BS 8903 Your route to full competence

About BS 8903 BS 8903 is the first standard in the world to define and describe best practice in sustainable procurement. It builds on the Flexible Framework which was described in the UK Sustainable Procurement Task Force report “Procuring the Future” in The standard is published as “guidance” so it is not possible to obtain formal accreditation at present. This may be possible in future if the standard is adopted an an ISO standard. As an alternative to formal accreditation, Action Sustainability are uniquely placed as lead technical authors of the standard to offer a formal competence evaluation and a range of services to support organisations wishing to comply with the standard. Organisations who take our evaluation service and who meet a minimum standard will receive a certificate of competence, valid for 2 years and the opportunity to be recognised on our website as having been independently evaluated against the standard.

5 steps… Diagnose Plan Execute Evaluate Review & learn

Diagnose Use our online tool at chain-diagnostic/ chain-diagnostic/ This is free of charge It will give you some idea of where you are today Note: this is an indicator, not a full evaluation

Plan Contact us to organise a half day workshop to confirm your diagnosis and develop an action plan You will need to send us any procurement or CSR strategy documents you have already developed Senior managers from procurement, CSR, commercial and key operational functions need to attend We will provide a short report and a menu of our support services Note: this is not a formal evaluation

Execute We will support you in the execution of your plan depending on your needs and budget If your diagnostic scores are typically 1-2, your execution plan will probably take 2 years, depending on the size and complexity of your organisation, your internal resources and budget This will include training of your staff If your diagnostic scores are high, you may want to move directly to the “Evaluate” stage

Evaluate When your action plan is sufficiently mature, we can conduct a formal evaluation This will comprise a thorough analysis of your strategies, plans and processes, coupled with a detailed review of your procurement activities to gather evidence of compliance in your day to day procurement work Our evaluators will expect to spend at least two days on your premises and will need access to all procurement related documents, you may require us to sign an NDA to do this You will receive a comprehensive report and an evaluation at one of four levels of competence

Evaluate On completion of your evaluation there will be a range of possible conclusions Fail. If you fail the evaluation you will be given some recommendations to get to the first stage. If you comply with these recommendations within 3 months we will conduct a re-evaluation for a small additional fee Improver. If you have made a start on your journey you will not receive a certificate but you will have a comprehensive report and recommendations Competent. If you are able to meet the basic requirements of the standard you will receive a certificate and recognition on our website Expert or Leader. We will recognise organisations showing deep expertise or leadership

Review & learn The evaluation will recommend actions to get to the next level, to consolidate your position at the current level, or to continuously improve We can support your action plan to take on board these recommendations and continue the process

Thank You Mark Turner Action Sustainability