Deliverable accountability, change management and breach in consultancy contracts: A comparative study of world bank versus europeaid funded projects
| Pages | 525-571 |
| Date | 01 April 2017 |
| DOI | https://doi.org/10.1108/JOPP-17-04-2017-B003 |
| Published date | 01 April 2017 |
| Author | Youssef G. Saad |
| Subject Matter | Public policy & environmental management,Politics,Public adminstration & management,Government,Economics,Public Finance/economics,Texation/public revenue |
JOURNAL OF PUBLIC PROCUREMENT, VOLUME 17, ISSUE 4, 525-571 WINTER 2017
DELIVERABLE ACCOUNTABILITY, CHANGE MANAGEMENT AND
BREACH IN CONSULTANCY CONTRACTS: A COMPARATIVE STUDY OF
WORLD BANK VERSUS EUROPEAID FUNDED PROJECTS
Youssef G. Saad*
ABSTRACT. A considerable proportion of donor aid is dedicated to technical
assistance to support developing countries in their development initiatives.
The majo rity of this aid comes from globally-operating international donors
including the World Bank and the European Union. In spite of several
harmonization attempts, there still exist major differences in their
procurement regulations and standard contracts. Based on an extensive
literature review on consult ing services and an in-depth analysis of the
standard forms of contract, it was found that divergence between both forms
is not only clear but also paradigmatic owing mainly to market orientation
paradigm differences. The findings and recommendations help advance
research on and practice of various types of consultancy services in general.
INTRODUCTION
Consultancy Services
In order to procure knowledge, clients resort to consultants who
are capable of pooling and efficiently applying knowledge:
“Knowledge intensity is widely recognized as a hallmark of the
management consulting industry” (Richter & Niewiem, 2009, p.275).
Researching consultocracy, Gunter, Hall, and Mills (2015) classified
consultancy knowledge production into three approaches (functional,
critical and socially critical) each of which distinctively and differently
conceptualizes purposes, rationales and narratives of the knowledge
production process. Ideally, the aim of a consultancy service should
not only be answering clients’ practical questions but also enhancing
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* Youssef G. Saad, M.E., is a Senior Procurement Officer / Team Leader at
the Office of the Minister of State for Administrative Reform (Lebanon). His
research interest is in public procurement reform and modernization and
contract management.
Copyright © 2017 by PrAcademics Press
526 SAAD
clients’ reflective practices to engage in novel ways of problem
anticipation, analysis and resolution (Puutio, Kykyri, & Wahlström,
2009). Consultants help clients through organizational diagnosis and
knowledge transfer in order to solve problems, achieve organizational
goals and effect change (Lu, Su, & Huang, 2010). In another view
that sees no magicians in consultants, a consultant’s service should
revolve around helping clients to help themselves rather than just
solving clients’ problems or providing expertise (Soriano, 2004).
Cohen and Eimicke (2008, p. 86) believe that consultants’ duties
ought to exceed mere compliance with contract requirements to
include acting as faithful agents of the public sector to advance that
sector’s goals of satisfying public needs and ensuring government
effectiveness. Amidst the evident ambiguity on the role of
consultants, Furusten (2009) considers that both clients and
management consultants are uncertain of the role expected of
consultants and that the latter should be considered as improvisers
(and satisfiers) playing an indefinite role as agents of stability rather
than agents of change.
The continuum of roles a consultant assumes ranges from an
“outsider” role- a simple market-based transaction role- where the
agent furnishes advice in exchange of monetary gain to an “insider”
role- a complex social integration role- where a network of long-lasting
social ties emerges (Kitay & Wright, 2004). The two roles are not
mutually exclusive, and neither role is inherently good or inherently
bad; the alleged efficiency of either is contingent on the particulars of
the required service and the needs/orientation of the client (Kitay &
Wright, 2004). Werr and Pemer (2007) suggest that the
characteristics of the consultancy services are better understood as
characteristics of the interaction between the client and the
consultant. Critical success factors in a client-consultant relationship
are the “need for trust, high levels of interaction and contingent
methods” (Mitchell, 1994, p. 334). A successful consultancy service
applies processes and methods that stress “the active management
of the client-consultant relationship” where consultants “actively
manage and manipulate the interaction process in order to create
favorable impressions of their service” (Clark & Salaman, 1998,
p.19). For the interactive game to succeed, consultants need to adapt
their services to clients’ wishes and rules (Taminiau, Boussebaa, &
Berghman, 2012). Interestingly researching literature on how
consultants working for the public sector see themselves, Lapsley
ACCOUNTABILITY, CHANGE MANAGEMENT AND BREACH IN CONSULTANCY CONTRACTS 527
and Oldfield (2001) further identified perceptual differences in such
self-views based on the size of the consulting entity (large firms as
opposed to small ones and freelance individuals). Viewing the client-
consultant relationship from the agent’s side, Whittle (2006)
observed that the consultant’s role is daunted with a multitude of
paradoxes governing the client-consultant engagement and
discourse: marketing for their services, consultants face role and
intention paradoxes (advocate vs. advisor; and interested vs.
independent); furthermore, as owners of consulting knowledge,
agents endure the paradoxes of being scientists vs. storytellers and
delivering knowledge that is bespoke vs. standardized; finally,
relationship paradoxes revolve around whether the consultant is
perceived as an ally vs. enemy and whether it is a facilitator vs. leader
(Whittle, 2006).
On the other side, Lloyd-Walker, Mills, and Walker (2014) find
that consultancy services rendered through the traditional
transactional mechanisms are flawed with systemic inefficiencies
caused mainly by a “deterministic product paradigm” where both
parties mistakenly believe that the requirements and the plans are
“real” and clearly represent agreed actions. Such a perceived
determinism becomes more and more realistic as the product of the
project moves closer to tangibility. There is a spectrum of service
tangibility that helps to identify a service-logic and a goods-logic in
procurement regulations. Consultancy services are seen as activities
rather than objects (Roodhooft & Van den Abbeele, 2006). Although
procurement of consultancy services seems to be dominated by a
service-dominant logic as opposed to the goods-dominant logic in the
procurement of goods, works and non-consulting services, these two
apparently incongruous paradigms are not mutually exclusive; they
interact in the planning, selection and implementation of consulting
services procurement at both macro and micro levels (Lindberg &
Nordin, 2008). In any case, client selection of a consultant relies
mainly on signals and symbols of perceived consultant competence
and qualifications (Clark & Salaman, 1998). Although clients are
increasingly making well informed consultant selection decisions,
such a selection still remains “largely driven by instinct, haphazard
relationships, or chance” (Richter & Niewiem, 2009, p. 286). On an
opposite front, Roodhooft and Van den Abbeele (2006, p.492)
characterize a consultant selection process to be “interactive,
continuous and dynamic.” Although previous findings that clients of
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