Procurement website and Buying Manual improvements under way

In the fall, we conducted a survey and three focus groups to evaluate the usability of the Buying Manual and the Procurement website. Thank you to the 203 survey respondents and the 15 focus group members for your participation and willingness to help us improve our services and tools! To further enhance our understanding of our customers’ needs, we hired CIT to conduct in-person interviews.

We have already made several improvements in response to the survey, focus groups, and in-person interviews:

• Hyperlinked the Buying Manual table of contents.
• Ensured all policy links within the Buying Manual open the policy.
• Added hyperlinks to the flowcharts in Sections 200 and 700.
• Added more hyperlinks for referenced materials.

We have also taken the following steps to ensure that BSC directors and staff members are aware of Buying Manual changes and process improvements:

• Continue to publish a listing of recent Buying Manual changes on Procurement website.
• Began publishing news articles on the Procurement website and Procurement Gateway to explain Buying Manual updates.
• Began sending email announcements to BSC directors and staff members to announce all Buying Manual updates and process changes.
• Continue to publish articles in the Procurement Update newsletter, which is emailed and published on the Procurement website.
• Requested that Procurement tools be added to the DFA Business Tools page, e.g., Buying Manual, Spend Viz, Procurement news feed.

To better serve you, we plan to conduct BSC information sessions two times a year to review all policies and procedures changes and process improvements. Each session will include a question and answer period. We are also updating our e-SHOP, Buying, and PCard FAQ. Additional Buying Manual improvements are planned based on your feedback. Watch for upcoming emails and news articles!