Governments love competitive tension.

They spend 18 months creating it.

Market soundings.

RFQs.

RFPs.

Best and Final Offers… or Optimization Phase in some places…

Lawyers, financial models, technical advisers, probity officers… and 143 versions of a contract called FINAL.

I love this game!

Then they select the preferred bidder.

Sign the contract.

Open the champagne.

Take a photograph wearing hard hats.

Book holidays to Fiji.

And kill the competition.

Because the first auction is over.

The second one begins shortly afterwards.

It usually starts with a perfectly innocent letter.

A “minor” scope clarification.

A request for temporary relief.

Perhaps a practical concession to keep the programme moving and machines on the ground.

Someone prepares a Board paper, or a Steerco paper… you know. And it describes the issue as “manageable”.

Those are dangerous words.

They have destroyed more projects than marriages / strip clubs’ combinations.

“Temporary” is one of infrastructure’s most permanent words.

“Minor” is often one of its most expensive.

The response goes out.

Tick, tack, tick, tack.

Nothing dramatic happens.

Tick, tack, tick, tack.

No sirens. No emergency Board meeting. No journalist calls.

Tick, tack, tick, tack.

But a principle has been conceded.

A baseline has moved.

A precedent has been created.

Tick, tack, tick, tack.

Six months later, the minor issue has grown into a major renegotiation.

By then, the private partner has teams on site, detailed cost information and a very clear commercial position.

The public side has a completion date, political commitments and a project that may already be half-built.

Walking away is technically possible.

In the same way that setting fire to the project office is technically possible.

This is the second auction.

Except this time there is only one bidder.

And they know you cannot walk away.

This is not because the private partner is evil.

They are doing exactly what a rational commercial party should do: using the position available to them.

The real problem is that governments spend enormous effort creating competitive tension before contract award….and surprisingly little effort protecting their commercial position afterwards.

The best procurement people move to the next project.

The advisers disappear.

The project team inherits 143 versions of the contract and a shared folder called FINAL_FINAL_2.

Then the letters begin.

Many multimillion-dollar renegotiations do not begin with a dramatic dispute.

They begin with one sentence in a letter.

A temporary concession.

Or a Board paper saying:

“The issue is considered manageable.”

That is why I created Before You Send.

Senior, independent review of important letters, Board papers and commercial positions… before they become admissions, precedents or very expensive acts of kindness.

Because the first auction selects your partner.

The second auction decides what the project will really cost.

And this time, there is only one bidder.

Before you send, let’s talk.

Use this information at your own risk.

$49.90 VILENTIA ACCESS Book A Call NOW

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