Procurement Contract Management

Procurement Contract Management 1
PROCUREMENT CONTRACT MANAGEMENT
Name
Course
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University
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Procurement Contract Management 2
Procurement Contract Management
Background Information
The University of Central Queensland (CQU) is a leading university in the
engineering industry in Australia. Following the university's excellent performance and high
rankings in recent times, the management has forecasted an increase in student numbers and
wishes to undertake an expansion program which will include the development of new
infrastructure to accommodate the expected increase in student enrolments. The management
plans to build a new campus complete with several facilities including a 300 student capacity
lecture building, computer and engineering laboratories, a 50 room motel and a 250 seating
capacity conference hall. They have also acquired a 40 acres piece of land in Melbourne in
which the project is to be constructed. The university has identified a contractor named
PPMP20011 Company and expects the completed project to be handed over early to enable
the management to use the complex in the January 2020 academic year.
Project Management
A project entails all those activities that are aimed at delivering capital assets that are
intended to achieve a specified goal using triple constraints of project management, namely
the scope, budget, and time. The project manager is charged with planning, executing, and
controlling a project on behalf of the executive management. The management authorizes the
project manager to exercise responsibility to create a project team and manage it to execute
the plan. In instances where the agency cannot recruit a project manager from within, it is
advisable to hire services of an experienced project consultant to undertake the project
management services on the agency's behalf. , but in cases where several projects will require
the recruitment of additional project managers, the project manager becomes the program
manager.

Procurement Contract Management 3
The triple constraints of quality characterize projects; scope, time, and cost. The
project schedule identifies the timelines of the project; it specifies when to begin the project
and when to complete it. The scope usually has written requirements that are considered to
give quality deliverables. It keeps changing with the emergence of new ideas and
information. Sometimes a scope can be refined to fit into the unique requirements of quality
and desired outcomes. The schedule, as indicated earlier, identifies the project. , and in
developing the schedule, the work is broken down into manageable activities, and each event
is used to do time estimation sequentially. This helps the project team to know the critical
path activities that influence the completion date. Evaluation of the budget defines the
funding resources required for the completion of the project. Budgeting is done by the project
manager based on estimates received at the commencement of each project life cycle and it is
advisable not to fix the budget as a baseline until after the preliminary engineering phase to
avoid estimate disruptions.
Contract Management
The project manager is actively involved in managing the contract's implementation
to ensure effective delivery of the outcomes to enable the agency to maximize value for
money. Downstream activities such as contractual agreements greatly influence the success
of the upstream activities such as procurement planning and contractor selection. The
objective of contract management is to ensure timely delivery of the contract, completed to
the required specifications and at the agreed price. Contract management is an ongoing
process throughout the project lifecycle. The project manager is also called the “contract
manager." The appropriate contractual arrangements govern the relationship between the
contract manager and the contractor.
Project Procurement

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Capital projects like the one the CQU University is undertaking require careful
management and administration of the procurement processes. There are four most common
methods used in contract procurement, including “Document Design," “Design Development
& Construct," “Design& Construct," as well as “Managing Contractor." Each of these
methods has its pros and cons, and it is upon the user to understand and choose the plan that
best suits their requirement.
Project Life Cycle
Any construction project must be planned and documented to create value in the
capital assets of an agency. In this respect, the agency must sustain and improve service
quality, meet the growing demand by expanding service, as well as comply with regulatory
requirements. A project lifecycle happens in several sequential stages that may be broadly
defined as the concept, designing, tendering, pre-construction, construction, and
commissioning (Uher, 2009 p.28). Each of these stages must be appropriately managed for
the project to be successful. Coordination of work across the entire life cycle of the project
must also be managed effectively. The lifecycle of a construction project is relatively long
and involves pools of teams ranging from the agency representation, contractors, financiers,
consultants and designers, and most times they must sign a contract with the agency. The
university needs this project to meets its demands for quality service provision for its growing
student population. Project items which include the four structures are scheduled to be
completed by a specific time for the university to achieve its intended objective in the span of
the project lifecycle (Dixon et al., 2018 p.204). After authorization from the board,
discussions about the triple constraints triangle begin. The next phase involves a feasibility
study which will generate the project plan and designs. Sometimes a project's aspects
intertwine forcing the project team to come up with alternatives.