practice to disregard the lowest and highest scores in an evaluation, but this is not
always a reliable option. Because of these difficulties, a consensus approach to
evaluating suppliers has become a popular method of selection.

Team Evaluation Checklist

• Select project manager/bid administrator.
• Select evaluation team members based on stakeholder representation and expertise.
• Establish criteria based on organization needs.
• Establish scoring and weighting guidelines.
• Create RFP and send it out to prospective suppliers. Ensure a firm submission deadline.
• Collect proposals.
• Distribute proposals and evaluation forms to each team member for their individual evaluations.
Set a firm deadline.
• Collect individual evaluations and calculate average scores for each supplier for each criterion.
• Hold meeting to discuss scores and areas of strong disagreement. Re-evaluate if needed.
• Select winning candidate and pass to bid administrator to contact and negotiate with winning supplier.

The Complete Guide to Team Bid Evaluation 6


With improved technology
solutions, there is an
opportunity to simplify
the evaluation process.
Recording, weighting, and
averaging scores, as well as
creating a final report on the
results, can be automated.
Role of Technology in Managing Evaluations
Technology can make the evaluation process quicker and more efficient. The traditional
method calls for each team member to enter scores and weights into a spreadsheet.
This must be done individually, and the different spreadsheets must be collected,
assessed, and collated into one document that includes the average scores. This is a
tedious process that is predisposed to error. Yet, this is still the predominant means
of scoring.
In addition, if a team of evaluators meets to discuss scores and re-evaluate or reach
consensus, it can be a time-consuming process to have team members manually
resubmit scores, calculate those scores, and potentially repeat that process. If there is
significant disagreement on any number of criteria, this period could be prolonged.
With improved technology solutions, there is an opportunity to simplify the evaluation
process. Recording, weighting, and averaging scores, as well as creating a final report
on the results, can be automated.
The ideal evaluation automation system would do the following:
• Allow the bid administrator or project manager to select the members of the
evaluation team.
• Enable the team to input the criteria and create a hierarchical RFP that can be sent
out electronically to potential suppliers.
• Allow suppliers and vendors to submit their proposals online.
• Facilitate the entry of individual scorings and weightings once the proposals have
been submitted.
• Calculate the average score for each criterion for each proposal received,
collating it into a final report.
• Produce a concrete audit trail.
• Reduce overall cost of RFP and proposal evaluation.
Ideally, everything is managed from a user-friendly web-based dashboard and all team
member activity could be tracked in real time.
Pitfalls to Avoid in Team Scoring
Unfortunately, evaluators face pitfalls throughout the evaluation process, regardless of
which method is used or how technology plays a role. Evaluators can keep the process
smooth by learning where problems occur and how to best avoid them.
Selecting the evaluation team is relatively straightforward, but managing this team can
pose challenges. The evaluation process can also have its own stumbling blocks. Team
leaders often find the need to:
• Check up on evaluators and ensure everyone submits their scores on time.
• Keep evaluators from sharing notes/opinions during the individual evaluation
process so they don’t influence each other.
The Complete Guide to Team Bid Evaluation 7
 • Keep all aspects/files related to the evaluation process organized and
easily accessible.
• Check for mathematical and logic errors that can occur during manual recording
and calculation of scores.
• Ensure team members, who have their regular jobs to do, prioritize the evaluation.8
• Prevent the timeline from extending, resulting in weeks or months to award
a contract.
• Deal with a process that is time consuming and requires a lot of effort.
• Contend with a scoring system (such as 0-10) that can be too cumbersome
and broad.
• Work with a fragmented process with too many individual comments and
conference calls/meetings required.
Other common pitfalls include:
• More focus on RFP preparation than evaluation. To avoid this, it is critical to
determine the primary attributes required by the organization, ensure the selection
criteria have been well-defined, ensure references are required of all applicants,
and that these references are thoroughly checked.9
• Not asking the right questions when it comes to the reference check. The key is
to consult with people who are experienced with the project and know what
questions to ask. They will be able to help devise a set of questions to ask
respondents’ references.
• Team members divulging information they shouldn’t. Ensure the evaluation
team is mindful about who they speak with and what they say. Unwanted
consequences can result if any of the RFP respondents learn information that
the others have not.
• Including people solely based on seniority, but who might not be experts.
Team members should possess the required expertise to adequately assess
the RFP respondents.
• Poor timing. Clear milestones and dates should be set for the entire evaluation
process, from the date the RFP is sent out to the due date for the proposals, the
completion of the evaluation process, and selection of the winning proposal. It is
important to ensure there is enough time for the evaluation process. This is not to
be rushed, but it should not be subjected to numerous extensions or delays.

8 Mak, J. 2010. Increased Transparency in Bases of Selection and Award Decisions.

http://www.RFPsolutions.ca/articles/Jon_Mak_IPPC5_Increased_Transparency_Basis-of-Selection_22July2013.pdf
9 Mak, J. 2010. Increased Transparency in Bases of Selection and Award Decisions.
http://www.RFPsolutions.ca/articles/Jon_Mak_IPPC5_Increased_Transparency_Basis-of-Selection_22July2013.pdf

The Complete Guide to Team Bid Evaluation 8

Conclusion
When it comes to the evaluating RFPs, it is critical to choose the evaluation team with
care and to include the team in the process from the very beginning. While there are
many forms of scoring that permit a team evaluation approach, using the traditional
spreadsheet is cumbersome, time-consuming, and prone to error and liability.
Technological advancements in recent years have led to procurement software
that has automated the evaluation process. ProcureWare by Bentley Systems is
procurement software developed with the evaluation process in mind, offering supplier
management, sourcing, and contract management.
The sourcing portion of ProcureWare streamlines the bidding process, manages
respondent questions, provides configurable templates, and allows the evaluation
team to collaborate with each other. To learn more about how you can gain these
advantages for your organization, call +1 206-855-8430.

© 2017 Bentley Systems Incorporated. Bentley, the “B” Bentley logo, and ProcureWare are either registered or unregistered trademarks or service marks of
Bentley Systems, Incorporated, or one of its direct or indirect wholly-owned subsidiaries. Other brands and product names are trademarks of their respective
owners. CS14414 0817

The Complete Guide to Team Bid Evaluation 9