Raising commercial skills is a key part of Civil Service Reform. This is because we spend £240bn of taxpayers’ money with third parties to deliver public services, including £40bn in central government alone. In an era of increased demand and less resource it is more crucialthan ever to spend every penny of it well.
Bill Crothers Chief Commercial Officer
Improve your commercial skills
Civil Service Learning has produced a simple guide to the courses and guides available on the website to help civil servants develop their commercial skills. This has been broken down by grade to make it easier for civil servants to find the learning that is right for them and their role.
You can download the pdf which includes links to all the courses and further reading, or use the links below.
Course links
(Note: all courses are on Civil Service Learning which requires you to be logged-in to see course details.)
Suitable for all grades
EO to Grade 6
- Managing contractors
- Successful negotiation skills
- Effective commercial planning and contracting
- Commercial and financial acumen
- Achieving supplier engagement
SCS only
- Commercial skills for leaders
- Contract management for leaders
- Commercial and financial acumen for leaders
General further reading
- Top tips to improve your commercial awareness
- Negotiating skills learning course
- Managing business performance: consulting with experts (workplace learning activity)
- What is a contract?
Further reading for HEO and SEOs
- Contract management standards
- Risk management in procurement
- Managing business performance: stakeholder identification and consultation workbook
Further reading for senior leaders
- IACCM research paper: public vs private sector contracting
- IACCM white paper: basics of relational contracting model
- Review of major contracts across government
- Report of the Laidlaw inquiry
1 comment
Comment by Shauna vulliamy posted on
This is a really useful guide to commercial learning!