How one man is getting Dutch procurement professionals to accurately report definitive contract values

While attending the Open Procurement Event in Amsterdam in 2022, Richard Lennartz, Director of the Netherlands Government Procurement Agency (Rijksinkoopsamenwerking, RIS), learned that the Netherlands was trailing in reporting definitive contract values and ranked among the lowest-performing EU Member States. The information spurred him to investigate further and, after spending roughly 40 hours and receiving some assistance from TenderNed, he managed to reduce the volume of erroneous contract values by 67%. Below is a glimpse into his unconventional yet successful strategy.

Commercial confidentiality?

More than a year earlier, Lennartz read in a LinkedIn post by Professor Fredo Schotanus that the Netherlands was falling short when it came to accurately reporting contract values. Hearing this message once again at the Open Procurement Event, Lennartz decided to contact TenderNed, the Dutch government’s online tendering system, to ask how the RIS went about reporting the value of contracts. 

Analysis of the data indicated there was scope for improvement. “My first reaction was one of surprise. I thought we were doing fine,” Lennartz says. By analyzing the data, Lennartz discovered that two procurement teams were not following the process. “Why not? There must be a reason. It turned out that the process was not being adhered to properly, and that teams at times cited commercial confidentiality as a reason for not accurately reporting contract values.” 

Closer examination revealed that commercial confidentiality was being interpreted too broadly. Adherence to processes seemed to be negotiable. 

At least half of contract values were inaccurate

At another data conference in 2023, the Netherlands again ranked poorly in reporting definitive contract values. Lennartz could not hide his frustration: “I’m a strong advocate of open government. Disclosing contract award details to the public builds trust in government among citizens. It makes clear what we spend taxpayers’ money on and how that benefits them as well as the country. Transparency is a key aspect of a public official’s professional skill-set, and not just in a positive setting.”

Lennartz decided to contact TenderNed again, requesting a detailed analysis of the Netherlands’ public procurement performance in reporting definitive contract values. TenderNed analyzed the previous year’s figures and found that in 2022, at least half of contracting authorities regularly failed to accurately report the contract value, despite it being a legal requirement to give the definitive contract value in the announcement of the award of the contract.

Unconventional strategy

“Without actionable insights, meaningful change is impossible,” Lennartz continues. His next logical step, therefore, was to contact underperforming central government organizations directly by email. However, this only reached a fraction of public organizations in the Netherlands, leading Lennartz to go public. He decided to adopt an accountability approach of naming-and-shaming and naming-and-complimenting through LinkedIn. 

Lennartz’s choice of this unconventional strategy was deliberate. “I aimed to keep things straightforward. You can achieve a lot through a few practical steps. While forming a working group is the conventional route, it can take years before any tangible results emerge.”

In his first LinkedIn post about contract values, Lennartz came clean about RIS’s performance 12 months earlier. “Next, I began posting organization performance lists, starting with the worst 10 performers and expanding the list to 20, then 30 and beyond. I focused first on the largest contracting authorities and progressively included others by size, and so on down the scale.”

A common response across the contracting authorities, regardless of size, was one of surprise: “I had no idea our performance was so poor”. The reaction was all too familiar: back in 2022, Lennartz too was unaware that his organization was underperforming on this front. 

Man on a mission

Over a period of 18 months, Lennartz released a list every two weeks, highlighting not only contracting authorities with room for improvement, but also those organizations that had already achieved measurable progress. “For my posts, I utilise the public tender data which is freely available on tenderned.nl/analyse. TenderNed were very helpful in explaining, upon request, how I could use and interpret the data.”

To strengthen the impact of his posts, Lennartz went a step further by reaching out directly through personal messages to individuals in his network who work at organizations flagged for underperformance. These included organizations where Lennartz has few or no connections. He used LinkedIn to identify professionals working in the procurement departments of these organizations: “I began proactively expanding my network. Where LinkedIn failed to identify the right people for certain organizations, I turned to alternative channels, such as the Trade Register of the Chamber of Commerce.” 

Lennartz’s outreach extended beyond procurement professionals to include local councillors and mayors, who also received a personal message with a link to the post in which their organization was mentioned. “I timed these messages for moments when they were likely to be in transit, such as in the car with a driver. This strategy proved effective, as I often received timely responses.”

Commitment

The result

Lennartz focuses on European tenders where both a contract announcement and award have been published. Contracts awarded using a dynamic purchasing system or negotiated procedures without publication of a contract notice, for example, are disregarded. Investing roughly 40 hours over a period of 18 months, Lennartz achieved the following results:

• The percentage of awarded contracts with a value of €1 (or less) decreased by a factor of 2-3. This decrease is evident across all types of contracting authorities, but is particularly marked among central government organizations. Whereas previously, up to 40% of awarded contracts were reported with a contract value of €1, this now occurs only occasionally.
• In 2024, 125 fewer organizations reported awarding contracts at a value of €1 at least once compared to 2022.
• The percentage of contract values between €1 and €300 (contract values indicating an hourly rate rather than the total contract value) also decreased during this period. This seems to indicate increased awareness concerning which contract value to report.
• Encouragingly, Q1 2025 delivered better figures than 2024.

Further improvement

Despite this progress, the Netherlands has yet to distinguish itself in the accurate reporting of definitive contract values. As a result, Lennartz will continue publishing lists for the foreseeable future. The combined procurement volume – some €116 billion (US$130 billion) in 2024 – empowers procurement professionals and policymakers to challenge the market, create momentum and accelerate developments. As he continues to drive these changes, Lennartz’ motivation remains clear: reinforcing public trust in the government.

Photo credit: Rijksinkoopsamenwerking
Translation: Taalcentrum-VU