Call for tender: External Project Management Support for Interreg Baltic Sea Region Project “BSR Cultural Pearls”

The CBSS Secretariat, in its capacity as lead partner of Interreg Baltic Sea Region Project No C004 “BSR Cultural Pearls” opens a call for tender for Project Management Support covering a period of up to 35 months (31 January 2026).

The Project Management Support entails the following tasks:

  1. Strategic project coordination support
  2. Operational project management support
  3. Monitoring and reporting support

All information on the tasks and on proposals submission can be found in the Terms of reference here (Annex 1).

We also ask interested parties to familiarise themselves with the project through the project website and the project application – available upon request via e-mail to [email protected].

Interested candidates must submit their proposal via e-mail, no later than 20 April 2023 (date of sending) to the CBSS Secretariat at the following addresses: [email protected]. Proposals sent after this deadline will not be taken into account.

The CBSS Secretariat will choose the successful service provider within two weeks from the deadline. Project Management Support activities are to be started at the earliest possible date in May 2023.

For further queries please contact project coordinator Felix Schartner Giertta at [email protected] no later than 15 April 2023.

In the interests of transparency and non-discrimination, all questions received will be anonymised and publicly answered on the website as soon as possible. Inquiries by phone will not be answered.

Annexes:

Annex 1 – Terms of reference

Q & A

Question 1: […] whether the chosen service provider is expected to also join transnational project meetings for “Supporting and facilitating working groups” (building block B.)? And if yes, how many meetings are we supposed to calculate (travel costs and man days) for?

Answer: We don’t currently foresee that travel will be necessary for the consultant. Supporting and facilitating working groups should be understood primarily as support in the design of processes or workshops, and to a limited extent may entail the facilitation of meetings in an online format. However, we would like to reserve the possibility for travel and ask the tender to budget for 2 single-person, one-night-stay trips annually, which if unused can be periodically redistributed into additional working hours per the hourly rate suggested.

Question 2: Regarding objective, scope and task (chapters 2, 3 and 4 of the Terms of Reference): Our understanding is that the need is primarily focused on supporting the project management and coordination. This includes planning, monitoring and overall quality assurance of the process. Also, to some extent, operational facilitation within the working activities. Though, in chapter 6 (“Requirements”) more specific experience and knowledge is described as “an advantage”. This regards e g community development, social innovation and the Cultural/Creative sector. This is thus additional skills with respect to the prime need for project management/coordination. In what way are these expert skills valued in the assignment, i.e. How should we consider and plan for this in the offer?

Answer: Thematic experience and skills will not be used as the primary basis for selection, but can be used to distinguish between tenders that are similar in price and quality, relating to the main specifications in section 3 and 4 of the Terms of reference.

Question 3: Chapter 5 – Timeframe estimates: Can we approximate the mentioned expectation of 100 working days with approx 800 working hours? Is this a base foundation during the possible assigned period we can calculate on?

Answer: 800 working hours is a reasonable approximation of 100 working days.