Answers:
- Software development agreements
- Bill of quantities method of pricing project contracts
- Reasons for why an organisation uses standard form of contract
- Post bid review
Software Development Agreements
Software and IT projects involve software testing, software development and software maintenance. Most of the organisations use the services of software organisations for installing, developing and maintaining software products. The contracts are built among the organisations and involve aspects such as project cost, project scope, project initiation process, etc. The execution of software development projects is unique in nature. It entails various unique lifecycles to form as a final product. The main ingredients in any kind of software project are programming and utilisation of database.
Bill of quantities method of pricing project contracts: Price is a flexible item that depends upon varied factors, such as strategies, competition, cost etc. It is an essential element that affects both buyers and sellers. Contract pricing begins with estimating the cost of the contract. Cost is determined by developing a work breakdown structure, which is based on the technical and administrative performance requirements. Performance costs are determined by the resources needed to work, quantities of the resources needed and cost of the resources. Thus, contract price can be defined as a mutually agreed upon total amount that a buyer or project owner pays to a contractor on the completion of the contract as per the terms and conditions.
Contract price may be calculated with the help of three methods. These three methods are depicted in Fig.
• Reasons for why an organisation uses standard form of contract: A standard form of contract is the most popular and widely used contract. It is also referred as an adhesion or boiler plate contract. An example of a standard form of contract is insurance policies, where the insurer decides the items to insure and the language of the contract. Contracts with government agencies or standard service providers like the Electricity or Telephone Service provider are another example, where certain clauses must be included by the law or regulation.
Post-Bid Review
After the completion of the bidding process, it is essential to conduct a postbid review of the process. A post-bid review identifies the errors in the bidding process so that appropriate steps can be taken to rectify those errors and avoid them in future bids. For instance, a price analysis is conducted to know why the bid was not appropriately priced. In addition, some other aspects that are covered under the post-bid review are as follows:
- Why did the client choose our organisation?
- Whether the client was satisfied with our proposals or not?
- Did we have the right approach?
- Did we offer the right solution or were negotiations needed to bag the contract?
- Whether the cost was appropriate or not?