Real-Life Decision Making
You are a contracts coordinator. You work in the finance department of
a government.
Today when you arrived at work, you found an urgent message on your voice
mail. It was from one of the vendors you have recently been working with.
This vendor is bidding on a job to supply seven departments within the government
with new software.
The vendor was angry with some of the conditions in the contract you drew
up. The biggest issue, it appears, is that the timeline to complete the project
is too short.
You erase the message and are in the process of pulling out the contract
when the phone rings. It is another vendor who is also concerned about the
short timeline given to install the software. You patiently explain that the
timeline hasn't changed and that it was discussed before the bidding
process ever began.
You also explain that the project has to be completed by the given date.
The new software packages need to be fully installed and working before the
department's year-end takes place.
After you hang up, you notice you've received a few new faxes while
you were on the phone. You pick them up and look over them quickly, then groan.
More complaints from the vendors -- what are you going to do?
You glance at your calendar, looking at the projected start date and the
completion date of the project. You know you don't have much choice on
the dates -- your boss was quite specific when you discussed them earlier.
But you have to take into consideration your vendors' concerns. So
far, only one vendor out of the five that are bidding agreed to meet the timeline.
Unfortunately, that vendor is also the most expensive. In fact, their price
quote came in at almost double everyone else's.
But you also know how important it is to meet the deadline. The software
has to be installed and working by the time the year-end calculations start.
You could ask for a contract extension, which would give the vendors an
extended timeline. That would mean you'd have a better choice of vendors
bidding on the project, which would mean you could negotiate a better price.
However, if your boss and the management team don't agree to the contract
extension, even more valuable time would be wasted. Your other choice is to
go with the vendor who could do the job, have the project completed on time
and just forget how much it's going to cost.
What do you do?