Bid Assessment
Introduction to the Bid Assessment Tool
The Bid Assessment Tool (BAT) is designed to make it easier for the funders of public services to make objective, evidence-based decisions. It is most commonly used by organisations to allocate grant or investment funding on a fair and transparent basis and has been used in the allocation of over 100million to date. Each BAT is developed afresh to reflect the funders requirements and can also be adapted for other uses including candidate sifting for recruitment purposes or selecting a winning tender for service provision.
Clients have reported that the BAT:
- reduces subjectivity
- improves the quality of decisions
- saves time and money
The Tool can also automatically check that the applicant has complied with essential criteria, provide summary pages for each individual assessment and automatic feedback for applicants. Since each Tool is developed uniquely for each client by an experienced designer, we can advise you on what would work best in your particular situation.
Our work with clients typically begins with designing the funding or decision making process, through drafting a prospectus or tender and tool design, to facilitating the assessment and moderation of decisions.
Assessing quantitative information
The Tool allows a user to check the features of an application against quantitative information, such as essential minimum criteria. In the example below, a scorer wishes to find out whether a funding applicant will meet the minimum targets for equalities groups and delivery outputs and outcomes. The specification requirements automatically change depending on which option the scorer selects and the percentages for the application in question are calculated automatically.
Alternatively, view information about our Partnership Evaluation Tool.
Assessing qualitative information
A key strength of the Tool is that it enables different users to assess qualitative information against set selection criteria in a consistent way. In the example below, an assessor would read the information provided by an applicant and, per row, assess which of the boxes contained a statement that most closely described the information that the applicant had provided. In this case, two scorers would complete the exercise independently and discuss their thoughts to arrive at an agreed score. Error between the scorers is typically less than 5%.
Scorers are also encouraged to fill in comment boxes for every section to explain the rationale for their decision.
Reporting
The Tool can present findings and feedback in a way that facilitates the decision making process. In the example here, individual areas of scoring are grouped into three sections, so that, for example, applicants with strong project management could be prioritised. Raw scores and graphs are also provided as required.
Check out our Bid Assessment case study. If you would like more information on the Tool, or our decision making support services, please contact John Griffiths at Rocket Science on 020 7253 6289.