Incentives In Procurement Contracting

This volume presents a nontechnical treatment of issues that arise in procurement contracting, with an emphasis on major weapons systems procurement. Employing the economic theory of agency as their analytical framework, contributors assess the incentives that arise, for both buyers and sellers, in different contractual settings. Procurement contra

Based on their work in the application of principal-agent theory to questions of regulation, Laffont and Tirole develop a synthetic approach to this field, focusing on the regulation of natural monopolies such as military contractors, utility companies and transportation authorities.

Contract theory, which emphasizes the importance of unverifiable actions and private information, has been a highly active field of research in microeconomics in the last decades. This thesis is divided into two parts. Part I consists of three chapters that study contract-theoretic models which are motivated by the classic procurement problem of a principal who wants an agent to deliver a certain good or service. In such models it is typically assumed that decision makers are interested in their own monetary payoffs only. Moreover, they have unlimited cognitive abilities and behave in a perfectly rational way. Yet, in practice people often do not behave this way. While empirical research is very difficult in contract theory, laboratory experiments have recently turned out to be an important source of data. In Part II, three experimental studies are presented that investigate contract-theoretic problems brought up in Part I.

Value management incentive programmes and clauses are a powerful mechanism for allowing continuity of contractors' input throughout a project delivery. The fact that incentive programmes have been overlooked in the reports and publications portraying alliancing and partnering as the way forward, means that this effective tool has been largely lost to the UK construction industry. The book considers value incentive programmes in depth, highlighting their application and benefits to client and contractor. It provides an insight into contractor-led value engineering and its effective use in different procurement forms.

The purpose of this thesis is to provide the reader with the ability to analyze the effectiveness of incentives and to document innovative approaches to incentive contracting that can be applied to Cost-Plus-Award-Fee (CPAF) contracts. While a CPAF contract is a vehicle to obtain products or services needed by the Government, it also acts as a management tool for the awarding entity, which focuses on the impact of meeting or exceeding award criteria. The need for improved procurement effectiveness necessitates the exploration of innovative arrangements. Contracting officers must take advantage of reforms and become innovative in their approach to provide best value in programs. More efficient ways of doing business are available and must be capitalized upon. Changes in the regulations have given the contracting officer the freedom to innovate. They must use this new freedom in order to meet DoD's expanding requirements with increasingly limited resources. The use of innovative incentives to contractor performance is beginning a period of renaissance. Numerous Government entities have embraced the use of innovative arrangements in the effort to get goods and services better, faster, and cheaper. The contracting officer must determine which incentives are most effective for a program based upon numerous variables.