How and why to make an event sealed
In this article we are discussing what sealed events are and when they are used, explore how they differ from normal sourcing events, show how sealed events can be created in Market Dojo and offer some additional tips when working with sealed events.
About sealed bidding
Sealed bidding is a procurement method where the participants submit their bids but those are only visible to the tendering party once the deadline for submissions have passed, and then they are opened together for evaluation.
In some cases, for example large, public tenders, it is customary to use sealed events so that there is no risk of interfering with or influencing bids favouring one participant over others, and therefore not providing equal opportunity to all invitees.
Sealed events in Market Dojo
In Market Dojo, without sealing an event, the Host and
collaborators can see the progress of the individual Participants and can also
access their submitted bids and documentation once they hit the Submit button.
Important: This option cannot be changed once the event has gone live.
How to seal an event
This is not a default option, so to get started, the Superhost must turn this option on (if have not done so already) in the Admin Panel, under Sourcing Settings, as explained in this walkthrough.
Once this is enabled, when creating a new event, on the
first page you will find this option under the Brief section:
This option will activate once the event is launched, and
you will not be able to see any questionnaire responses, bids or uploaded
documents until the submission deadline.
The Messaging tab will remain open however, so you can communicate with the participants at this stage as well through the platform.
Useful tip
In sealed events it can be very useful to turn on the option allowing participants to edit their answer before the deadline, which is found at the bottom of the Sourcing Settings page:
When this feature is enabled, the participants can make changes to their submissions until the deadline. This is a particularly handy option for Hosts to use in sealed events, so that they don’t have to grant resubmissions case by case to suppliers, and as the answers are not visible before the deadline, participants changing their responses will not interfere with the process.
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