3.6 Two individuals oversaw the project for the Agency and remained on the team throughout the procurement. This was a strength in the procurement process. While the Agency changed its project and senior managers at least five times during the procurement, the continuity of staffing in the core team resulted in the Agency acquiring a comprehensive knowledge of the project which served it well, particularly in the negotiations with GeneSYS during the preferred bidder stage. Members of KHHD and GeneSYS told us that, while the Agency's team was one of the smallest it had encountered for a procurement of the size and complexity of the NRTS, it was one of the most effective.
3.7 A consequence of the small size of the Agency's team was that it necessitated passing the vast majority of work on the client's side of the procurement over to advisers, including day-to-day responsibility for the management of the procurement. The Agency's ability to manage effectively the cost of KHHD, which earned its fees on an hours worked basis, was limited by the size of the Agency's team, the considerable volume of material prepared by KHHD and the diverse geographical spread of the team and its advisers.
3.8 The Agency planned to manage its advisers by identifying each task and defining the work required by the advisers to complete the task before assigning a budget or commissioning the work. In practice, there were no incentives, such as task performance bonuses/deductions, in KHHD's contract to encourage delivery against budgets. Moreover, for most of the set tasks, the Agency did not in fact seek detailed task descriptions in advance of the assignment. In some cases, the Agency formalised the tasks retrospectively.