If you are an individual consultant looking for your next assignment or job, there is an exclusive way of staying ahead of the competition. In addition to applying to open positions or sending your CV to several organizations, you can target those that are further along the contract award selection process. By knowing which companies have been shortlisted by donors or development banks, you can contact them directly and offer your services. What exactly are shortlists and how can you use them effectively? Learn all about this in the article below.
Introduction
International companies across the globe invest considerable time and resources in winning funding. Some of them are shortlisted, meaning that they are among the finalists from the full list of entities who submitted an application following the publication of a procurement notice.
How are companies shortlisted?
The selection criteria and the tasks to be undertaken are described in the published contract notice. A ‘long list’ of all the candidates replying to the notice is cut down to a shortlist on the basis of their replies. The donor picks, for example, three to eight bids and continues the dialogue only with those selected entities. Sometimes they choose the companies that meet the minimum eligibility criteria and sometimes they take the best qualified from the best.
Why is access to shortlists important for international consultants?
When an organization has been shortlisted, it may still be looking for consultants (this depends on the specific donor procedures) so it makes sense to send them a CV as they might be searching for experts for their technical proposal.
How to approach shortlisted organizations?
All you have to do is access the tenders with shortlisted status which shows you the details of any project in your sector/locations for which certain companies have been shortlisted. Then, follow these simple steps:
- In the advanced search, enter your sectors, location and, if preferred, a funding agency. It is important to choose the status “Shortlisted” and also “Consulting Services” in the “Categories” filter.
- Choose “Organization” in the “Types” filter. You should also use the filter “Modified after” and select only recently added shortlists (for example within 2 weeks – max. 1 month from now).
- Open any relevant listing to check information about the tender and in the attachments, you will usually find a list of all the shortlisted organizations.
- You can contact every single one of them (by finding the contact details in our Organizations database) informing them of your availability. Once they get back to you, it will be up to you to choose which company to work with.
Only some of the donors/banks (EC, ADB, GA Canada, AfDB, JICA) feature such a stage in their project cycle and DevelopmentAid tracks all of the shortlists that they publish.
To gain access to the documents with the shortlisted organizations, join us as a member.
