New Bid Grid Formats for RFPs (Enterprise Edition Sponsors)

The Sponsor workflow from planning through vendor selection in outsourcing can be arduous, time consuming, and costly, but ClearTrial 5.8 streamlines your existing insular benchmarking and contracting processes in one place.

With 5.8, outsourcing/procurement users can manage and maintain benchmark plans, RFPs, and vendor bids in one place, to efficiently compare apples to apples and to centralize all your historical data in one place so that you gain actionable insights.

When creating an RFP and generating a Bid Grid in 5.8, there are new options to select from to give you direct control over the data included and format required to receive quality bids from vendors.

Generating the RFP's Bid Grid from a plan can be launched by multiple ways or locations in the service.

1. Select an existing RFP from the RFP List screen launched by selecting RFPs from the Edit menu.

   1. Click New from the RFP List screen.

   2. Choose the plan from which you want to create the RFP.

      In the Create RFP dialog there is a new option that is selected by default: Download Bid Grid.

2. Select an RFP from the RFP List screen and click the Download Bid Grid button.

3. Select an RFP from the RFP List screen and click Edit.

   On the Details tab, there is a Download Bid Grid link towards the bottom of the page.

4. Selecting a plan from the Plan List screen and clicking Create RFP from the Other Actions… menu.

   1. In the Create RFP dialog, fill in the required information and then you will see a new option selected by default: Download Bid Grid.

   2. Keep that option selected and click Continue… to see the new Download Bid Grid dialog where you will be able to select from various options to control the level of data and default contents included in the Bid Grid.

Note:

Additional roles/capabilities required for RFPs and bids management

• Users who have the RFP Administrator additional role/capability granted can create, edit, or delete RFPs.

• Users who have the RFP/Bid Reader additional role/capability granted can view RFPs and bids.

Your assigned ClearTrial System Administrator can configure these for you and any other user permissions, on demand.

Specify Bid Grid File Name when Creating an RFP or Later

In 5.8, when you create an RFP from a plan, you will be prompted to enter the Bid Grid File Name, which is a user-defined file name that you set to use when you export your Bid Grid workbook. You can also change this filename after the RFP has been created, at any time, by editing the selected RFP from the RFP list screen and navigating to the Details tab.

New Download Bid Grid Dialog

Upon downloading the 5.8 Bid Grid, there are several new options available to control the format and contents of the Bid Grid you send to vendors. Additionally, you now have direct control over the values your vendors can submit to ensure you are receiving quality bids and reducing time on comparisons.

New options to specify the level of detail included: You can now choose from three levels of data granularity for the activities included in the Bid Grid.

• Major Task/Cost (highest level)

  Note: The Bid Grid will always contain, at a minimum, Major Task/Cost level data.

• Major Task and Task

• Major Task, Task and Resource (lowest level)

New options to specify location options: 5.8 allows you the flexibility to generate a global Bid Grid on a single worksheet or to include a worksheet for every location.

• Global

• Per Location

New options to specify what vendors are to submit: You have several choices to control which data you want vendors to submit back in their bids.

• Unit Hours or Total Hours

• Unit Cost or Total Cost

• Resource Billing Rate

  Note: The resource Billing Rate option is only enabled when you are generating the Bid Grid at the lowest level of granularity (by Major Task/Cost, Task, and Resource).

If you want your vendors to edit the number of units per major task, then generate the Bid Grid with Major Task/Cost detail selected and either at a global level or by location. You will see the Number of units cells highlighted in blue in the Bid Grid-specific worksheets.

Note:

All blue cells in the Bid Grid are editable by vendors.

The options selected when generating the Bid Grid will determine which fields are blue in the Bid Grid workbook. For example, if you want vendors to provide the total hours and total cost for each line item, then you can change the ClearTrial default to total hours and total cost for the vendor editable values and you will see the total hours and total cost cells with a blue background color in the Bid Grid. Blue is to indicate to your vendors which fields they are able to enter and edit.

Additional sheets to include: Specifications, Responsibilities Matrix, and Timelines worksheets will be selected and included by default in your Bid Grid.

Don't worry! ClearTrial 5.8 will remember the options you selected last time you generated the Bid Grid, so you don't have to.

Enhanced Default Bid Grid Structure

After you have downloaded and opened the ClearTrial default Bid Grid from a specific plan, you will see multiple sheets included in the excel (.xls) workbook, depending on the options selected, each of which you will want to review before sending out to vendors.

Instructions: The first sheet included will offer the default instructions for vendors to understand how to enter and complete their bid successfully.

Note:

If you want to change the default Instructions included, you can simply delete this sheet and insert a new custom sheet for the custom instructions you want to provide to your vendors.

Specifications: When included, this sheet provides you the default study specifications from the study plan you created your RFP from. This sheet is editable to allow you the upmost flexibility to change the format or data included based on the specific needs for your study or to align with your already established business processes and standards.

Note:

Please make sure you enter in your Sponsor contact information at the top of this sheet in the space provided before sending out for bid.

If you have configured custom fields in your plan using the custom assumptions feature, all custom fields will be located at the bottom of this sheet, so that you can easily remove them if needed.

The "- -" is displayed as the Total value for specifications where the global value is not calculated as a summation.

Responsibilities Matrix: When included, this sheet provides you the default activity ownership matrix for all included tasks in the study so there is no confusion between who is assigned to do the work between you, your CRO and if applicable, other vendors.

This sheet is editable in case custom updates need to be made and is filterable so you or your vendor can quickly hone in on your assignments only.

Timelines: When included, this sheet will contain the study activity milestone date schedule.

The Study Duration displayed at the bottom is calculated from the time between the first and last included milestone. The comments column in blue allows vendors to add any comments for alternative dates or anticipated timeline changes.

Summary: The BidGrid_Summary sheet included provides you the ability to export and view summary bid data in a comprehensible format for inclusion in your contracts.

This sheet will include a blue cell for each vendor to enter in their name which will cascade onto the other subsequent sheets.

Note:

The vendor name is required for each vendor to enter before you import the completed bid or you will receive a fatal error upon import of the completed bid grid. The vendor name will be associated with the bid version upon import of the bid in ClearTrial.

Additionally, there is a blue cell offered for vendors to enter in a bottom line discount off of the total labor fees.

Global: The BidGrid_Global sheet included provides your vendors the ability to enter their proposed hours and costs for effort being performed in the back office or not being performed in a particular location.

Per Location: The BidGrid_<plan location name> sheets will include those tasks that are being performed in a specific location and indirect costs that vary by location. There will be a single sheet included per location.

Editable Mapping Key: The mapping key was initially offered in ClearTrial 5.3 in the Bid Grid to allow your vendors a quick way to map back to their client grids. In 5.8, the mapping key is editable so your vendors can efficiently update the ClearTrial default value offered per line item to align with their existing mapping identifiers.

Important Bid Grid Considerations

1. All bids uploaded must be in .xls format only. Any other format will cause upload errors.

2. You cannot delete or alter the structure of any of the BidGrid_global or by location sheets in the workbook.

   For example, deleting or adding columns to these sheets are not permitted and will result in errors when you upload the bid into ClearTrial.

3. Blue cells in the workbook are those cells which your vendors can edit and will vary depending on the options selected when generating the Bid Grid.

4. Vendor editable comments support up to 2500 characters in the Bid Grid_global/by location sheets so vendors can add alternate scenarios or their assumptions when completing their bid.

5. Number of units is editable for your vendors, when you generate the Bid Grid at the Major Task/Cost, global or by location levels.

   Vendors can enter or edit the Number of units provided in whole number values.

6. You can insert any custom sheets you wish to include in your workbook, in any particular order.

7. If you would like to edit or replace the default Instructions, Specifications, Responsibilities Matrix and Timelines included in the workbook, delete the sheets and insert your custom sheets into the workbook.

8. If you do not want assigned items included in your RFP/Bid Grid, remember to exclude them from your plan before generating your RFP.

9. All included, assigned line items which result in zero value (tasks/indirect costs calculated as zero) or are adjusted to zero will be included in your RFP/Bid Grid so you can solicit a cost you don't know and want vendors to bid on.

   If you don't want costs or fees that have no expected effort or amounts to be included in the Bid Grid, you can exclude them from the plan or remove their assignments. If fees/costs with zero amount are not assigned to the provider for the scope of work for your RFP, they will be excluded from the Bid Grid.

10. Major Task, Task and Resource must be included in the plan for the data to be included in the Bid Grid.

    If you run the Bid Grid by Major Task and your major task has no included tasks, the major task will be excluded from the Bid Grid.

    Major tasks with no tasks or with only tasks with no resources are excluded from the Bid Grid.

11. If you zero out meeting attendees or set the number of attendees for a particular resource type to zero from the Meetings Manager of a plan, those meetings line items are excluded from the Bid Grid.

Import Vendor Submitted Bid Enhancements

After you have received a submitted bid from a vendor for your RFP, navigate to the RFP list screen and for that selected RFP, click on Import Bid. ClearTrial 5.8 will automatically associate the vendor name provided on the Bid-Grid_Summary sheet by the vendor in the completed Bid Grid to the specific bid being imported. If a bid already exists from that vendor, you can still choose if you want to replace the existing version or create a new bid version for that vendor.

Bids Comparison Enhancements (Enterprise Edition Sponsors)

5.8 offers you the flexibility to compare up to 5 items at any given time, where a bid compared against the planned values count as 2 items.

For example, you can compare up to 4 bids against your benchmark's planned values or compare 5 bids, where you can select which bid you want to be the baseline for comparison.

Tip:

Tip: Compare bids can be launched from multiple locations/workflows in the service.

You can compare bids in the following ways:

1. Select an existing RFP from the RFP List screen from Edit > RFPs (launched by selecting RFPs from the Edit menu).

   1. Click Compare Bids to compare all the bids imported by vendor and version number for that RFP.

   ClearTrial assumes that you want to compare all bids for this RFP. If you want to limit your comparison to specific bids for this RFP, access the comparison from the Bid list screen (see option 2 below).

   Note:

   You can compare bids for an RFP that has existing bids uploaded. To easily identify which RFPs have bids imported against them from the RFP list screen, click on the Configure List Options link and ensure you have selected Number of Bids as a column to display.

2. Select multiple bids from the Bids List screen from Edit > Bids (launched by selecting Bids from the Edit menu).

   1. Click Compare.

View Bids from RFP Bids Tab

When you edit an RFP from the RFP list screen, if you navigate to the Bids tab, you will see a new button in 5.8 to view the bid directly from this screen without having to go back to the Bid list screen and locating the specific bid for the RFP.

Vendor Bid Comparison Options

When configuring the reporting parameters for comparison, you can choose the level of granularity, which values to compare and whether or not to highlight variances above the user-defined threshold specified for costs and hours.

Available options to select depend on the granularity of bids selected for comparison. By default, bids are rolled up to the corresponding common lowest level of granularity.

• Level of Comparison: Select the level of data for the comparison. Major Task is selected and disabled by default since this high level activity is static in all Bid Grid formats. If the bids selected include data at the task-resource level, those options will be available to choose from for values comparison.

• Location Options: If one bid is global and the other bid is by location, global will be selected by default because comparisons can be done at their most common level.

• Values to Compare: Select all the data points you want included for the bids comparison. For all comparisons conducted, the total cost will always be selected and included and the number of units will be selected by default.

• Variance Display: Specify whether or not you want to highlight costs and/or hours variances beyond a user-defined (positive/negative) percentage threshold or tolerance.

• Baseline for Comparison: Select to include the Planned Values or a specific bid as the baseline, if you are comparing multiple bids. If you are comparing a single bid to the benchmark's planned values, then the planned values will always be included in the comparison and selected.

You can also click on the blue question mark icon in the upper right hand side of the dialog in real time for more information directly from the UI.

Important Bids Comparison Considerations

1. Default for comparing bids is excel (.xls). CSV is not supported for bids comparison reporting.

2. If you need to store the comparison report for historical data purposes or records, when exporting to PDF, zoom your document to 100%.

3. The baseline item appears first in the report, whether that be the benchmark's planned values or the bid chosen as the baseline for comparison against other bids.

4. When specified, cost value variances greater than the user-defined threshold, are highlighted in yellow.

5. Hours value variances, when specified, are highlighted in blue to easily distinguish between the two types of variances in the report.

6. The specified user-defined thresholds for costs and hours, depending on what you have selected to highlight is explicitly displayed in the report output so you can easily identify what the % was when reviewing the report at a later time.

7. Use the bid mapping table located at the top of the report to identify each bid by plan name, vendor name, version of the bid and its description.

8. For comparison ease-of-use in Excel, when comparing multiple bids and/or including planned values, beneath the bid mapping table provided:

   1. Select the row under the column headers where Bid 1, Bid 2, and so on is displayed.

   2. From Excel's View menu, Window options, select Freeze Panes to freeze that row while the rest of the worksheet scrolls. This makes it easy to identify the items for further review or decisions.