Review season begins as preparations ramp up for procurement

A few weeks before SKAO’s first Council meeting, 2021 kicked off with a Progress Review aimed at checking our preparations for procurement as well as sharing knowledge and understanding across the teams. The latter took on even greater importance due to the remote working situation, as we’re not able to have those “corridor conversations” or catch-up at the coffee machine.

We began by reviewing the status of the key project and system level documents then moved on to the preparations for the contracts themselves, assessing what was ready, what still had to be done and what issues were foreseen, if any. Adjusting the procurement schedule as we went, we then examined organisational readiness for construction, stepping through all the business units one by one. This was essential in enabling us to see the good progress already made, check our assumptions and identify additional interdependencies. We exited the week with a muchimproved collective understanding of where we were, the action plan going forward and individuals’ roles within that.

“The Progress Review has proved itself to be a useful tactic in highlighting where more attention needs to be paid and where uncertainties in external conditions, such as Observatory Membership, funding commitments and the nature of In-Kind Contribution Agreements need to be catered for in the ongoing procurement process,” said SKAO Head of Assurance Tim Stevenson, who chaired the review. The outcomes of the review led to key decisions being sought, and obtained at the first SKAO Council, allowing us to move forward with greater certainty.

Since then, we’ve held the first four of our Contract Readiness Reviews (CRRs), for Mid Correlator Beamformer, Mid and Low Infrastructure Professional Services and Sole Source Software, the latter covering 17 contracts. These four reviews covered very different types of NEC contract so represented good tests of our preparation. They had wide engagement across SKAO, with the owning Project Managers and Design Authorities presenting, and the review teams chaired by Assurance and comprising people with similar roles on other contracts, procurement specialists, legal specialists, representatives from Operations and from the Science and Telescope Delivery Teams as appropriate. Over 140 issues were raised on these CRRs, over half of which are resolved and the rest are in progress. It’s expected that these contracts will be ready to enter the Invitation to Tender stage over the next few weeks.

March will see us conduct CRRs for the majority of the Low and Mid Infrastructure works contracts, so we are making great progress towards our targets.

By Andrea Casson (SKAO)