Objectives

The primary objective of this tender is to engage a professional service provider to deliver research and advisory services that will facilitate the transition of Rand Water’s Finance division into a future-ready, insights-driven, and digitally enabled operating model. The provider will offer strategic guidance across various domains including financial transformation, digital finance, risk management, governance, ERP optimisation, talent professionalisation, and more, to support the achievement of finance mission-critical priorities.

Scope

The scope of work includes:

• Providing specialised, on-demand strategic guidance across multiple finance domains such as financial transformation, digital finance, risk, governance, ERP optimisation, and talent development.
• Supporting deployment and change management, finance technology portfolio optimisation, and guidance on finance tools (e.g., planning, budgeting, reporting, automation, ERP systems like Oracle).
• Delivering research tools, maturity models, peer insights, and cost optimisation frameworks.
• Assisting Finance from strategy through execution on mission-critical priorities, enabling faster and smarter decision-making.
• Advising on AI adoption in finance, metrics, storytelling, management reporting, cost management, growth planning, M&A, sustainability reporting, and fintech roadmaps.
• Supporting talent development, professionalisation, and building a skilled finance workforce.
• Providing management research, diagnostics, and access to research portals and toolkits.
• Building a finance technology roadmap aligned with organisational objectives.
• Conducting management research and valuation diagnostics across sectors for mergers and acquisitions.
• Ensuring the provider is an established research organisation with a client base of over 5,000 enterprises and providing two user licences.

Technical Requirements

The technical requirements include:

• Demonstrated experience in working with finance transformation projects aligned to public sector mandates.
• Provision of detailed references, case studies, and evidence of past performance in similar projects.
• Capability to deliver research tools, frameworks, diagnostics, and advisory services as specified.
• Availability of relevant research content, tools, and frameworks specific to finance transformation and digital finance.
• Provision of a detailed project plan with milestones, schedules, and resource allocation.
• Capacity to support the development of finance technology roadmaps and strategic initiatives.
• Ability to support the building of a skilled finance workforce through competency frameworks and upskilling pathways.
• Compliance with the requirement of an established research organisation with a client base exceeding 5,000 enterprises.

Skills Requirements

The skills and expertise required from the service provider include:

• Extensive experience in financial transformation, digital finance, and strategic advisory services.
• Proven track record supporting large public sector or similarly scaled organisations in finance strategy and execution.
• Expertise in ERP systems, finance technology tools, and automation solutions (e.g., Oracle, CaseWare).
• Strong research capabilities, including access to research portals, maturity models, and benchmarking tools.
• Capability to deliver management research, diagnostics, and best practice frameworks.
• Skills in change management, deployment strategies, and stakeholder engagement.
• Expertise in talent development, competency modelling, and workforce upskilling.
• Ability to develop and implement finance roadmaps linked to organisational objectives.
• Strong project management skills to deliver milestones within specified timeframes.
• Experience in providing advisory services on AI adoption, metrics, storytelling, and sustainability reporting.