Work and Health Programme (WHP), Department for Work and Pensions

A £500m contract supporting 250,000 people with disabilities, long-term unemployed and people requiring intensive support to find sustained employment. The programme delivers intensive personalised employment support to participants, including a key worker, mentoring and peer support, integrated access to specialist support networks and support from experts with knowledge of the local labour market.

A selection of key contract management activities and cross functional interactions at each stage within the contract lifecycle are set out below.

Stakeholder, supplier and market engagement stage

The Contracted Health and Employment Services directorate (CHES) account management team led workshops with providers and internal stakeholders (commercial, finance, performance management, strategy, operational policy, Jobcentre Plus and local authorities) to identify lessons learnt from previous employment programmes.

The high level design of the WHP was delivered by the CHES account management team, strategy, finance and commercial to ensure it was deliverable, commercially viable and delivered Ministerial priorities.

Once the design was set, the WHP Project was established. Project team change specialists were tasked with programme delivery, managing changes across the Department and writing the contract specification using input from CHES account management team, strategy, commercial, Jobcentre Plus, IT, legal and HR.

Strategy and CHES analysts worked with finance leads to input into the 'value for money' section of the business case.

Procurement stage

The commercial team designed and led the procurement phase with the CHES account management team providing support through the dialogue phase by testing that what bidders described was realistic and deliverable.

The CHES account management team maintained a continuous dialogue with the commercial team to ensure they could effectively manage and deliver the expected business benefits when the contract went live running, e.g. by providing input on performance terms and conditions and payment validation systems. They also supported the due diligence exercise through identifying risks in the proposed delivery proposals.

Alongside the procurement process, the project team, CHES account management team and commercial expanded on the contract specifications to write supplier guidance for the contract.

Contract and supplier management stage

Accountability for the contracts' spend, delivery and performance was transferred to the CHES account management team. The team held workshops with suppliers and commercial colleagues to gain assurance that required implementation activities were being carried out to plan.

The CHES account management team is accountable for the performance of the contract. They are also accountable for ensuring a robust system of financial control is in place, together with a process for reporting and understanding performance. They own provider guidance and leads on changes to guidance to ensure that the programme performs, impacts wider policy changes and delivers the Department's priorities.

The team work in partnership with commercial, finance, operations, legal and many other expert domains to deliver on these accountabilities. This includes identifying and managing risks that could impact the contract, impacting policy changes, and delivering contract changes where required.