Expert Advisory Network (EAN)

How the EAN can help you

The EAN has expert teams offering project support across a broad range of policy and strategy, stakeholder engagement, infrastructure and technology services.

The EAN provides support via:

• upfront advice: one-off advice on scope, policy, technical content, or process,
• project coaching: regular advisory support
• project delivery: discrete components of work or an entire project
• peer review: quality assurance throughout or review of a piece of work or advice.

How to engage the EAN

Any NSW Government team contact the EAN. The EAN team will quickly assess the project enquiry, clarify scope and assess the EAN’s ability to support.

Should the EAN be able to support your enquiry, the client team will negotiate directly with the expert partner team to agree scope and cost to deliver the project.

EAN alignment with procurement policy

You can use the EAN to engage directly with government entities, so you won’t require a specific procurement process.

In line with PBD 2021-04 Approved procurement arrangements, an agency may obtain goods or services directly from any government entity that provides those goods or services within its functions. This applies even if there is a mandated scheme or whole of government contract in place for equivalent services.

Assessing value for money when using the EAN

You must consider value for money when you engage another agency to provide expert assistance, particularly if the engagement is on a cost recovery or fee-for-service basis.

The Procurement Policy Framework states that value for money isn’t the lowest price or the highest quality good or service. Value for money requires a balanced assessment of a range of financial and non-financial factors, such as:

• quality
• cost
• fitness for purpose
• capability
• capacity
• risk
• total cost of ownership.

You must take steps to ensure that the government entity you’re engaging via the EAN can deliver the assistance your agency requires. Consider:

• The type of assistance required.
• The capability and capacity of the EAN partner to provide the expertise within the required timeframes.
• How risks will be identified, allocated and managed.
• Whether the fee, if any, is in line with market rates.

There are many ways to consider how the proposed fees of an EAN expert partner compare to market rates without conducting a competitive procurement process. These include comparing the proposed fees to:

• the maximum daily rates and fee structures for equivalent engagements and role types under the:
  • Standard Commercial Framework for Performance and Management Services Scheme categories 1–12
  • Infrastructure Advisory Standard Commercial Framework
• price guides, fee schedules or catalogues for equivalent services on catalogues (including your agency's) and buy NSW
• the cost of past engagements for similar services
• publicly available price guides, schedules or benchmarking data.

Using an EAN expert partner for services on a mandated scheme

You can engage an EAN expert partner to provide support, even if the Procurement Board mandated the use of a prequalification scheme or whole-of-government contract for equivalent services.

The government entity doesn’t need to be a member of a scheme or panel contract to be engaged.

You should take steps to ensure the government entity you engage can meet any licensing or other minimum qualifications, if applicable.

Written agreements and contracts when using an EAN expert partner

In most cases, where a NSW Government agency is contracting with another NSW Government agency or department, it’s not appropriate for the government to contract with itself.

In many cases, a project agreement is sufficient. This is the preferred approach for intra-agency engagements.

For inter-agency engagements, you can use a project agreement or memorandum of understanding.

The complexity and risk profile of the engagement and internal agency policy will determine the appropriate agreement.

Competitive neutrality and EAN expert partners

Agencies engaging another government entity through the EAN aren't required to consider whether competitive neutrality is applied. The obligation to consider competitive neutrality applies to the agency providing services, not the agency procuring the service.

If competitive neutrality is a consideration for your agency providing expert assistance through the EAN, refer to:

• TPP02-1 policy statement on the application of competitive neutrality policy and guidelines paper
• 2023 IPART Review of NSW Competitive Neutrality Policies and Processes