Archive for October 2024

Keep the Head Count Down on Proposal Reviews

October 18, 2024 Federal Contracting, Proposal Writing Comments Off on Keep the Head Count Down on Proposal Reviews

Formal “color coded” proposal reviews are frequently overdone and can have a negative an impact on profits. Too often people are taken on billable time and they have nothing to contribute.

Involve just the key people (writers and project people) when the proposal manager and chief technical person sees the need for a review of the draft proposal. Send each person the draft proposal and request that they add content and edit content in the draft proposal itself and do not use track changes. Send the changed draft proposal to the proposal manager before the review meeting. The proposal manager should color code all suggested changes in a draft proposal before the meeting use the new draft as the basis for the meeting. Consider dis-inviting any prospective attendees that do not have time to make comments in the draft proposal.

Evaluate proposals from the government’s perspective and answer theses questions:

  • Have you redounded to Section L with insights and creativity?
  • Is all of your content in sections that will earn evaluation points?
  • Have you broken up the key points in the Executive Summary into sections that earn points.
  • Have you made unsubstantiated sales points and claims?
  • Have you made it easy for the evaluators?
  • Can you reduce your price?

Finish all of your proposal reviews several days before the due date.

Proposal Management – Organize to Win!

October 18, 2024 Federal Contracting, Proposal Writing Comments Off on Proposal Management – Organize to Win!

Amendments

An RFP amendment can throw a proposal out of compliance with a couple of words. Track amendments and filter the words like they were the RFP itself. And then update the proposal outline for any requirement changes.  The consequences of missed requirement changes in an amendment can be financially disastrous and demoralizing.

Organize to Win

The evaluators tell you how they want the proposal to be organized in Section L of the RFP; that’s the way they want it. Don’t dream up your own organization structure because you think it’s better. Your better organization structure can be the kiss of death.

Don’t Write to the Statement of Work

Writers new to proposal writing often think they have to write technical approaches to tell evaluators how you are going to meet all of the work requirements. This is impossible if the statement of work is 200 pages and the page limit for the Technical Approach is 20 pages.

Management Involvement

Proposal writing projects invariably turn into a crisis. Involve top management in an effort to minimize the crisis.

Management typically assigns the project and then goes into hiding; except for the final review on the last day before submission. Management must stay involved in the proposal scheduling and review process and make a focused effort to support proposal managers.

In particular, management needs to make sure the proposal manager is getting the required support from technical writers. Most technical writers hate writing proposals will avoid proposals like the plague. Again, management must stay involved and make sure that technical people know the importance of proposals, acknowledge their efforts, and if possible provide monetary incentives for wins.

Losses Demoralize

Loses are demoralizing; “I worked all weekend and we lost”. The key to minimizing demoralizing loses is to bid wisely.

 

Win Theme Development

October 18, 2024 Federal Contracting, Proposal Writing Comments Off on Win Theme Development

Use an Executive Summary as a tool for win theme development. Write the Executive Summary first using customer insights, your experience with similar work, and contract performance and management insights. Then refine and rewrite it as the proposal progresses.

Again, start the Executive Summary on Day 1 of the proposal project. Many of Fedmarket’s customers say; “we can’t do this.” But you can; it depends on who is writing it; ideally a project person, a unit manager, someone who knows the technology required or the customer. And if you can’t then maybe take a pass on the opportunity.

Break the Executive Summary up, when you think its complete insert all of its content in scored Section L responses if an Executive Summary is not asked for in the RFP (has no evaluation points assigned to it). Move:

  • Technical content into the technical approach
  • Experience points into the experience volume
  • Personnel points into the personnel volume
  • Management points into the management volume

You may have to change the context a bit to make it fit each win theme in the right place.

Try it, it works.