Writing the understanding of the mandate: what the evaluator looks for

What the section has to prove

Just one thing, really. You read this particular call for tenders, and you see what is at stake for this client beyond the list of tasks.

A summary does little for the committee. What it wants to see are signs that the firm has spotted what will make the mandate hard: a tight deadline, data that doesn't exist yet, stakeholders who want different things, a regulatory constraint, a previous attempt that went wrong. Those signs let it predict how you will work.

The exact list of what it looks for is often written down. For a public body, the tender documents must specify, for each criterion in the grid, the elements of quality required to reach the acceptable level of performance. If the "Understanding of the mandate" criterion lists the context, the objectives, the issues, the constraints and the risks, you have the outline of your section. Follow it in that order, under those headings.

Four ways to lose points

Paraphrase

"The City wishes to retain the services of a firm to carry out a traffic study in the north sector." The committee knows, because it wrote that. An understanding that restates the tender documents paragraph by paragraph shows you can read, and nothing more.

Generalities

"Municipalities face growing challenges in sustainable mobility." The sentence is true of every municipality, so it says nothing about this one, and a competitor could sign it as is.

An issue with no consequence

Naming a risk without saying what you will do about it leaves the evaluator halfway. "The traffic counts date from 2019" becomes useful when the next sentence says how your method deals with it.

The forgotten element

If the grid expects five elements and you cover four, the fifth is missing, however well written the other four are. It is also the easiest loss to avoid, with one reread against the grid.

A five-step method

1. Copy the expected elements the grid lists for this criterion. They become your subheadings.
2. For each element, note what the tender documents say, then what more you understand: an implication, a tension between two requirements, a risk, a link with another part of the documents.
3. Tie each issue to a specific choice in your methodology, with a cross-reference to the section where it is handled.
4. Point out what the tender documents don't say, and the assumption you are making.
5. Reread sentence by sentence, asking whether each one could appear in another proposal. If so, cut it or make it specific.

If a point remains unclear, ask during the question period set in the tender documents, through the channel they name. The answer will be published as an addendum for all tenderers, and you can rely on it.

An example, before and after

The mandate is fictional. A regional county municipality of 40,000 residents is revising its residual materials management plan. The tender documents set the filing of the draft plan for March and call for a characterization of materials over two seasons.

The "after" version is not more elegant. It is a few lines longer, and each line gives the evaluator something to score: the calendar tension, the method's answer, the ambiguity cleared up in writing. The "before" version could have been sent to any regional county municipality.

How Clarido does it

Clarido reads the tender documents and their addenda, and draws from them the requirements, the evaluation grid and an analysis of the mandate, each with its quotations. The first draft of the understanding of the mandate is written from that reading and from the past mandates you keep in the plan, plus those done for the same client, in the same pass as the rest of the proposal, so one section does not contradict another.

An issue your documents cannot support is marked "[À fournir par la firme : …]" ("to be provided by the firm") instead of being filled with a generic sentence. The marker is highlighted in the editor, where you can replace it with the information directly, and it stays highlighted in the Word export until someone fills it.

Length and placement

Respect the page limit when the tender documents set one, and put the section where the grid expects it. If the understanding is worth 10% of the score and the methodology 30%, don't give them the same space, even if the understanding is more pleasant to write.

Also avoid repeating in the methodology what the understanding already said. A cross-reference is enough, and the committee will see that the two sections hold together.

What the evaluator keeps

When scoring, each committee member rereads the list of expected elements and looks for where each one is handled in your text. A section that follows that list, under the same headings, saves them the work. They won't thank you for it, but they will score what they found without having to look.

Sources

• Regulation respecting certain service contracts of public bodies, CQLR c. C-65.1, r. 4 (updated to July 1, 2026), Schedule 2, s. (2) (elements of quality required for the acceptable level of performance, specified for each criterion in the tender documents). legisquebec.gouv.qc.ca/en/document/rc/C-65.1,%20r.%204
• Act respecting contracting by municipal bodies, CQLR c. C-65.01 (updated to August 12, 2026), s. 43, para. 2 (weighting and evaluation methods described in the tender documents). legisquebec.gouv.qc.ca/en/document/lc/C-65.01