1. How to develop a request for proposal document.
RFP
How to develop a request for proposal document.

2. Request for Proposal
A process for having vendors do some of the design work for a project.
Objective: open, fair competition with understood evaluation criteria.
Qualified vendors should be offered an opportunity to bid.

3. Intelligence In-house Vendors Consultants Literature
Similar installations
Review services (Auerbach, DataPro)

4. RFP Process First Pass: Eliminate unacceptable alternatives
Reduce the choices to 2-4 alternatives
Second Pass:
Select the final product.

5. Need to publish: Written requirements Formal presentation expectations
Don't let vendors run the selection
Evaluation standards

6. Typical RFP Contents Introduction Instructions System Requirements
Objectives
Contacts
Timetable
System Requirements
Mandatory Requirements
Desirable Features
Evaluation Method

7. Evaluation Criteria Features Table Delivery Date
Hard Dollar Evaluations
Soft Dollar Evaluations
Delivery Date
Acceptance Criteria & Penalties
Mandatory Features
Desirable features

8. Desirable Features Modularity Compatibility Reliability
Maintainability
Vendor Support

9. Acquisition Strategies
Rent: Short term, complete vendor support, high cost
Lease: Intermediate term, local support, user specified equipment
Purchase: Cheaper, total user responsibility
Contract: Full vendor responsibility, contract sensitive

10. Validation
Test the proposed system to assure that it does what you want:
Modeling
Simulation
Benchmarking
Work sample analysis