The innovation buying journey follows the NSW best practice procurement process, including the plan, source and manage stages. However innovation procurement is less linear. Some steps happen at the same time, the plan and source stages will repeat for each round of testing, and several Discover and Plan steps will iterate after each round of testing. Buyers may need increased support for steps that are complex or less familiar.
Design a buying pathway
The first step in the Plan stage is designing a buying pathway. This step starts with deciding whether the market approach should cover the final implementation of a successful solution at scale. Buyers can then explore a range of engagement methods to include in the pathway, to narrow proposals and improve confidence in investment decisions.
Buyer journey resources: Buying Pathway
Mobilise the buying team
When buying innovation, a cross-functional and collaborative buying team will need to design and monitor the innovation buying pathway, and approvers will need to know what to expect. It's important to mobilise the buying project before procurement activity starts. This aligns key people on objectives, roles and ways of working and minimises conflict and delays.
Buyer journey resources: Mobilise your buying team
Scope for innovation
Defining the scope of the buying project through an outcome-focused challenge statement can attract innovative proposals. Innovation scoping workshops help stakeholders identify business needs and understand the end-users' perspective. They also help align the stakeholders’ understanding of the problem to be solved, the value to the end-user, success criteria, and measures, which then facilitate framing a challenge statement.
Buyer journey resources: Scope for innovation
Buyer journey resources
Choose whether to plan for scale and explore engagement methods.
Get the right people on the same page and kick off work.
Attract innovation with a challenge statement for the market to solve.