FOR THE DEVELOPMENT AND DELIVERY
OF LEADERSHIP DEVELOPMENT TRAINING AND TOOLS FOR THE CITY OF GUELPH
Reference Number: 13-156
A D D E N D U M NO. 3
The following shall form part of the tender documents issued by the City of Guelph’s Purchasing Department, November 2013.
NOTE: the acknowledgement of this addendum must be indicated on FP2R
DELETE: Pages FP1-FP3
ADD: Pages FP1R-FP2R
QUESTIONS AND ANSWERS
Q1. Page 18 outlines the guiding principle ‘Varied, supportive development methodologies (classroom, online, network based, assessments, coaching)’
Q1.1. What type of online learning do you currently offer? e.g. online virtual classroom, online asynchronous self-study
A1.1. Online asynchronous self – study
Q1.2. Do you have a Learning Management System in place? If so, which one?
A1.2. No LMS in place.
Q1.3. Can you clarify ‘network’? For example are you looking for an online networking or social media as part of this initiative?
A1.3. This question refers to the guiding principle of “Builds collective leadership synergies throughout network.” This statement refers to the leadership network across the City of Guelph. Leadership development opportunities should encourage participation from a diversity of participants, allowing for leaders to gather and learn from each other cross departmentally and across various roles as opposed to siloed within departments.
Q2. Do any of the City of Guelph leaders who will participant in this program manage employees who belong to a union?
A2. Yes, in fact unionized employees may have the opportunity to participate in the program as well.
Q3. On page 19 you indicate the programs need to be offered starting May 2014. How flexible are you in staggering the implementation?
A3. We would be open to starting various streams at different times.
Q4. If you are open to a staggered implementation, what is your preference for which stream is launched first and the timing of the second and third?
A4. The preference is to introduce the Emerging Leaders program first. Timing of the second and third can be staggered as well, occurring within a few months of each other.
Q5. As of November 21, 2013 there were over 50 vendors identified in the ‘plan taker’s’ list. Assuming the majority will submit a proposal, this is a significant undertaking for the City’s review committee to review and evaluate the proposals. What pre qualifications or criteria can you provide about how you will evaluate the proposals?
A5. The RFPs would be reviewed using the criteria set out in section 18, page 10. It is not expected that all 50 plan takers will submit a response to the RFP. It is our experience that organizations review the plans to determine if the RFP is one that makes sense for them to respond to (fits within their scope of work).
Q6. How much input has Council provided in the drafting of the RFP?
A6. Council has not provided input into the drafting of the RFP.
Q7. Page 18 identifies The City of Guelph has additional leadership components, of which this initiative is only one. Can you provide examples of the other components?
A7. Here are some examples:
-mandatory courses (ie safety essentials for leaders, etc.)
-online leadership orientation program (to help leaders navigate City of Guelph processes in their work environment)
- online learning in various topics through another vendor (serves as baseline of information in subjects such as feedback essentials and goal setting) – Jan 2014
-leadership excellence workshops in key identified topic areas
Q8. City documents reference your Online Leadership Orientation Program. What topic areas or content are provided as part of that program?
A8. There are approximately 20 modules that enable leaders to learn about processes within the Guelph of Guelph (for example, Emergency Response Planning and Working with council, our Performance Development process, our unions, etc). These modules are more specific to process rather than concepts.
Q9. What has been your experience developing leadership training internally or with a partner vendor versus sending employees to externally offered leadership training programs?
A9. We have delivered specific workshops internally with various vendors and occasionally employees take leadership development programs externally.
Q10. What other leadership training does The City of Guelph currently provide to your leaders?
A10. See question a under Questions about your existing processes and systems:
Q10.1. How have you developed and implemented the programs?
A10.1. Through a combination of internally developed or externally sourced options.
Q10.2. What external firms have you worked with?
A10.2. In this RFP process we are unable to comment on previous vendor relationships.
Q10.3. How effective has it been?
A10.3. In this RFP process are unable to comment on previous performance of vendors.
Q11. In City documents, you identify an Organizational Assessment. What areas did the assessment focus on? What firm did you partner with to complete the assessment?
A11. Please see the Organizational Assessment which is posted online at the following link:
http://guelph.ca/wp-content/uploads/governance_addendum_0916131.pdf
Q12. City documents describe an Employee Engagement Survey initiative. What firm did you partner with to design and implement the survey?
A12. In this RFP process we will not comment on vendor relationships.
Q13. Does the City of Guelph have a Performance Management Process in place e.g. setting annual objectives with employees, having mid-year reviews, and year-end reviews and evaluations?
A13. Yes
Q14. How well established and received is your Performance Management Process?
A14. There are multiple unions with various Performance Development Plan processes (PDP) in place. In addition, there is a non-unionized PDP process in place. The form(s) along with process will continue to be reviewed for improvement opportunities.
Q15. Does the City of Guelph have defined competencies for the various leadership roles?
A15. City of Guelph has overall competencies defined for all employees that provide context by role categories (individual contributor, etc). These are being updated to align with the leadership learning streams.
Q16. How did you develop the competencies – what firm did you partner with?
A16. Developed internally
Q17. How well embedded are the competencies into the City’s processes and culture?
A17. They have been in place for 4 years. This is an area in which we continue to evolve and make improvements.
Q18. Does the city have a defined process for managing poor performance?
A18. Yes, we do for unionized employees.
Q19. In Addendum 2, you indicate some leaders have been exposed to Thomas PPA and MBTI. What supplier or vendor have you partnered with to provide these instruments?
A19. We have certified internal facilitators for both of these assessments.
Q20. Page 26 asks that the vendor quote on customizing the Strategic Leadership – Strategic Leadership Development Stream for council members. Please explain more about your vision of how this content would support this secondary audience.
A20. The program is geared primary towards City of Guelph staff. There is a potential for Council to benefit from content being offered to staff however and if this is identified, the vendor would be asked to host a council development opportunity.
Q21. Page 22 references case studies for the Leading from the Middle – Focused Leadership Development Stream. Please clarify your expectation of these cases. How robust to you expect them to be e.g. MBA-style or robust scenarios?
A21. These do not have to be MBA style scenarios however must an analysis of a particular situation to be used as practice for drawing conclusions using concepts, methods, approaches taught in class.
Q22. How closely does the content need to reflect The City of Guelph systems, culture, and employee environment?
A22. The Organizational Development staff will review proposals carefully. We are open to new ways of doing things that add value and ensure that outcomes support the program goals of to equipping leaders with the knowledge, tools, techniques and experiences to effectively lead themselves and others while fostering an engaged and productive workforce that enables execution on the Corporate Strategic Plan.
Q23. What types of programs or events does the City of Guelph have for recognizing employees and which might be leveraged to include recognition for the completion of the leadership streams?
A23. Recognition programs and events are currently under review.
Q24. Page 20 states ‘Vendor will be required to organize and summarize cohort/course evaluations…’ How do you define a cohort/course? For example, Cohort/course is defined as Foundational Leadership Development, or Cohort/course is defined as one training day within Foundational Leadership Development.
A24. Cohort based training in a program such as Emerging Leaders would involve a group of individuals attending training together where the duration is proposed by the vendor. The vendor would suggest what they feel is needed for employees to develop in this area. This could be 3 days, this could be 5 days.
Courses – If during the Emerging Leaders cohort there is a module on a particular subject, for example “The Power of Teams,” this would be considered a “course” for the purpose of the flex option listed in the RFP. See below for flex option wording:
(In the interests of flexibility, we are also interested in a learning option that will allow employees who are not able to participate in cohort learning to join a single class where necessary to focus in on certain skills, while still building onto an eventual Emerging Leaders certificate. This will require a leadership assessment upon enrolment with a potential telephone review if the class enrolled in does not analyze it and upon completion of all courses, if applicable, a post assessment and coaching session. This will also require tracking by the vendor to ensure all of these obligations are met. Please be sure to quote this option as well).
Q25. Page 20 states ‘The vendor will be required to provide a report for each cohort/class…’ Are these reports based on the same definitions above? For example, Cohort/class is defined as Foundational Leadership Development, or Cohort/class is defined as one training day within Foundational Leadership Development.
A25. See above response for explanation.
Course based –the circumstances would need to be reviewed at the time with the successful vendor.
Q26. Page 20 requests the vendor provide results of the cohort/course evaluation forms, an aggregated annual cohort summary, and a report for each class/cohort. Can you clarify the difference between the results, the summary and the report?
A26. Each cohort participant should receive an opportunity to evaluate the program and their overall experience.
The results of cohort based program should be tabulated and provided to the City in a report.
At the end of the year this information should be summarized in aggregate and provided to the City.
Where there is a “course” flex option, these circumstances should be reviewed with City staff for best approach.
Q27. Also, do you have template you want the Vendor to use for the results, summary and report?
A27. No. This can be proposed by vendor.
Q28. Donald Kirkpatrick is a leader in providing training industry standards for evaluating training and learning effectiveness. In his model, he outlines four levels of evaluation:
Level 1: Reaction – How well did the learners like the program?
Level 2: Learning – How well did the learners learn the content?
Level 3: Behaviour – How did the learners apply what they learned to their jobs?
Level 4: Results – How did the implementation of the program impact business results?
Recognizing the level of sophistication and cost increases with each level, what level of evaluation do you require of this program?
A28. Level 4 is preferable.
Q29. Will all participants have easy access to a computer for completion of on-line assessments?
A29. All existing leaders will have access. Some employees do not have their own computer terminals however will be able to use a site computer.
Q30. Under Leadership Development Stream Cohorts and Tool Expectations/Logistic starting on page 21 there are references to “session”. Please define a session. Is this a group of courses that make up a development program for a particular stream or does it refer to an individual course on one specific topic?
A30. “Session” refers to a cohort based program such as Emerging Leaders. For the purposes of this question, the vendor is correct in that it is a group of courses that make up a development program for a particular stream.
Q31. The RFP requests a total bid price. Perhaps we have misinterpreted some of the information but at this point are having difficulty developing a total bid. Many aspects of the proposal will be included in cost but our area of difficulty is with the number of courses to be offered. We understand there are 175 individuals with the title of leadership but do not know the number of individuals in each stream and each stream will have access to a different number of courses depending on need. Also there are an unknown number of other employees who might access the program. The RFP describes the program running for 2 to 3 years “depending on need.” Therefore, although we can provide total costs for each course, we are unsure of how to accurately calculate total costs. Could you give more information as to what “total bid price” should include?
A31. For greater ease, vendors may respond to the RFP using an assumption of 1 cohort from each stream in a year (including assessments and coaching) and then break out costs further such as “per cohort” or “per course” costs , per participant, per hour. Please use the new form of tender attached (Pages FP1R-FP2R).
End of Addendum #3
7