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Towards a good practice model of procurement: Learning from the role of procurement
practices in the attempt to tackle poverty
Dr Natalie Paleothodoros, Lecturer in Business Management, St John Business School
Dr Peter Watt, Lecturer in Business Management, York St John Business School
Robert Garvey, Professor of Business Education, York St John Business School
Jeff Gold, Professor of Organization Learning, Leeds Beckett University
Dr Dave Devins, Principal Research Fellow, Leeds Beckett University
Dr George Boak, Senior Lecturer in Leadership and Management, York St John University
Corresponding Authors
Stream 6: Organisational Development and Organisational Learning
Submission Type: Working Paper (Please do not cite or circulate)
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Abstract
Purpose:
The purpose of this paper is to begin to describe, analyze, reflect and ultimately understand
the processes (the limitations and potentialities) by which organizations learn via the
facilitation of Appreciative Inquiry as part of a wider project concerned with working with
Anchor Institutions to help alleviate poverty in the Leeds City Region.
Design/methodology/approach:
The paper reports on participative fieldwork based on participative enquiry with Leeds City
Region (LCR) anchor institutions as a mode of action research concerned with local and
social change research. The purpose of the methodology is to create a platform whereby
anchors in the LCR can learn about their practices and develop an understanding of their
potential to play an active part in the reduction of poverty in the local area.
Findings
The paper offers primary insights into the tensions involved in accomplishing sustainable
procurement and the way in which anchor institutions can learn and develop through
appreciative inquiry as part of that on-going accomplishment.
Research limitations/implications
From our findings we are interested in their pragmatic application (‘what works’ where, why
and how) in tackling poverty, and from this what principles can be applied to wider themes of
organizational learning in large organizations.
Practical and social implications
This paper contributes to ongoing understandings of the practice of action learning. In
particular, the implications for practice lie in both the tackling of poverty by establishing a
model for good practice in sustainable procurement and the implications of this for
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organizations to learn and develop their own practices in a sustainable and socially
responsible way.
Keywords: Procurement, Poverty, Anchor institutions, Organisational Learning
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Introduction
This working paper is a preliminary reflection on a project that seeks to investigate the
impact, response and effectiveness of appreciative inquiry (AI) on procurement best practice.
To do so, this paper draws on notions of ‘sustainable procurement’ (Walker and Phillips
2009; Walker and Brammer 2007; Walker and Jones 2012) in order to explore the
relationship between poverty reduction in the Leeds City Region (LCR) and the practice of
procurement in ‘anchor institutions’.
The paper forms part of a wider investigation (funded by the Joseph Rowntree Foundation
(JRF) into the interrelationship between recruitment, employment and procurement practices
and the consequences of them for impacting poverty in the LCR. For this paper we are
focusing on procurement, as we deem it an area that has been largely sidelined in recent
studies. As a response to this, this paper emphasizes the importance of the role of sustainable
procurement practices as having gained legitimate attention in recent years following the
2007 Local Government and Public Involvement in Health Act, the 2008 Sustainable
Communities Act (HMG 2007; 2008) and most recently the Social Value Act 2012 (which
became law in January 2013).
Map of Paper
We begin with a brief overview of anchor institutions before considering key points relating
to procurement. We then outline and reflect on the methodological approach undertaken in
order to address the overriding issue we are concerned with, and outline the story so far in
terms of findings, challenges and limitations, before drawing some preliminary conclusions
and outlining how the project and the methodological developments might proceed.
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Anchor Institutions and Sustainable Procurement
While a relatively new idea in the UK, in the US the term ‘anchor institution’ has gained
growing recognition. Mauresse (2007) suggests that they are the ‘civic, cultural and
intellectual institutions which contribute to the cultural, social and economic vitality of
cities’. Through their size and presence such institutions are likely to be play a vital and
impactful role in terms of employment, revenue-generation and, especially relevant for this
paper, their procurement, commissioning or spending patterns (PIUR 2010). Anchor
institutions can include organisations such as universities, hospitals, colleges, local
authorities and public services such as the Police. They can also include larger private sector
organisations although, as suggested by Dubb and Howard (2012), such organisations are not
‘anchored’ to a specific region in the same way as public and semi-public institutions, as they
are likely to relocate because of the attraction of lower costs, subsidies and the avoidance of
regulation.
As suggested by the title ‘anchor’, such institutions are important to a region because they are
likely to be ‘anchored’ in that they are very unlikely to move away from where they are
located. For example, York City Council has to remain located in the City of York. As such,
through their presence and influence, they have a significant potential to influence local
poverty through their practices in recruitment, employment and procurement. The Work
Foundation (2010) argued that cities need to make the most of their anchor institutions as
they can play a significant role in the alleviation of poverty at a local level and procurement
seems to be a good starting point. As a recent report from Newark, New Jersey (Zeuli et al.
2014) shows, anchor institutions were able to move over $400m of procurement to local
purchasing.
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In recent years the concept of sustainable procurement has gained attention to focus on both
environmental and socio-economic considerations as part of a movement to promote
decisions to meet the Triple Bottom Line (Meehan and Bryde 2011). In the UK, the
recognition that, given the size of expenditure by central and local government, procurement
can play a role in bringing wider benefit to society beyond the provision of services. In 2006,
the Government defined sustainable procurement as:
… a process whereby organisations meet their needs for goods, services, works and
utilities in a way that achieves value for money on a whole life basis, in terms of
generating benefits not only to the organisation, but also to society and the economy,
whilst minimising damage to the environment (HM Government, 2006, p. 10)
Since 2006, various pieces of legislation have sought to promote sustainable procurement
including, most recently, the 2012 Social Value Act.
Project Background and Methodology
The project is based on a call for proposals commissioned by the Joseph Rowntree
Foundation which sought to develop an action research project with anchor institutions with
the aim of reducing poverty in LCR. The two central components of this project are
‘poverty’ and ‘anchor institutions.’ The first is the ‘issue’ or ‘problem’ on which the action
research is directed, and the second is the focus through which the issue can potentially be
addressed. This has lent itself to two strategic moves which are needed to be brought to
attention from the outset of this paper, in our focus on the relationship between action
researchers facilitating the means by which anchor institutions can help alleviate poverty in
the LCR. As stated above, the ‘problem’ (poverty), ‘means of resolution’ (Action Research)
and the ‘actors’ (anchor institutions) have all been identified by the third-party who are
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funding the project. As such, both the definition of the problem and the means of its
resolution have been defined from the outset, and therefore have guided our design for the
project. The initial call for proposals read:
‘Anchor institutions have an inherent stake in a particular place and are the
biggest spenders and employers in the local economy… We are interested in the
procurement, recruitment and employment (wider HR practice/management)
processes of local anchor institutions and how these could better address both out-
of-work poverty and in-work poverty. Through a programme of action
research … we want to assess and maximize the impact of a cross section of
anchors on the local economy and on reducing poverty locally. Our overarching
objective is for the anchor institutions taking part in the study to agree and adopt
a shared set of policies/principles, which guide their procurement, recruitment
and employment practices.’ (Bold added)
Although these details from the call for proposals give a sense of the overall agenda, it is key
to note that in terms of definition (of issue, potential solution and methodological means by
which these former two aspects can relate) JRF have set the parameters (emphasized in bold
above). What is important to note here is that although the ‘action research’ aspect of the
project is the methodological means by which these two components can be brought together,
the project was developed by an early and specific identification which came via JRF. This
has lent itself to a particular view of what ‘poverty’ is (how it is defined), and, naturally, the
limitations and methodological scope by which the chosen means can stake themselves in the
process of this issue’s alleviation.
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As a methodology, Action Research is well-known among those seeking social change,
following the influence of Kurt Lewin (1946) who referred to a ‘circle of planning, action and
fact-finding about the result of action’ (p.38). Others such as Kemmis and McTaggart (1988)
suggest a cycle as ‘plan, act, observe, reflect’ (p.11) and while others have presented
variations of this, the notion that in the face of a difficult social and cultural phenomenon, we
need iterations of action that are informed by understanding drawn from theory. As Raelin
and Coghlin (2006) have recently suggested, action research ‘intentionally merges theory
with practice’ (p.676). While we are happy to subscribe to action research, we were also able
to extend the scope of the approach via the use of what are called the ‘action modes’ of
research (Raelin 2015) which can include methodologies such as Cultural Historical Activity
Theory, Appreciative Inquiry and Action Learning Research. Our plan was to draw upon
such methodologies as appropriate but to bring representatives of anchor institutions into an
action learning set. This would be our core group, and Figure 1 shows the approach to form
this group and our intentions to work with the group. The inquiry encompasses an exploration
of the recruitment, employment and procurement practices of anchors in the LCR and the
consequences of those practices for poverty in the local area. The question that the research is
concerned with relates to the way in which the LCR makes the best use of anchors to address
poverty at a local level.
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Figure 1: Design of the Project
In order to identify anchor institutions in LCR, we set some basic criteria relating to size,
numbers employed and length of time located in LCR to reflect their ‘footprint’ on the region
and likelihood to remain. Through a range of contacts, we sought to ensure the backing of the
most senior manager, who could then introduce between 4-6 other managers who would act
as the strategic group for the project. They would also set an intent to reconcile their
expectations with the aim of the project and find a member for the core group.
To start the project, we proposed to work with the core group to conduct an Appreciative
Inquiry which is rooted in traditional notions of action research, with a particular focus on
appreciating what works in procurement (in poverty reduction), rather than what does not.
Copperrider and Whitney (2005) outline the underlying principle of AI:
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‘The infinite human resource we have for generating constructive organizational
change is our collective imagination and discourse about the future. One of the basic
theorems of the anticipatory view of organizational life is that it is the image of the
future, which in fact guides what might be called the current behavior of any
organism or organization. Much like a movie projector on a screen, human systems
are forever projecting ahead of themselves a horizon of expectation (in their talk in
the hallways, in the metaphors and language they use) that brings the future
powerfully into the present as a mobilizing agent. To inquire in ways that serves to
refashion anticipatory reality—especially the artful creation of positive imagery on a
collective basis--may be the most prolific thing any inquiry can do.’
The assumption of AI can therefore be understood in terms of positive images of the future
leading to positive actions (Copperrider and Whitney 2005).
The purpose of the inquiry is to initially unpack procurement practices in order to identify
barriers to CSR and the triple bottom line. By doing so the anchor institutions are active in a
process whereby they discuss, learn and develop solutions to barriers together by focusing on
‘what works’; i.e. appreciating ‘what works’, how they can learn from each other about
‘what works’, and implement best practices based on ‘what works’.
Methodologically, this carries particular significances, amongst others, in relation to the
enrolment of actors. The significance is twofold: firstly, in relation to enrolling anchor
institutions to partake in the research and secondly, in the enrolment of further actors. There
is a arguably a significant difference between approaching an organization and asking them
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to partake in research looking at what they do badly in relation to procurement and what
consequence that might have for poverty, and asking them to partake in research looking at
appreciating what they do well and what others do well in order to develop best practices and
alleviate poverty. While we are aware that the negative aspects of appreciative inquiry (Bushe
2007) contain crucial means for understanding and addressing social issues like those we are
concerned with here, by focusing on the appreciation and roll-out of positive action, anchors
become likely to enroll in the project, which, in the delicate stages of getting this research
underway, was our chief concern. As such, the concept of enrolment continues as the project
does and anchors are asked to enroll further actors into the research process under the same
premise (See Latour 1987).
The methodology intends to explore what motivates anchor institutions to take poverty into
account and enable participants to make positive choices to impact on the alleviation of
poverty. In relation to procurement, the inquiry is exploring what practices have a positive
impact on poverty alleviation, working with anchors to build models of best practice and
establish opportunities to share those models across the LCR. The purpose of the research is
to create a platform whereby anchors in the LCR can learn about their practices and develop
their understanding of the consequences of them for poverty in the local area.
The inquiry has been set up to encompass 5 core meetings with anchor representatives in
which anchors and researchers work together to appreciate what works in procurement and
the alleviation of poverty. So far, of the 5 planned meetings, 2 meetings have taken place.
The next section of the paper will move on to outline the story so far.
The Story so far …
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This project provides an opportunity for anchor organisations in the Leeds City Region to
identify and develop innovative approaches to workforce development and procurement
which can improve productivity and performance and also make a difference to the city
region’s prosperity through more and better paid jobs.
Leeds Beckett University in partnership with York St John University has been
commissioned by the Joseph Rowntree Foundation (JRF) to undertake an exciting new
project which engages representatives with a responsibility for organisational change in an
innovative action-oriented research project aimed at providing an opportunity for making a
real difference to organisational performance and LCR’s prosperity.
Due to the ‘Action’ orientation of this research, the practical implications are inextricably
bound up with the intended social implications of the work. Through the collaborative
exercises of appreciative inquiry the anchor institutions that are involved in this project have
thus far begun to identify, share and analyse (in terms of correlating central thematics that
have emerged as similarities) current measures of procurement ‘good practice’ in order to
learn from one another in order to develop an understanding of ‘what currently works well’,
and what might work in addressing poverty in the local city region in the future. As such, the
practical implications of identifying good procurement practices will help organizations learn
and consolidate on their current practices and, in doing so, develop a procurement map by
which the social implications can be disseminated and rolled out across further organizations
that share the organizational, social and geographic environment of this focused case.
As we have articulated above, the parameters of our action-orientation comes via JRF,
however the process has proved much more complex than this. The process of AI began with
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intent statements, which functioned in two key ways – firstly, in the traditional sense of
developing the project by understanding what the anchors sought to achieve through their
participation in the project. However secondly, the statement of intent was also a means of
early engagement in the definition of poverty and the acknowledgement of the anchors that 1)
poverty exists, and 2) they have a potential stake in its alleviation. As such, the initial means
of identifying the issue is essentially an act of coercion (what elsewhere has been understood
as a gesture of ‘seduction’ on the qualitative researchers part (Newkirk 1996), in which the
participants come to understand on their own terms the central issue that has brought them
into the project in a manner which is in keeping with the call for proposals. This was done
prior to the first core meeting via a statement of intent, and underpinned the positivity
outlined previously through which the first core meeting launched its primary data-collection.
Identifying the issue through a statement of intent
Action Research is different to other forms of research in a number of ways, however each of
these is rooted in an overriding trajectory of the ‘action’ seeking to overcome or solve a
social problem in a collaborative way. It is through this preoccupation that it is referred to as
a ‘living theory’ (Whitehead and McNiff 2006) in which the research is at the same time a
contribution to pragmatic knowledge (broadly defined as an ontological understanding of
truth being inseparable from ‘what works’) and ‘real’ social impact. Therefore it is a process
that is inherently performative in its trajectory and methodology. The different means by
which Action Research is conducted are therefore understood as devices for and of
intervention, and inherent in this is an ethical and political imperative that shapes the process
and outcomes that such lines of inquiry take. The outcome of the project is both concerned
with reaching an ethical and political consensus on what anchor institutions can do to help
alleviate poverty via ‘good procurement practices.’ However, the development of this
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performative means starts in the early stages of the research via the identification of the
problem itself. This is despite the issue being defined and understood prior to the project’s
inception. Such action-oriented modes of research and learning are rooted in the relationship
between learning and problems. However, how one identifies a ‘problem’ is of the utmost
importance, both ethically and pragmatically, for how those engaged in the consequent action
are going to relate to and play their part in achieving the intended outcomes.
Before the first core meeting we had the participants create and sign a ‘statement of intent’.
This process served two functions for the later ‘appreciate’ conduct of the research. First of
all, through these intent statements we acquired a sense of what the organizations sought to
achieve through the process. We therefore got a sense of how they understood their place in
the project, and secondly it meant that the individual organizations were identifying and
therefore acknowledging that there was an ‘issue’ or ‘problem’ that they had a stake in
overcoming.
It was clear that the anchors did not want to be judged or address any negative aspects of their
current, which in turn influenced the intensely positive orientation of the first core meeting.
Core group meeting 1
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The first core meeting revolved around the nature of the project – understanding the AI cycle
(Figure 2)– and the anchors were invited to share with one another what their statements of
intent were, what worries, concerns and ambitions they had about their involvement in the
project and how they foresaw their involvement developing
Figure 2: The AI Cycle
As an exercise that would be the basis of their first act of data collection, the anchors paired
up and interview one another based on the data collection card (see appendix 1). Following
this exercise the anchors were given five data collection cards and were asked to each go
away and interview 5 people from within their own organization or across their procurement
process more generally in order to identify and learn from what works well. In the meantime
researchers used the same set of data collection cards to research what currently works well,
to help support and later thematize the data that would be brought together in second core
meeting.
Limitations and challenges
It is widely received that Action Research is a means of intervention. Intervention – that is,
the means by which conditions can be improved as a means of appreciation, collaboration
and pragmatism - is the determining factor which makes Action Research different from
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other kinds (Argyris, Putnam, and Smith 1985). Due to the nature of intervention, one of the
challenges in an Action Research project is balancing support with research outcomes (be
them learning, practice or modeling). Specific to the case at hand is the fact that the
‘appreciative’ aspect of AI was based on the positive association of good practice, i.e., what
practices are already available and in place at the organizations involved in the inquiry.
After the first core meeting, it was revealed that the first task set to the anchors may need
support. In particular, one of the 12 anchors voiced concerns that the current position their
organization was in ‘did not have any good practice in place’. The question was raised as to
how we might support this institution at this crucially early stage in the project in identifying
good practice. The importance of this at this stage was also on account of keeping this key
organisation’s confidence that they would be able to contribute to the inquiry of the other
anchors whose practices and organizational identity were better established. We decided at
the first debrief, that half-way through the period of time assigned to this task (between core
meetings one and two) that a general email would be sent to all anchors from the personal
email of those who were involved in their declaration of intent that support was available.
This allowed for the anchors to ‘opt-in’ should they need to, and was framed in a way that
wouldn’t undermine the individual basis of discovering and interpreting what was deemed
‘good practice.’ This also aligned the individual to the organization for a time later in the
process, when the anchors would report their outcomes of appreciative inquiry to a specific
researcher.
Core group meeting 2
In the weeks that passed since the first core meeting, the anchor institutions had filled in their
data collection cards. The second core meeting was based around discussing, thematizing and
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coding this data in order to take the project forward (Braun and Clarke, 2006). The meeting
was organized by splitting the anchors into 3 groups of 3-4 anchor representatives in order for
them to discuss their findings.
The session operated around four steps:
1) Communicating – ‘Read the findings … note what is interesting’
2) Understanding – ‘Generate codes for actions, behaviours and results’
3) Conceptualisation – ‘Develop themes: collate codes into potential themes’
4) Reviewing – Review themes – are they linked? What is interesting? What is useful?
After this, the research team brought the groups (3 groups of 3 -4 anchor representatives)
together and asked them to identify an overriding theme from their shared discussion and
coding (facilitated by a researcher). We then went round the other groups and asked them all
to offer a sub-theme, in turn, until we had six sub-themes under the dominant themes.
From analyzing the findings of the second core group, 5 overall themes and actions have been
identified (shown as Table 1):
Table 1: Overall themes and actions
Leadership
Setting an example – drive behaviour
Ensure practice supports strategic
objectives
Tying up the links
Coaching and education
Collaboration
Engage local stakeholders early and
often
Work in partnership with multiple
leads
Agree common goals
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Making connections and build
relationships
Future plan. Objectives and review/
measure.
Meet, talk, co-produce
Key account management
Combine buying power – small groups
brought together.
Extending Benefit
Stretch to allow overflow
Imagine what is possible – id, opps
Find employment opportunities
Consider the long view
Grow partnership and working
relationships
Peer group influence.
Social Value
Develop charter/ shared principles
Outcomes accountability
Understand fit to the system
Take a long view
Whole view vs parts
Funding the ‘common’
Build into procure practice.
Market Making
Do it creatively
Use apprenticeships
Stimulate SME skills
Find the innovators
Help investment into innovation
Linked social value.
From these themes we tentatively produced our first model, the purpose of which was to
present this as actionable knowledge based on practice that works. This is shown as Figure 2.
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Figure 2: A Thematic Model of What Works in Procurement
This model, based on the actions and behaviours of what works, became the first indication
of what can be done. However, like all such artifacts, it remains without significance until it
becomes part of a conversation that is used to change intentions and then behaviours. This
requires a rhetorical process of persuasion enroll others in the project (Latour 1987).
Where do we go from here?
Action Research as Process and Movement
A key aim of the project was for the core groups, on which the face-to-face aspect of
Appreciative Inquiry (AI) was given a platform, would become self-sustaining. It is through
these that the imperative for sustainability of the procurement ‘good practices’ could be
rolled out through all the participating anchors. However in terms of the impact and reach of
the project, it was also the aim of the steering group to continue to open up the involvement
of the project to further organizations, including those who declined to participate in the
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initial phase of the project’s development. The individual reasons for this declination is
important, and is something that the research team was considering further research on at a
later stage in the project’s development. However inherent in the aim of recruiting further
participants was conceptualized from the outset as an outcome of the specific process
involved in action research. Due to the emancipatory aim of intervention through poverty-
alleviation, the process of this alleviation came to be understood as something of a
movement, to which high-profile names and institutions could be aligned. This was both a
product of the development as it was a technique of furthering the profile and legitimacy of
this approach, which, particularly at the beginning of design, was highly speculative and
reliant on the process itself. The notion of a ‘movement’ is different from ‘process’ here in a
number of distinct ways which are too theoretically divergent to be addressed in this paper,
but are appropriate lines of inquiry from which some methodological considerations can be
developed at a later date which takes into account the reach of Action Learning processes that
this project is concerned with.
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Appendix 1:
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