By the end of this course, participants will be better able to:

• Develop robust commercial contract plans, responding to scopes of work
• Appreciate the contractual legalities of commercial contract management
• Conduct effective commercial contract activities
• Negotiate effectively with all key stakeholders, making use of the key skills of persuading and influencing, and working with stakeholders to improve outcomes
• Create and manage effective relationships with clients and contractors
• Take a proactive approach to managing commercial service delivery contracts
• Make effective use of lessons learned to promote improvements from less optimal outcomes, using appropriate templates
• Deliver client KPIs and SLAs to provide optimum performance, at lowest cost
• Make appropriate use of best practice commercial contract management tools, techniques and templates

Dr Ray Carter, a UK-licensed contracts paralegal, runs his own international training and development consultancy, specialising in procurement. A prolific author, his latest book is on the subject of this programme: Practical Service Delivery and Commercial Management. His previous publications include Practical Procurement, Practical Supplier Selection and Relationship Management (with Sharon Croome), Practical Contract and Commercial Negotiations (with Kenny Campbell) and Practical Contract Management (with Steve Kirby, Alan Oxenbury and Geoff Kontzle). He has also had numerous articles and papers published in journals such as Supply Management and the Centre for Advanced Procurement’s Praxis publication. Ray is Chairman of the Procurement Best Practice Forum, which is made up of many large blue-chip organisations, the purpose of which is to identify and disseminate supply chain management best practices. Ray’s now famous ‘10 Cs’ of supplier evaluation model, first published in 1995, has become an accepted model for the evaluation of suppliers and contractors and has been adopted by many organisations. It is also part of the CIPS level 3 syllabus. Ray is an external examiner for Salford University and a Fellow of Leicester University.

In recent years, he has undertaken training and consultancy assignments across the UK and around the world for organisations such as Prudential, Virgin Media, Cobham, The Home Office, Ministry of Justice, Low Carbon Contracts Company, IBM, Ministry of Defence, NHS, Royal Botanic Gardens Kew, Bapco, AA, Coca-Cola, Foster Wheeler, Pfizer, British Nuclear Group, Honeywell, Total, Qinetiq, John Lewis, DeLaRue, Serco, Wiliams F1 Team, Hitachi Rail Europe, Rolls-Royce, Boots, RBS, DWP, NHS, Lucas Engineering and Systems, Abu Dhabi Company for Onshore Oil Operations (ZADCO), NDC, Ericsson, BAe, Marconi, BBC, Magnox, Ordnance Survey, Chevron, Caspian Pipeline Consortium, Tengzichevroil Company, Coca-Cola, Shell International BV, IMechE, African Development Bank, United Healthcare, MLM, SEPA, Yorkshire Water, East Lothian Council, Medway Council, Wigan Council, National Grid, City of Bradford MDC, London Fire Brigade, etc, etc, etc.