Lessons Learned From Managing Your First Government Proposal

Everyone remembers the first time they produced a proposal. In my case, I wasn’t a proposal professional—I was a new project manager, managing a team of 25 more junior staff members at a government facility. None of us had any experience developing proposals beyond updating our resumes, and we could expect little help from our company. However, one thing was very clear: if we lost the competition, we might also lose our jobs. That’s when extreme self-preservation kicked in. 

That first proposal experience remains one of the most useful lessons of my career. The pressure forced my team to build discipline from scratch, and the lessons we learned that year still apply to capture and proposal efforts today.

Lesson 1: Do Your Homework

We asked our Vice President for a copy of the old request for proposal (RFP), proposal, and samples of previous proposals written by the company. After giving us the document, the VP told us to expect competition, noted that we’d need a good reason for the customer to pick us, and wished us luck. We researched the customer’s budget, spending patterns, and dependencies, as well as potential competitors and what they might offer.

Lesson 2: Figure Out What the Customer Wants

We started with a frank discussion with our Contact Officer’s Representative (COR) to determine what she wanted on the next contract. We also queried the Contracting Officer, other government leads, the user community, and others involved in the procurement process. Our intelligence was distilled into one fact: the government could either hire more government staff to do our job or continue our contract if we offered better value, higher quality, better reporting, and a lower price.

Lesson 3: Huddle, Brainstorm, and Strategize

My team met to identify why the government should pick us. We put together a commonsense plan to demonstrate better value, greater efficiency, the highest quality levels, and more insightful reporting. As project manager, I didn’t want to reduce headcount, so I identified additional work (still within the scope of contract) that would save the customer money across the period of performance.

Lesson 4: Manage the Proposal Like a Project Deliverable

I shared our approach with the COR, key agency leads, and Contracting Officer, which they bought into. The entire team then started a massive mission of collecting data points to support our strategy, updated their resumes, and signed commitment letters.  

Lesson 5: Write a Clear and Compelling Proposal Devoid of Fluff

As I mentioned previously, none of us had any proposal writing experience. However, we were experienced in writing technical documents for the government customer. As we developed our approach, we tried to answer the seven questions of journalism (who, what, where, when, why, and how) and keep the tone straightforward (because we weren’t used to writing persuasive documents); we substantiated everything with compelling facts.

We read each other’s work and made iterative suggestions for improvements. Our VP also reviewed the final proposal and made a few minor changes. Finally, we worked with a desktop publisher to produce it and handed it off to contracts for submission.

Conclusion

We won the competition, and I attribute our win to a fear of losing; with so much at stake, we were all determined to do whatever it took to win the contract. However, not every team left to figure it out for themselves will be so lucky. If you are writing your first proposal (or could just use some seasoned experts in your corner), consider contacting Lohfeld Consulting to help you navigate the road to winning pursuits.

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Deepen your capture and proposal expertise with these Lohfeld resources:

• Capture proposal lessons learned – and then live them! Winning your first proposal is only the beginning. Here, we explain how to formalize a debrief process so every lesson learned strengthens your next capture and proposal effort instead of getting lost after submission.

• Why Proposal Reviews Fail and How to Fix Them: Lohfeld Consulting’s latest survey data reveals why final reviews falter, from vague content to weak value propositions. We show proposal managers how to fix the gaps before the next Red Team convenes.

• Master Capture Management for Ultimate Victory Now: Before you even get to proposal development, capture management sets the foundation for a win. This roundup curates Lohfeld’s best guidance on building the capture discipline that your first proposal team will depend on.

By Brenda Crist, Vice President at Lohfeld Consulting Group, MPA, CPP APMP Fellow

Lohfeld Consulting Group has proven results specializing in helping companies create winning captures and proposals. As the premier capture and proposal services consulting firm focused exclusively on government markets, we provide expert assistance to government contractors in Capture Planning and Strategy, Proposal Management and Writing, Capture and Proposal Process and Infrastructure, and Training. In the last 3 years, we’ve supported over 550 proposals winning more than $170B for our clients—including the Top 10 government contractors. Lohfeld Consulting Group is your “go-to” capture and proposal source! Start winning by contacting us at www.lohfeldconsulting.com and join us on LinkedIn, Facebook, and YouTube^(TM).