Negotiation Requirement Responses Scoring

You can score a supplier's response to a negotiation requirement if the requirement was created with a scoring method of manual. Requirements can also be scored automatically by the application (or not require any scoring).

If the requirement is scored, supplier responses are assigned numeric values (either manually or automatically). The score values interact with the weights assigned to the requirement. You can use the weighted scores to compare responses when making award decisions. You must first close the negotiation before you can score requirements.

When the category manager creates a requirement, she defines any requirements needed to solicit additional information from a supplier. Requirements take the form of questions which the supplier contact answers during the course of creating a response to the negotiation. Once the negotiation is closed by the category manager, a response evaluator can view and rate the supplier responses by assigning a numeric score to each supplier response to the requirement. The category manager can then use the requirement ratings along with response price to determine the best supplier(s) from whom to source the item or service.

If the negotiation supports team scoring, the negotiation author can assign one or more members from the collaboration team to a scoring team. The author then assigns the scoring team to one or more requirement sections.

After the negotiation is closed and scoring is opened, the scoring team members can view and score supplier responses to the requirements in the sections that are assigned to their scoring team. Once the scoring team members have entered their scores, and the scoring phase is closed, the application calculates the final score for the requirement.

When calculating scores for supplier responses, there are three possible methods:

Automatic scoring - The scores for responses are calculated by the application. When defining the negotiation, you must specify the possible response values and assign a score value to each possible value.
Manual scoring - When defining the negotiation, you don't define any score values. With this method, you (and any scoring team members) view the supplier response and enter scores yourself. The application uses the scores you enter to calculate the weighted score for the response.
None - if the scoring method is None, no scores are calculated by the application or assigned by anyone.

When the buyer defines the negotiation, if the requirement is available for scoring, she can use the default maximum score value for the requirement, or she can define a new one. Requirements with a scoring method of None aren't scored and therefore have no maximum score value.

After the negotiation is closed, the evaluators (either a single evaluator or members of a scoring team) view each supplier response and assign a score to the response to the requirement. The score value (either entered manually or generated automatically) is divided by the Maximum Score and the result multiplied by the weight of the Requirement. The weighted scores are rolled up to the response level, which means a weighted score is calculated for each requirement, each requirement section, and the supplier response as a whole.

If the scoring method for the requirement is Automatic, the negotiation author defines a score for each possible response value for the requirement. The application uses the scores that the negotiation author defined to the negotiation with the weights to derive the weighted score.

You can give your scores offline by downloading the scoring spreadsheet in the Score Responses page. As prerequisite, you require ADF DI, which is available for Windows only. You can also give scores on behalf of the scoring team member offline by clicking the Score Responses button in the Manage Scoring page. In the Score Responses page of the selected user, you can download the scoring spreadsheet for that selected user.

When you define requirements, you can allow suppliers to provide comments with their requirement responses. These comments may provide additional insights that are useful for evaluation and scoring. You can now view the supplier comments in the scoring spreadsheet.

Scoring can happen on behalf of another team member from the application as well (in addition to using the spreadsheet.)

For example, assume a requirement with a scoring method of automatic. The requirement accepts a single response choice. The requirement has maximum score of 20, a weight of 10, and three possible acceptable responses:

If the supplier picks 15, the calculation to determine the weighted score is: (15 / 20) * 10 = 7.5

If the requirement allows the supplier to select multiple response choices, the method to calculate the score is different.

The response score is the sum of the scores for the values the supplier chose.
The maximum score is the sum of the scores for all possible choices.

For a requirement that allows multiple choices, with a maximum score of 30, a weight of 10, and three possible acceptable responses of

USD (defined score of 5)
EUR (defined score of 15)
CAD (defined score of 10)

If the supplier selects EUR and CAD, the weighted score is calculated as 8.33 (rounded)

((15 + 10) / (5 + 15 + 10) ) * 10 = 8.33

If the scoring method for the requirement is Manual, the negotiation author defines no score values. When you (or any other scoring team member) views the supplier response, you enter the score directly into the application. The application then uses the scores you enter along with the requirement weights to derive the weighted score.

If the negotiation allows team scoring, the negotiation author creates a scoring team and assigns members to the team. The author also assigns the scoring team to score one or more requirement sections. After the negotiation is closed, and the category manager opens the scoring phase, each team member views the supplier response and enters a score. Once the scoring is complete, the category manager closes the scoring phase, and the application calculates the overall composite average score for the response.

With team scoring, since multiple scores are entered for the same supplier response to the requirement, the application calculates the score by adding together the scores entered by scoring team members and then derives the average score by dividing the total by the number of team members who entered scores (it's possible that a team member didn't enter a score. The application doesn't require a score from each of the team members before it can calculate the final weighted score). When the scoring is closed, the application uses the scores submitted by the scorers to make calculations.

For example, assume this requirement:

Requirement text: How many employees do you have?
Requirement Weight: 30 The maximum requirement score is 10
The maximum requirement score is 10.

The available answers to the requirement are:

0 - 500
501 - 1000
1000+

The scoring team members assigned to score responses to this requirement:

Vijay Patel
Susan Lin
Steve Wolf
Clare Furey

After all the suppliers have responded and the negotiation is closed, the category manager opens the scoring and team members view and score the supplier response. Once the score team members have entered their scores, the category manager closes the scoring. At this point the score information for this requirement is:

This table shows the employees and the score values for the example.

Name	Score
Vijay Patel	8
Susan Lin	6
Steve Wolf	NA (Steve Wolf didn't submit any score)
Clare Furey	5

Based on these scores, the application calculates the final score as 18.99:

(((8 + 6 + 5) / 3) /10) * 30 = 18.99