Take your proposal from good to great in 30 minutes

Thirty minutes is all the time you need to redirect the writing of a mediocre proposal and put it on a clear path to victory. In this article, I’ll explain how to use this simple yet effective technique.

Proposal mediocrity

We had just finished a Red Team review on a typical 100-page proposal. The proposal manager instructed the review team on how to do an effective Red Team review. The reviewers had done an excellent job reviewing the proposal and documenting their comments electronically.

They briefed the proposal team, and it was clear what needed to be done. While the proposal team could easily turn the comments in 48 hours and make the repairs needed to the proposal, there was a sense that the proposal just didn’t come across as a winner.

The proposal team knew they had done an admirable job building a compliant proposal outline that was easily traceable to the RFP instructions and evaluation criteria. The review team confirmed that the proposal text was, for the most part, compliant with the RFP. They pointed out where additional content was needed and where text and graphics could be improved, and they provided additional content that would help make the proposal more responsive to the requirements.

Yet, the team still had an uneasy feeling that it takes more to win than building a compliant, responsive bid.

We have talked in previous articles about the 7 factors we use to build winning proposals; the first 2 of these factors are compliance and responsiveness. But these alone are not sufficient to win…

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Email your comments to me at RLohfeld@LohfeldConsulting.com.

This article was originally published July 28, 2014 in WashingtonTechnology.com.

Lohfeld Consulting

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