Streamline Your Vendor Decisions with Just-in-Time Decision Evaluation (JITDE™)

Traditional vendor selection processes can be slow and inefficient. In today's fast-paced world, leveraging modern tools and collaborative approaches can lead to better decisions faster.

Why Modernize Vendor Evaluation?

The internet, AI, and social networks offer a wealth of information about vendors, their solutions, and customer experiences. This readily available knowledge, combined with direct engagement with existing vendor customers, provides a more accurate and comprehensive understanding than lengthy, formal RFP responses. This approach saves time, improves efficiency, and leads to superior decision-making.

When you adopt a more agile evaluation process, vendors also benefit. They save time and resources, which they can then reinvest in their products, people, and customer relationships.

Introducing JITDE™

JITDE™ is a collaborative approach that prioritizes interactive dialogue and ongoing research over extensive paperwork and intermediaries. It's designed to accelerate and optimize your vendor decisions by:

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Focusing on vital needs early on: JITDE™, also known as the Brief-based approach, emphasizes in-depth diligence into your organization's core needs, potential vendors, and peer organizations. This ensures you concentrate on what truly matters, rather than getting bogged down by minor requirements.
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Leveraging ongoing capability team research: Your teams continuously research and network, gathering real-time insights into the market.
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Minimizing unnecessary formalities: By reducing reliance on heavy documentation, JITDE™ fosters a more dynamic and responsive evaluation process.

The result of this comprehensive diligence is that only two or three of the most viable vendor candidates receive either a Brief (an abbreviated RFP) or a traditional RFP. The final recommendation is then made through an accelerated evaluation and selection process, often involving intensive 3-day, onsite vendor summits.

Your JITDE™ Selection Journey

1. Initiation

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Mission, organization, and milestones.
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Guiding principles, engagement framework, and management processes.
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Draft scoring methods for evaluation.

2. Diligence

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Research vendor software.
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Structure the evaluation around vital needs.
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Network with peer organizations and vendor customers to measure satisfaction.
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Finalize vendor minimum requirements, evaluation methods, question design, and scoring criteria.

3. Scoring Process

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Establish scoring foundations and vendor minimum requirements.
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Avoid publishing questions and weights prematurely.
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Finalize scoring models, scoresheets, and critical solution needs.

4. Solution Needs -- Brief or RFP

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Collaborate with Procurement to develop a Brief or RFP.
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Design questionnaires to collect essential vendor details, including technical and infrastructure capabilities, security protocols, vendor and third party profiles, and solution requirements and cost structures (one-time and recurring.

5. Evaluation & Selection

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Agile evaluation: Evaluation and negotiation summits with each vendor, or
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Traditional evaluation: A staged approach involving proposal reviews, interviews and software demonstrations, customer references, field visits, vendor recommendation, and final negotiation.

6. Resources

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Leverage advanced tools and techniques, including AI, sophisticated search criteria, and digital assets, to maximize project outcomes.

Learn More

Accelerate Using Capability Thinking®

Capability Thinking® is a transformative organizational approach that enhances performance and value. In the vendor selection process, it enables business capability teams to accelerate decision-making and speed solutions to market, while reducing or eliminating wasteful, time-consuming RF activities such as:

Request for Information (RFI)
Request for Qualifications (RFQ)
Request for Proposal (RFP)
Request for Quote (RFQ)