Plan for social procurement

The Agency’s Social Procurement Strategy outlines the Agency’s priority objectives and outcomes. Buyers can then align the procurement activity to the objectives in the strategy, if this is consistent with the social procurement opportunity analysis.

The main aim of a social procurement opportunity analysis is to determine what opportunities exist to deliver social and sustainable outcomes in the context of your procurement activity.

For example:

• are there social benefit suppliers available? what is their capacity?
• should you pursue social benefit suppliers using the direct or indirect approach to social procurement?
• are there opportunities for the supplier to conserve energy and water as part of the procurement?

Buyers can log in to Digital Marketplace and access Supplier Hub to search for Victorian social benefit suppliers, including Victorian Aboriginal Businesses and social enterprises. This is not a complete list of social benefit suppliers, it only contains those suppliers who have registered in the Supplier Hub.

Buyers can also find out about social benefit suppliers and their capability through:

• Kinaway
• Supply Nation
• Social Traders
• BuyAbility

See, Analyse the market and Plan for procurement-related policies for more information.

If social benefit suppliers aren’t available, consider social procurement commitments that could be achieved from mainstream suppliers, for example:

• providing employment and training opportunities for Victorian priority jobseekers
• advancing gender equality
• environmental outcomes

Consider the specific circumstances of the procurement, such as the location, value, type of goods and services or construction, opportunities for employment and training outcomes, and environmental impact, and select the best suited objectives and outcomes to prioritise for your procurement activity.

Avoid selecting all or too many objectives / outcomes. For example, if the Agency Is using a weighted evaluation criterion for social procurement, the more objectives it selects the less weighting per objective. This may impact the Agency’s ability to obtain social procurement commitments from potential suppliers.

Read all the social procurement objectives and outcomes.

Review the results from the social procurement opportunity analysis, together with the chosen objectives and determine how social procurement will be incorporated in the sourcing phase for this procurement.

Contemplate if a direct or indirect social outcome is appropriate for the procurement.

Direct - procure from a social benefit supplier (or ensure that social benefit suppliers are invited to participate e.g. if seeking multiple offers). In particular, a lower value procurement activity may be suitable for a direct approach to a social benefit supplier

Indirect - procure from a mainstream supplier and seek commitments to deliver social or sustainable outcomes. This includes through subcontracting or supply chain arrangements with social benefit suppliers.

Buyers must always follow their Agency’s procurement policies and processes when conducting a procurement.

Evaluation planning is important. At this stage buyers should review:

• Social procurement requirements and expectations
• Plan for evaluation

This will help establish criteria to be used to evaluate offers. This includes evidence needed from suppliers and the method of evaluation.

The Social Procurement Framework recommends a minimum weighting of 5–10 percent for the evaluation criterion. However, it is important to consider the value of the procurement activity. For really low value procurements, a weighted evaluation criterion may not be required.

The weighting depends on:

• the scale and complexity of the procurement
• the opportunities to deliver social and sustainable outcomes relative to other procurement requirements.

See, Evaluate social procurement offers