2.4 Formalize Procurement Plan

Once project requirements have been fully defined in a bid invitation specification, the procurement organization can begin implementing the formal procurement process. To help ensure clarity for the procurement organization, it is a good practice at this stage to collect all project requirements into a procurement plan document, and have it approved by the responsible senior executives. Such a document could contain for example the following sections (adapted from NP-T-3.21):

1. Introduction (purpose, background, objectives)
2. Scope of procurement and exclusions
3. Options considered (contract options, available suppliers, etc.)
4. Recommended procurement approach
5. Interfaces and communications with vendors
6. Procurement plan
   • Schedule
   • Milestones
   • Key assumptions
7. Roles, responsibilities, and resources
8. Risks and mitigative actions
9. Evaluation process and scorecard
10. Oversight, auditing, and fairness monitoring

The procurement plan builds upon but does not repeat previously prepared documentation such as a project’s business case or project execution plan. Procurement plans provide the methodology and approach, process, and project management structure for implementation of cross-functional procurement activities.