An important part of the construction process is awarding the contract to perform the construction in a timely manner to a qualified contractor. The owner must choose a delivery method and a selection method. The four basic delivery methods are: Traditional Design-Bid-Build, Construction Management, Design-Build, and Design-Build-Operate-Transfer and the two most commonly used selection methods are Invitation to Bid and Request for Proposal (Source Selection). The method that will give the owner the most flexibility in selecting the most qualified contractor is the Request for Proposal or Source Selection Process. There are several basic steps in the Source Selection Process that ultimately lead to the selection of the "Best Value" Offeror. In the private industry the steps are left to the discretion of the individual owners. For Government Agencies there are applicable rules and regulations that apply and must be followed. In either case, the basic framework of the process is the same for both private and Government "owners". The primary difference is that private owners can enter into contractual relationships in any matter they choose as long as it is not fraudulent and therefore do not run the risk of the process being stopped by a protest. On the other hand, the Government runs the risk of the process being stopped by a protest and must follow all the prescribed rules, regulations, and procedures to mitigate this risk. The most important step in the Source Selection Process is developing Evaluation Factors and Subfactors because this will ultimately determine the ease and cost of proposal preparation for the offerors and the ease of evaluating proposals for the evaluation team. The second most important step is the consistent evaluation of the proposals received. No matter how complex the evaluation factors are if the evaluators evaluate the proposals consistently and adequately document their findings the probability of a successful
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