Waara, F (2008) Mitigating contractual hazards in public procurement: A study of Swedish local authorities. Construction Management and Economics, 26(2), pp. 137-145. ISSN 1466433X
Abstract
Private sector buyers often award construction contracts through negotiation rather than through open competitive tendering. Negotiating with a reputable contractor is a way to mitigate contractual hazards. For many public sector buyers, however, open competitive tendering is required by law. The practices of procurement officers in local authorities are examined in regard to the selection of construction contractors, focusing particularly on their use of scoring-based competitive tendering and ex ante information exchange between procurement officers and the firms competing for contracts. Semi-structured interviews were carried out with 15 procurement officers in 10 local authorities in Sweden. Using the contractor's staffing of the project organization as a contract award criterion allows procurement officers to select reputable contractors. Arranging face-to-face meetings with contractors before the final award decision allows procurement officers to resolve at least some technical problems in complex construction projects. When negotiations are prohibited by law, these practices can be seen as combined responses to hazards of construction contracting.
| Item Type: | Article |
|---|---|
| Uncontrolled Keywords: | contracting; procurement law; public sector; Sweden |
| Index terms: | construction contractor, construction project, negotiating, face, local authority, information exchange, project organization, interview, competitive tendering, negotiation, construction contract, private sector, public sector, Sweden |
| Subjects: | tendering, organizational theory, Geography, production management, conflict resolution, sociology, industry analysis, administrative law, data collection methods, contract type, practitioner, psychology, data science |
| Topics: | Procurement, Stakeholder Management, Roles and Professions, Research Practice, Geographical Context, Project Management, Business Strategy, Organizational Design, Legal Issues, Digital Applications |
| Descriptive scope: | 3 PCE |
N.B. Descriptive scope is a count of how many of the five facets of empirical research are indicated by the words used in title, abstract and keywords. It is not intended as a judgement on the research; merely a count of the kind of word we would expect to indicate Phenomenon, Concepts, Theoretical framing, Empirical techniques, Analytical techniques. If all five are present, then a code of “5 PCTEA” will indicate this. If you feel the coding for this record is questionable, we welcome discussion around the terms we matched or the way we categorized them. The facet you would expect may not be coded, or a facet may be coded inappropriately. This can also bear on a larger question, of which facets should be treated as defining in construction management research. Please get in touch, and we will look at it. More details here