5._Notes_SPC_Pre-Proposal_Conference.pdf

SPC Pre-Proposal Conference Hanoi Club

November 9, 2018

Welcoming comments

Welcome to everyone. Thank you for joining us today for this pre proposal conference. My name is Michael Trueblood, and I’m the Director of the Economic Growth and Governance Office at USAID.

USAID/Vietnam is committed to working with institutions to strengthen their ability and reach to provide high-quality, practical and relevant trainings to provincial officials. This activity, Strengthening Provincial Capacity, is all about building long term sustainability of Vietnamese institutions and promoting greater ownership and leadership.

We at USAID/Vietnam are always trying to do things differently. This procurement is no exception. The purpose of today’s conference is to go over the Request for Proposals - seek your input and address your questions. This will be a firm fixed price contract with an award fee.

Frankly, we have not done anything like this at the Mission, so we want to make sure everyone understands what we’re asking from offerors.

We think it’s a best practice to hold these conferences - not only to facilitate better communication between USAID and potential offerors, but also to provide an opportunity for you to network amongst yourselves. Given the type of project, it’s likely that many of you will work together on a proposal - either as prime and subcontractors or as consortium members.

We hope that today, after we’ve finished the official part of the meeting, you’ll stay around and exchange cards and ideas with each other.

You’ll notice that we have a team of folks here taking notes. We will be posting the notes from today’s meeting online, so that everyone has access to the questions and discussion. There will be no attribution.

Without further ado, I’d like to introduce the team from the Office of Acquisition and Assistance, Mr. Michael Capobianco and Ms. Trinh Tuong Van, and my colleague Katelin Maher, who has been working closely with the OAA team.

Thank you again and I’m looking forward to a great discussion.

General Information

Michael Capobianco (MC): Why are we here? We’re here to provide more information about what USAID is looking for with this $13.3 million procurement. Also, want to provide info so we are getting better proposals. Most importantly, we’re here to provide more information so that Vietnam gets a better development program. We also want to hear feedback from you.

We’d done this before with our LinkSME program that went out early this year. We held 2 pre-proposal conferences and as a result of these conferences, there were substantial changes we made in the RFP. So we want to hear your feedback and take it seriously. We will take your input to improve our solicitation and the potential outcomes. This is a networking opportunity.

Remember procurement integrity. We encourage networking but this is a full and open procurement under USG laws and regulations, so please remember the Procurement Integrity Act.

We’re recording for transcription purpose only. Recording is not going to be posted.

Q – Will this Power Point be made available?

A – Yes, it will be posted on the Fed Biz Opps web site (www.fbo.gov)

Overview of Solicitation

MC: This will be a fixed price award fee type of contract for five years. We will go into details as we know it can be confusing in the RFP as we say the program is from year 1 to year 4 and then year 5 is for evaluation. We will utilize a Statement of Objectives (SOO) approach. For the contract academics, the Offeror writes the Performance Work Statement. Think of the Performance Work Statement (PWS) as similar to the traditional Statement of Work (SOW). The award fee will be detailed in the Award Fee Plan.

There will be a long response period. Given the upcoming holiday season and Tet, offerors will have 100 days to submit their bids.

Technical information:

Katelin Maher (KM):

Purpose – [see slide]

USAID is focusing on sustainability of institutions, not the training per se. We are looking at offerors to provide reasons why we should work with particular institutions. USAID is not dictating which institutions to work with but looking to the offerors to propose which organizations USAID should be supporting in the activity. The focus is institutions supporting mid-level provincial officials to implement economic governance reforms more effectively. This activity is consistent with “Journey to Self Reliance” under USAID and as such, the activity must incorporate strong sustainability. Per the procurement type, this will be open to the offeror to tell USAID what the results will be, how to be measured.

Q – When you say institutions that have a mandate to work with government officials, who is giving them the mandate? Who has an institution that can prepare training and be able to deliver to anyone that having mandate to deliver to public sector? What do you mean by “three existing Vietnamese institutions (with the mandate to provide capacity development opportunities to provincial officials)”?

http://www.fbo.gov/

A – We want to work and strengthen institutions that are already here. We are looking to institutions that already providing this training. They could be public, private, educational, etc.

We do not want to build a new institution but strengthen what’s already existing.

Q – If government authority does not have funding for these institutions for the training, could the activity fund these institutions?

A – It is up to the offeror to propose the approach.

Q – What do you mean by using “extension services”? Please clarify?

A – Glad you mentioned this. We put it on the Statement of Objective, but we were not sure if this resonated here in the Vietnam context. In the United States, we have extension services (e.g, agricultural universities) that they provide more technical assistance, practical assistance to local officials. Does that resonate here? [Audience: it does not resonate here in Vietnam]. Okay, we will clarify in the revised SOO. Under the “Constraints of SOO in the RFP, number 2, we say “build relationships between at least one (1) American institution working on capacitating local officials and the targeted Vietnamese officials”. That’s incorrect. We’re trying to develop institutional relationship between at least one American institution with Vietnamese institutions.

Q – How did you fix on three institutions, not two or five institutions?

A – We want to incentivize competition among these institutions so even after the project is over, they still compete with each other. Also we have a limited budget. This could be expensive, so we want to focus and concentrate. So by supporting a limited number, in the future, organizations can compete for providing services among each other. Given the limited amount of funding, USAID determined that 3 is within the budget to support.

Q – Does USAID desire to focus on geographic regions?

A – No, the focus is on institutions. We want to make them better and expand them. We did research and found that demand greatly exceeds supply. USAID understands that there are already institutions doing this work, but the demand exceeds supply. USAID wants to expand and build their capacity for services.

Q - It seems like you said they have a mandate, but not capacity. If they do not have capacity, how can they expand?

A – They could be nascent or ongoing. We do not want to create institutions from scratch.

MC: Let me clarify. We found in our market research that there are institutions who are providing the services but the supply does not meet the demand. Our hypothesis is that if we build the capacity of those institutions to provide more of those services, we can raise a level of supply to meet the demand.

KM: We have found institutions having problems meeting the market demand. Local officials have funds to attend the training but have difficulty to find good training.

Q – Can we see your background list of institutions?

A – No, but a lot of them are in this room.

Q – Have you researched the barriers, for example, is it related to costs? Do officials have sufficient budgets? There may be demand but they don’t have funds to purchase the training, so that could be something we could do to help the issue for public servants to procure trainings, having funds/tuitions.

A – USAID is looking to the offeror to propose how they might address this problem. However, USAID’s analysis during the design indicated that the VN government did have resources to spend for these services, but no place to obtain them.

Q – Please clarify what USAID means regarding capacity gaps in the area of economic and governance reforms as economic governance is very broad:

A - We conducted governance and economic growth assessments last year. Both assessments found that provincial officials lack capacity and that there were knowledge gaps. USAID funds the Provincial Competitiveness Index activity and have attended their training workshops. We find that PCI diagnostic workshops discuss issues at a high level but the fundamental understanding of public policy, economics, etc. to implement reforms was questionable. We are not trying to do governance work writ large, but rather economic governance.

Q – What do you expect in terms of linking this activity with the LinkSME and TFP?

A – We are hoping that capacitating local officials will lead to reforms around SMEs and trade facilitation, but this is very theoretical. We are not saying you must work in the same provinces that the other two projects are operating. Some reforms might be linked to same technical areas, but not saying must work in the same places.

Q – We work with universities here. What do you mean by mid-level officials? Who are the target officials? How about commune level?

A – The key leadership are not the target officials. USAID sees that officials will stay in the provinces. So we are targeting officials in the provinces (including potentially districts and communes) that are not yet in key positions.

Q – Is this activity linked to Resolution 19 or the Provincial Competitiveness Index (PCI) activity?

A – No, this activity is not linked to completing implementation of the resolution. We have a written question to this effect and will answer it.

Q – We are from a Government of Vietnam organization. Can we obtain this funding?

A – MC: It is quite difficult for a Government of Vietnam organization to be a prime contract holder because it would need to abide by US laws and regulations. USAID doesn’t expect any Government of Vietnam organizations to be the prime contract holder.

Q – When you say provincial level, do you mean district too?

A – KM: Yes, but we do not mean Hanoi or Ho Chi Minh City (HCMC) of which officials already have a lot of access to high quality training. The institutions can be located anywhere.

The important point is, are they providing the services to the target officials?

Q – What about rural officials living in the big cities?

A – Yes, so long as the target officials are provincial, then that would be acceptable.

Q – What about government provincial officials working in big city/Hanoi and Ho Chi Minh City “People’s Committees”?

A – That is okay, but they are not the target audience as the idea is to focus more on provincial level. When we find the capacity gaps are for officials further away from the center. While we’re concerned about beneficiaries at the second tier level, in this contract we focus more on institutional level, to the institutions’ capacity. We really mean to target more officials from more remote provinces.

Q – The focus is on institutions, as long as they decentralize their support on capacity building to local level. Can the institutions be based in the big cities?

A – Absolutely.

Q – Could these three institutions be a mix of public sector, private sector, and others?

A – Yes.

Q – Has this project identified project owner in the Government of Vietnam?

A – This is still under consideration. It will depend on the selection of the three institutions - that would determine the counterpart.

Q - Will the project have to seek and go through the government’s approval process?

A - We have to take into consideration Decree 16 and Decree 132, where a government counterpart is required.

Q- The project owner will be identified post-award?

A- Yes.

Q – What do you mean by sustainability?

A – We want you partners to tell us how to measure the sustainability. There are different notions and definitions out there. Tell us how you would apply it in this context. USAID is looking to partners to say in their proposal what the end results to be achieved and how this sustainability will be measured.

Q – My institution already has one USAID grant. Is it a problem to have more than one?

A – No.

Q – Will institutions that provide these training services now already be able to respond to this as the prime contractor?

A – Yes, they can.

Q – Please clarify how this activity for capacity building links to USAID’s other capacity building activities?

A – I think you refer to Partner Capacity Development (PCD). This is a separate activity which is ending soon and was working on organizational capacity building of local civil society organizations. By the time this award is made, PCD will be completed.

Q – You’re talking about three institutions for competition. What if institutions are complementary and working in the same area? Is it okay?

A – USAID is looking to the offeror to propose how they selected the institutions, what is the rationale, and how they got to the decision. USAID will evaluate the rationale and selection of the offeror to determine the awardee.

Q – When you talk about reforms, it is a wide target, too many to number. Does USAID want to target reforms? Are there particular areas of reform in your research? E.g., teaching Economics 101?

A - No. USAID does not have any particular training focus. We are trying to be flexible as possible. We are not the experts. You do this work on a regular basis. We are looking to the partner the community, the experts, to help us develop an activity that will best meet our objectives. We want to hear how you would do this related to governance reforms. Also this is why we want to give you three months to develop the proposal.

Q – You refer to some background analysis. Will this be made available to us?

A – No, but here is a link to the two assessments that were completed and are available online.

Inclusive Governance Assessment for Vietnam: https://goo.gl/9ZFJm7 Vietnam Responsible Trade and Growth Assessment: https://goo.gl/Sh8xMr

Q – The future customer of the services provided by these institutions is to be the government, correct?

A –The customers would be the provincial officials. Could be others but that is the target end-user.

Q – When you talk about clients, end users, or extension services, are they paid services provided on demand by provincial governments? Or training initiated by institutions because a certain area is needed of such training? We find provincial officials with budgets and are decision makers do not feel the need to approve the training because they don’t think it’s necessary, so they will not “buy” services from the institutions.

A –Yes. We hope that through this contract, the institutions that can market their services. The services could be initiated by the institutions or demanded by the end-user. USAID’s objective is that the institutions will market their services to the provincial government officials about why it makes sense to focus on mid-career, not necessarily just the senior level folks, so they will purchase these services and understand why these services are important. It’s not just designing curriculum, it’s the whole package when we talk about sustainability of the institutions. The offeror should take a market approach to this to ensure that there is supply and help facilitate the demand for these services.

Please note: USAID wants offerors to also identify at least one American institution, here or in the U.S., already providing the training services to U.S. officials, to also work with the institutions you are choosing in this award so help deepen relationships between countries. We leave it to offerors to propose how this relationship would work. The U.S. institution does not have to work all three Vietnamese institutions. It can be one-to-one, or one-to-three, it is up to you.

Q – You mention three Vietnamese institutions. Should they apply together or separately as “competitors”?

A – This would be one contract. The offeror should propose how to identify and how they will work with the three institutions. We realized that a lot of these institutions are competitors so that there will be firewalls most likely. There is one contract, one prime, and you might have subcontractors, consortium, etc. We do not know the best way, so we leave it to you.

Q – For the U.S. institution, do you mean U.S. government institutions or would this be a university, or U.S. NGO working here, or U.S. government agency?

A – USAID wants the offeror to work with an American institution that is also providing these types of services for building capacity of government officials and we focus on the link to the Vietnamese organizations so they have a relationship to support each other. For the U.S.

institution, it could be, for example, an education institution or an NGO. Once this activity is https://goo.gl/9ZFJm7 https://goo.gl/Sh8xMr over, those institutions still have the relationship, be able to reach back, share experiences, resources, troubleshoot issues together, etc., Q – Can you talk about pre-assessments you asked offerors to propose and what are the expectations? We would be concerned about the openness of institutions counterparts.

A – We will address this in a few minutes.

Q - Can one candidate apply to more than one proposal?

A – No, only one proposal per entity. However, it doesn’t preclude one entity from being a prime in one proposal and be part of multiple different proposals as a subcontractor. Please keep in mind about procurement integrity. USAID discourages exclusivity agreements.

Q – So one entity can go with different partners?

A- Yes. We also received several questions about exclusivity agreements. We strongly discourage exclusivity agreements. One institution or a university could be part of every proposal if they want, as long as they do not sign exclusivity agreements. We cannot stop you from doing that, but we would very strongly discourage it.

Proposal Information

MC: Regarding the SOO, we’re asking you to write and submit the Performance Work Statement, this is a type of “SOW” – that responds to the SOO and becomes Section C in the contract. The SOO is very broad and gives the offerors lots of room to make a proposal.

Offerors are to develop a PWS/SOW on how they will achieve the objectives through the activity.

There is new movement worldwide now for USAID for these types of contracts involving this process, which is a kind of a “co-creation.” We do not tell you how to do the work now. We tell you what we want to see. You get to “write your own contracts” – you decide what you are going to do and how you’re going to do it, and we will move out of the way. For example, with the annual work plans, USAID will not be approving it because the PWS already says what you’re going to do. You write the Statement of Work that is going into the contract. This is a true partnership.

The PWS: we’re looking at a synopsis of institutions analysis. As part of your proposal, you should not share the entire analysis. You will tell us what the results and how to get there.

Measurable performance standards are important in the PWS. Offerors get to propose and define success, but the offer must show how this success will be measured. You can also see more in the FAR 37.6 about what needs to be included in the PWS and that’s also what we looking for in the PWS.

Language must be very clear on what will be accomplished. You have to use contractual binding language: you have to use “must”, not “hope”, “should”, or other ambiguous language. We received questions if USAID has the format of PWS? No, we don’t.

While this is a 5 year award, USAID anticipates that all activity is completed by the end of year

4. USAID will be doing an evaluation at end of year 5 to determine the award fee.

Q – What is the page limit again?

A – 20 pages for the PWS (firm), 50 pages maximum for the whole proposal.

Contract Type

Build to budget means that USAID is advising how much funding is available, but we are not setting a contract price. The contract price will be determined through competition and the negotiations. This is a paradigm switch away from how much will programs cost to how much development can we get for the funding. Note, this budget amount is not our Independent Government Cost Estimate (IGCE). We simply say this is how much we have for this activity.

As we’re doing SOO, “build-to-budget”, we’re giving you the ability to write the SOW, identify success, and telling you how much funding we have. With that, we’ve taken out enough the uncertainties to allow Offerors to do it as a fixed price contract.

Regarding the fixed price, we expect the offerors to say what work they will do at this price. The cost incentive is on partner to be efficient. Offerors are allowed to write their own SOW, define success and set how they will be held accountable, and we have told how much budget is available. So this alleviates much of the uncertainty on the activity so offerors should be able to propose a program at a fixed price and manage the risk for achieving results. We wanted to incentivize the partner to think through the sustainability right at the outset, so we’ve decided that we need an award fee at the end. The award fee is to incentivize a better performance. The process and criteria for Award Fee Plan is set out in one of the attachments of the RFP, along with percentages, criteria, and who will evaluate. The evaluation will not happen until the 57- 58th month of the program. At that time the contractor has demobilized and gone home.

Q&A:

Q – How will USAID ensure that the evaluation will be not biased? Typically there are tensions between the evaluator and implementing partners.

A – We expect to have an independent evaluation, without connection to the institutions or the partner. USAID recognizes that there is a natural tension between an evaluator and the implementer. This is not a bad tension. There are ways to ensure objectivity. Note, USAID will also be considering information from the Contracting Officer Representative (COR), the award fee evaluation board, and other information to make the award fee determination. All this information gets merged for consideration.

Q – Will the evaluation be performed on a year by year basis, or only end of year 5?

A – Only in the end of the fifth year.

Q – You mentioned there is no statutory limit on fee, and the upper bar is $13.3 million. So is there a floor for the bid?

A – No, there is no floor as that would eliminate competition. USG regulations actually prohibit any sort of floor allowing offerors to propose as low a price they can to implement and achieve the results.

Q – Will you provide details, guidance, or template on the performance schedule payment plan or QASP?

A – USAID will not provide a QASP template. About the performance schedule payment plan, you can look at a Fixed Amount Award, in which the payments are associated with milestones, as long as you make sure any performance-based payment plan to submit complies with provisions in the contract itself.

Q – Regarding the award fee, will the award fee be less than $13.3 million, or in addition to that amount?

A - It will be part of the $13.3 million amount. How it is comprised is up to you. USAID stated in the solicitation that we expected 4-6% for the award fee, but offerors are free to propose above or below that amount.

Q – You said that the award fee is to incentivize performance. Is the award fee meant to be an incentive to continue the work of the program moving forward?

A – No, it is meant to get offerors to think through their interventions right from the beginning.

It is an incentive to the offeror to implement the best activity and reward them for the results they achieved.

Q – Can you talk about the award fee?

A – Yes, we would note that the award fee has a prescribed percentage evaluation formula. A “satisfactory” evaluation will only receive no more than 50 percent of the award fee; if they exceed a satisfactory rating, they would receive more than 50 percent. There will be a spectrum of possible award fees based on the evaluation. If the contractor has not met the award fee criteria, they get “zero” of the award fee.

In order for the contractor to have access to the award fee, the contractor must have achieved all the success identified in the SOW by the end of year 4. If you have not met the success by the end of year 4, you are no longer eligible for the award fee and the contractor must continue to work after year 4 until the success is achieved.

Q - What if the contractor believes that success was achieved but the independent evaluator does not agree?

A – USAID, not the independent evaluator, is determining and evaluating success in end of year

4. As part of the PWS, you have to provide us with a measurable level of success. That is what USAID will look at to see whether or not you’ve met success, and get payments. The QASP will be used throughout the life of the award to determine whether success is being met. Payments will be made in accordance to the quantifiable milestones achieved throughout the award which lead to the success/result.

Q – Why is the evaluation limited to the fifth year? Good projects are iterative, rather than wait until end.

A – The evaluator that is used in the fifth year will not determine if the project has met success.

The evaluation at the end is only meant to help determine the award fee and serves as a form of ex-post evaluation. USAID may be conducting other evaluations throughout the activity. The contractor may even conduct evaluations throughout implementation.

Q – The way to know if the offeror is eligible for the award fee or on the right path is if the milestones payments are paid as it means we’ve met the performance requirements?

A – It is more nuanced than that, but generally yes.

Q - About the fee at the final evaluation, is it only be evaluated based on the subjective evaluation, not from CPARS or any other scores?

A- Yes, correct.

Q – In the build to budget approach, do you consider cost shares or co-funding?

A – We are not requiring cost sharing or co-funding, but that would lower the cost to the offerors if you can find a partner who makes contributions. For example, suppose a fixed price contract has $1 million to provide 100 motorbikes, but they only cost the company $900,000 to deliver the 100 bikes; if the offeror can also arrange $100,000 from a company, then the contractor would make a $200,000 profit.

Q – If then offeror comes in under budget, then can they keep it as unrestricted funds?

A – The offeror gets to keep the savings. Conversely, if it costs more, then the offeror has to pay those costs. This approach incentivizes you to achieve success at the quality standards that you’ve identified and we agree to, at a lower cost.

Proposal preparation

Section L has all the information about what needs to be submitted and in what format.

Technical proposal:

Structure of PWS is up to offeror. Pay attention to the language: you will have to use the language “contractor must” versus “contractor will” or “may”. Please use “must” language and have well-defined, measurable success.

On QASP: Some folks asked if it is different than the MEL plan. There may be some overlaps but these are two different things. An MEL is focused on an activity’s progress measured against prescribed indicators. The QASP is catered to the relationship between USAID and the contractor to determine how USAID will oversee the contract and make sure the contractor will meet the quality standards. The QASP is focused on the things that USAID should do to determine that the quality is being met. Refer also to FAR 46.4 for more information.

Institutional Analyses: The analysis from the offeror on how they selected the institutions, the criteria used to select them, and the rationale why you chose them. It is not a capacity assessment of the institutions.

Key Personnel: Chief of Party is required. The other 2 may be proposed by the offeror based off of the program proposed.

Please pay attention to page limits.

Business proposal:

Separate from Technical Proposal. This is a fixed price type of contract. USAID only needs the bottom line price, does not need to see all the details of the budget. You need to submit Performance-based payment schedule. Past Performance is not a technical factor, and is not evaluated by the Technical Evaluation Committee. The contracting office will evaluate past performance.

How and when to submit proposal:

Proposal due Feb. 11, 2019. The proposals must include the PWS, institutional selection analysis, QASP, and key personnel. Proposals must be submitted electronically. No zipped files

– PDF or Microsoft Office format. We will send the confirmation once we receive the proposal, but if it comes late, we will not accept it.

Proposals Evaluation: We do a compliance check and then give the technical to the technical evaluation committee (TEC). The TEC team will look at the evaluation criteria. Price analysis will happen simultaneously to establish the reasonableness of the contractor’s price. We will consider all of these elements – both price and non-price factors to come to an award decision.

Although the government intends to award without discussions, the CO may establish a competitive range and enter into discussions.

Q&A

Q – How long will the evaluation take?

A – Sometimes we publish that information and sometimes we do not. In this case, we will not, but we have some internal targets. Our goal is to make the award around May 18, 2019.

Q – The page limit includes the business proposal too?

A – No, the page limit only applies to the technical proposal only.

Q – So, payments are not made up front (one time)?

A - No, we will negotiate the payment schedule and then you get paid according to it.

Q – Do offerors have to meet eligibility requirements for offerors (NGOs, non-NGOs, or everyone)?

A – Offerors have to be a legally organized entity, registered in the System of Award Management (SAM). They have to be from the United States, or Vietnam, or other developing countries. They could be for-profit or not-for-profit.

Q – Comment: please clarify language about “extension services.”

A – We will do so in the RFP amendment.

Q – You mentioned offerors / institutions from neighboring countries, e.g. Laos; they can be part of a consortium or a subcontractor? So that is possible?

A – Yes, e.g., a Laotian institution would be okay as a subcontractor or even a prime, but they would have to work in Vietnam. They can’t be one of the three institutions though.

Q - Are you referencing geographic code 935 or 937?

A - We are referencing geographic code 937.

Q – In the SOO, USAID provides the Theory of Change, can Offerors propose their vision within the PWS based on their knowledge and the local environment?

A – Yes, you can, as long as you still achieve the objectives.

Q - How is this program related to USAID policy?

A – We have the current Country Development Cooperation Strategy (CDCS) and will be updating it in the next 6-9 months. This Strengthening Provincial Capacity will be part of the Trade & Growth Project. We will share the results framework from the Trade & Growth Project.

Q - Can you share more about the capacity assessment and institutions analysis and the relationship between them? How should we describe institutions? This can be a delicate matter to discuss their capacity.

A – They could be related. Just tell us your thought processes of how you rate these institutions.

The baseline assessment is important. These assessments should be done by the offeror, but USAID only needs to see the important conclusions, a synopsis of the analysis in the PWS.

Q – Can we take six months for proposal preparation (laughter)?

A - No

The workshop ended at 11:12 a.m. and USAID encouraged people to stay through 12 for networking.

End of meeting