Choose the CRO that can deliver, not simply the one that presents best.
CRO SELECTION SCORECARD
A practical, weighted 40-criterion scorecard and scoring workbook for emerging biopharma teams comparing CRO proposals against the factors that will shape execution, accountability, and trial delivery.
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The proposal is the one thing you know is polished
Most CRO decisions are made with excellent information about pricing and general capability, and very little information about the people who will actually run the study.
The presentation team is not always the delivery team. The comparable experience is not always comparable. The cost is rarely like-for-like. And the questions that determine whether the partnership survives its first hard month, such as who decides, who escalates, what happens when we are the bottleneck, usually go unasked until they are urgent.
A simple framework for a complex decision: How it works
Define your priorities: Weight the criteria that matter most for your program, phase, therapeutic area, geography, and internal capability
Evaluate consistently: Score each potential partner on a shared 1-5 scale using proposal evidence, presentations, due diligence, and reference checks
Make trade-offs visible: See where partners are genuinely differentiated and where apparent strengths may conceal execution risk
Build alignment before award: Use the results to focus stakeholder discussion, document rationale, and identify questions that must be resolved before selection
What you get
40 criteria across five dimensions
A weighted scoring structure
A rating scale with an honest option
Must-pass requirements, scored separately
10 governance and escalation questions
A stakeholder discussion framework
An Excel calculation companion
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