Introduction

All videos have closed captioning.

Before You Begin

The tools and concepts introduced in this course are intended to provide a foundation for exploring opportunities within federal procurement and identifying opportunities that may align with the goods your business provides.

This course is designed to help you better understand how federal procurement works and how to begin identifying opportunities that may align with your business. It is not intended to guarantee that a supplier will receive contracts with the Government of Canada. Successfully participating in federal procurement requires ongoing research, preparation, and effort on the part of the individual or business. The tools and information provided in this course are intended to help you build a stronger foundation so that you can continue learning and developing your approach to federal procurement.

In the first part of this course, we’ll begin by working through the Government of Canada’s official guidance on preparing to sell to the federal government. You can find that resource here:

https://canadabuys.canada.ca/en/getting-started/preparing-sell-government

While this resource is an important starting point, you may find that it isn’t as straightforward as you would like. In particular, there have been updates to the SAP Ariba Business Network over the past year that are not fully reflected in the written guide. As a result, some of the steps shown in the resource may look slightly different from what you see on the platform today, and in some cases certain steps are no longer necessary.

In the section of this course that covers registering on the SAP Ariba Business Network, we will follow the government resource step by step while also walking through the current interface. This will help you navigate the registration process more easily and avoid some of the common hurdles that can arise when the documentation and the platform are not perfectly aligned.

Once you have a clear understanding of the registration process, we will move into the core topics of this course. Together, we will cover:

  • The difference between a Standing Offer and a Supply Arrangement

  • How to use the filters on CanadaBuys to identify relevant tender opportunities

  • How to download and review a Request for Standing Offer (RFSO)

  • How to use SOSA open data for market research and procurement intelligence

  • How to set up a procurement watch system so you can monitor opportunities and plan ahead

By the end of the course, you should have a clearer understanding of how federal procurement opportunities are structured and how to begin identifying opportunities that align with the goods your business provides.