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Procurement readiness is one of several work streams under the One Washington program in fiscal year 2019. The focus of this work stream is to assess procurement organizational strategy and readiness in preparation for replacement of the state’s core systems through an enterprise resource planning solution. An enterprise resource planning solution supports business processes and functions (budget, finance, human resources, payroll and procurement). Procurement readiness involves identifying opportunities to standardize data and procurement processes statewide to prepare for new technology implementation.

In the 2015-17 biennium, the Washington State Office of Financial Management as the sponsor for the One Washington program partnered with the Washington State Department of Enterprise Services to convene a procurement readiness workgroup representing procurement professionals from 15 state agencies. Enterprise Services is the service owner of the procurement business area within the One Washington program because of the agency’s statutory authority, roles and responsibilities related to procurement and contracts for goods and services.
 

Completed Activities

Thanks to the commitment of many state agency representatives, the procurement readiness workgroup completed the following:  

• Mapped current business processes for different types of procurements (competitive, convenience, cooperative, direct buy, emergency, interagency and sole source).
• Developed a glossary of standard procurement definitions.
• Validated essential data elements and developed a standard procurement data set (facilitated by a data architect from the state Office of the Chief Information Officer).
• Reviewed all Washington state executive orders, laws, policies and rules related to the procurement of goods and services along with implications for potential electronic procurement/eProcurement solutions.
• Collected a large sampling of current templates related to contracts and procurement.
• Identified potentially unique business capabilities or requirements related to procurement.
   

Additional Fiscal Year 2019 Activities

For the remainder of fiscal year 2019, procurement readiness includes the following:

• Draft an enterprise procurement data set (with the One Washington data governance team and other state agencies).
• Identify eProcurement data collection and reporting needs to manage data on state procurement spending (with the One Washington data governance team).
• Verify mandatory and desirable procurement business capabilities for an enterprise resource planning solution (with the One Washington capabilities team and other state agencies).
• Interview procurement leaders from other states with enterprise resource planning to:
  • Collect examples of policies related to eProcurement,
  • Identify best practices and lessons learned,
  • Analyze information gathered,
  • Inform recommendations to the policy team at Enterprise Services for consideration in developing appropriate eProcurement policies.
• Review proposed state contract management training in consideration of eProcurement and make recommendations to the policy team at Enterprise Services for consideration in developing appropriate contract-related eProcurement policies.
• Convene a new procurement advisory committee led by Enterprise Services with participation from procurement professionals from seven state agencies.
   

Future Activities

Future procurement readiness projects will likely include the following:

• Align planned procurement activities with the enterprise readiness framework under development by the One Washington team at the Office of Financial Management.
• Develop statewide eProcurement and other contract-related policies to support an enterprise resource planning solution, with Enterprise Services managing the policies.
• Coordinate with the contracts and procurement team at Enterprise Services to incorporate a state procurement manual (currently under development based on Washington executive orders, laws, policies, and rules) into system configuration for establishing procurement and purchasing system parameters and guidelines.
• Continue to develop a data set on procurement spending and explore common data with other service owners.
• Develop change management and communication plans for the procurement business area (with the One Washington team at the Office of Financial Management).
• Develop a supplier management plan to communicate about system changes.
• Assist in creating enterprise procurement templates, contract templates, and a clause library.
• Collaborate with the One Washington team at the Office of Financial Management and other state agencies to identify additional enterprise and agency readiness activities.