TERMS OF REFERENCE
Individual Contractor for BIGD Website Development March 2022
BACKGROUND
BRAC Institute of Governance & Development (BIGD) launched a newwebsitein March 2020, with the purpose of making the organization’s research work and resources more accessible to stakeholders. The aim was to create an efficient, engaging, and user-friendly platform for strategic communication, information sharing, and knowledge management.
The primary users of the site are researchers, academics, graduate students, development practitioners, public officials, journalists, and donors.
Based upon critical feedback from users on the website’s design, functionality, and ease of use, elements of the website were redesigned and updated in April 2021. To further enhance design and functionality, BIGD is now planning to carry out a third round of upgrades.
OBJECTIVE
To redesign and update particular sections and overall elements and features of the website to better serve the needs of primary users. The limitations of the current iteration were identified by feedback and requests from key stakeholders. The requirements proposed in this TOR are intended to address those issues and also further enhance the form and function of the website.
BIGD is inviting proposals from qualified consultants experienced in designing web solutions with excellent look-and-feel and functionality, to make the website content more organized, attractive, and easy to use.
SCOPE OF WORK
The consultant will need to improve the layout of the different sections and elements of the website within the current design characteristics of the website. Moreover, the consultant will need to ensure improved user experience by improving the search engine and site loading speeds, among other issues. Finally, the consultant will need to ensure improved content management system in the backend.
Examples (specified further in tasklist):https://ed.stanford.edu/,https://www.poverty-action.org/, https://lesley.edu/,https://www.ids.ac.uk/
DELIVERABLES
1. Improved LAYOUT OF SECTIONS AND ELEMENTS within current design characteristics of the website
- Keeping the existing design characteristics, add option to customize (disable/delete/add) tabs under each website section
- Main menu changes:Add dropdown for Publications menu item; add a “View All” hyperlinked text forTopicsandProgramsredirecting to their respective landing pages
- Homepage: Redesign layout with improved functionalities and flexibility of customization
- Academicssection: Full overhaul of layout, with added features and easy navigation for prospective students
- Publicationssection: Updated presentation of BIGD publications that is visually uniform ACROSS the website in order to improve navigation and search; must also allow backend customization of the publication data
- Peoplepage: New option (icon link or minimal sub-section) to add links to researcher’s external profile, e.g. personal website, Google Scholar profile, Twitter link, etc.).Autogenerated list of publications to be displayed on each researcher’s profile (in addition to op-eds and blogs)
- Eventspage: Change presentation of date/calendar; option to sort events by date
- Blogs, Media, About us, Partners, Programs: redesigned layout
- Work with us:Disable or enable online job application form and apply now button, edit online application form fields as needed, job application data to be displayed in a downloadable excel or Google sheet form
- Overall: Ensure a consistent visual language on the website by introducing fixed styles in templates and ensuring consistency infonts,formatting,icons,
images,hyperlinks, etc.
- The above changes must be made while alsopreserving the existing branding and overall look and feelof the website
2. Improved USER EXPERIENCE
- Speed: Improved site load times—optimize for low bandwidth users (making necessary adjustments to code, reducingunnecessary plugins, optimizing PDFs and images, etc.)
- Search: Improved search function—
● Updated search layout to improve user experience
● Easy to navigate way to present search results
● Sorting option for search result
● Search results shouldinclude text from within uploaded documents e.g PDFs
● Show suggestions/autocomplete while typing in the search bar
● Search results include all combinations of the words in the search string
● Search results include both if there are variations in spelling, e.g.
“program” vs “programme”
- Browser compatibility: The site must be compatible with the current versions of popular web browsers (Firefox, Safari and Chrome), as well as Internet Explorer version 6 and onwards
- Responsive design and platform compatibility: The site must be responsive acrossandroid / iOSdevices (mobile and tablet), as well as desktop computers with different screen dimensions
- Website should befree of bugs and glitches
- Redundant or outdated pages:All redundant (example) or outdated pages (example) to be removed or redirected to relevant pages
- Fix the issue ofbroken links
- Make website moreaccessible for visually impaired users(if possible within the scope of current project)
3. Improved CONTENT MANAGEMENT SYSTEM
- Make the process of editing content and changing layouts easier for admins managing the CMS
- CMS must be upgraded to the latest andmost stable versionof the current CMS (WordPress) applying all available security patches. Consultant(s) may recommend another CMS if there is a proven alternative that will be better able to meet BIGD’s requirements, but the primary preference is to update the current system
- CMS database needs to be made leaner;archived pages/functions to be removed
- Include in the CMS the option to add multiple users and user groups with different levels of edit access: admins should be able to track editsby date and user
WORK PLAN
Breakdown of deliverables into a list of specific activities/tasks:link WORK SETTING
Duration of the assignment
The duration of the project will be four months. The website will be LIVE and fully ready to use by 15 August 2022, before which all requirements—including the development of web sections;
site testing; and final approval by BIGD—will be fulfilled.
The project timeline is provided in the next section.
Briefing/debriefing arrangements
An initial meeting will be scheduled with the BIGD Communications team in charge, to brief the Consultant(s) on the necessary background information needed to develop the required
deliverables.
Weekly follow-ups will be held with the Consultant(s) to—
(a) Brief about upcoming week’s tasks
(b) Review and debrief previous week’s tasks
Reporting relationships and identification of responsibility for assessment of outputs The Consultant(s) will work in close consultation with the Senior Officer of Communications and Knowledge Management, BIGD, who will follow up on project activity and will assess the output and fulfillment of deliverables, under the supervision of the Head of Communications and Knowledge Management, BIGD.
Please note that the list of activities required to fulfill the project deliverables is not exhaustive, and it may be modified after a thorough inventory and further discussion with the contracted vendor.
Assessment of output
BIGD will evaluate the quality of outputs using a limited scale in-house testing among our own employees, and using a set of standard benchmarks that will be shared with the vendor.
Necessary support
BIGD will provide access to the current website code and content, including the CMS, online documents, plugins, and additional files, as appropriate.
PROJECT TIMELINE & PAYMENT SCHEDULE
Deliverable Deadline Payable Amount of
Contracted Project Cost The content layout of the website
is updated in line with specified requirements
15 May, 2022 40%
The Content Management System is upgraded to reflect the
requested fixes to the
management system and website backend
15 July, 2022 20%
The user experience is satisfactorily enhanced as specified in the proposal
15 August, 2022 40%
REQUIRED SKILLS & EXPERIENCE
Applicants should demonstrate and provide examples of previous experience in the performance of similar services:
- Be a reputable firm with at least 3 years of experience designing visually appealing and user-friendly websites
- Have relevant experience and comprehensive understanding of - Content Management Systems (CMS), particularly WordPress - Have experience in database management, especially MYSQL
- Expertise in the below scripting and coding languages and standards: PHP, AJAX, Java Script, HTML (including version ), CSS (including version ).
- Expertise in the use and configuration of the below applications: Word Press CMS, MySQL Database, Apache web server, Experience with other related applications is an advantage. The lead developer is an expert in the use and configuration of the below products and techniques: Search engine optimization, Google Webmaster tools, Google developer tools, Mobile device adaptation.
- Experience with the CMS integration of responsive CSS and graphic design of which at least one year is specific to WordPress CMS. The graphical integrator is an expert in the below scripting and coding languages and standards: HTML (including version 5), CSS (including version 3), PHP, Java Script (including JQuery).
- Have a broad knowledge of current web development technologies and design tools in the field, as well as new software and other web programming languages and programs - Have decent knowledge of recent trends in graphic design and online video publishing - Demonstrate the ability to create innovative and visually appealing design
- Knowledge and experience in design thinking and/or human-centred design will be an added advantage
- Experience of developing website for non-government agencies and academic institution will be an added advantage
- Vendor needs to have at least one existing running website in Bangladesh of either a non-government or corporate organization
PROPOSAL EVALUATION & SELECTION
Apart from demonstrating the experience requirements outlined in the previous section, the proposal should—
(i) clearly establish an understanding of the services required, including the activities needed to fulfill the project requirements listed above
(ii) describe how the company engages with its clients: what processes they follow and requirements they have regarding timelines, rates, requests, sign-off and payments (iii) provide work samples of a similar standard
(iv) include CVs of the assigned team (programmers and designers), the timetable, and the financial proposal
The proposed fee for the consultation—the project budget—should indicate the breakdown of all costs by activity.
The proposal will be evaluated according to the following criteria:
- Demonstrated understanding of the assignment: 20%
- Experience and profile of the company: 30%
- Professional capacity and experience of assigned team members: 40%
- Pricing: 10%
Please submit proposals to [email protected] with the following subject line: “Individual Contractor for BIGD Website Development”
