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Instead of looking at preparing proposals as a process, try looking at it as solving problems. A "process" implies steps. Proposal development is reactive, so processes based on mandated steps tend to fail. But solving the problems you will face in preparing a proposal implies the process. The problems you face also imply the goals you should have. Most companies that think they have a proposal process still spend their time solving problems. So looking at those problems in an organized way can

I like to think of it as the “other people” problem. Proposals would be so much easier if you didn’t have to work with other people. If they would just do what you need them to do…   At work we tend to think that working with other people is just a matter of management and leadership. But proposal specialists often (usually?) work with people that they have no direct supervision of. Proposals borrow people. And those people have other priorities.  If the only techniques you have are management a

PropLIBRARY contains a ton of information that can help you solve common business development, lead capture, and proposal problems. We give many solutions away. And some are part of our premium content. The list below is a mixture of links to free content and premium content that's only available with  a finding leads before the RFP is released If you need to fix a broken proposal If you need to be more selective in what you bid If you are writing a proposal even though you don't know the cust

People bring their expectations to work with them. People form expectations while at work. Expectations run in every direction, between every stakeholder. Humans generally do a poor job of communicating them, and an arguably worse job of fulfilling them. It is a wonder that anything ever gets done. We can do better.  What if expectations were communicated more clearly? And accepted? What could we accomplish if we fulfilled all of our expectations for each other? What stands in the way of this? P

Visual communication is more effective than text. Studies show that graphics get read first and lead to faster and better message comprehension. Most proposal specialists know that and seek to use a lot of graphics. They usually start by asking questions like “How many graphics should I have in my proposal and where should they go?” Some don’t get any further because if you don't have the skills needed to create the graphics, it seems difficult and time consuming. Plus it's hard to make it high

Creating proposal graphics can be thought of in two parts. My friend Mike Parkinson of the 24hr Company refers to them as: •    Conceptualization. Figuring out what to communicate visually and what the graphic needs to communicate. •    Rendering. Drawing the graphic. Rendering is where all the artistic skills are required. But conceptualization is where you figure out what should go into the graphic and what the graphic should accomplish. Conceptualization does not require any artistic abilitie

The things you do to win proposals come naturally when you have an effective corporate culture. But if you're encountering win rate stealing friction while doing proposals, it's a sign that your corporate culture is broken. Fixing your corporate culture can help you win proposals. But most companies don't understand what a corporate culture is, let alone how to cultivate an effective one. The good news is that if your leadership focuses on what it takes to win proposals, it can create the founda

The MustWin Process is an approach for capturing leads that require the submission of a proposal. It makes proposal development more efficient, sets expectations, enables progress and quality to be measured, and increases your chances of winning. It focuses on getting the right information and going through the steps to turn it into a winning proposal. The MustWin Process is for those who want to win and realize that a one-size-fits-all fill-in-the-blanks template is not the best way to go about

Companies generally start to embrace a proposal process when the number of people involved grows large enough to become difficult to coordinate. It would be better if they begin to embrace a process as soon as they start caring about their win rate.  The primary benefit of a proposal process isn't improved coordination. It's an improved win rate. A process that doesn't improve your win rate is a bad process. A process that improves your win rate but fails in every other way is a good process tha

What if I told you that on a 50-page proposal for services provided worldwide, due in just 7 days, we scheduled not one but two major reviews, and that we had the Red Team draft ready in less than 36 hours with only three writers... Want to know how we pulled that off and delivered an outstanding proposal? We started by using the Proposal Content Planning methodology we've been recommending and refining for two decades. The size and complexity of this proposal has convinced me once and for all t

We all dream of winning it big. If you want your business to win it big, there is something you need to master that’s more important that finding big leads. You have to create an organization that can do things bigger than yourself. What separates a large proposal from a small proposal is not the value or the size of the project. It’s the number of people involved in preparing the proposal. A proposal with one author is a straightforward production. A proposal with multiple contributors is a cha

When you are alone you have to work within your own limitations. What you know is all you know.  What you can write is all that’s going into the proposal. What you can do before the deadline defines your standard of quality. It’s not about winning or creating a great proposal. It’s about whether you can complete the proposal at all. Here are some tips that won’t help you win, but they might help you get your proposals submitted. What is the minimally viable proposal submission? The gap between t

Selling in writing is about influencing the decision process and the decision maker with what you put on paper. Procurements that require a proposal are not impulse purchases. When the customer will make their decision based on the proposal you submit, you need to sell in writing to influence the outcome in your favor. A salesperson has influence in person, but if they don’t carry that over to what gets put in writing they have no influence over closing the actual sale. Influence in person vs in

Proposal themes are defined in many different and not very helpful ways. Try googling it. How does someone new to proposals write a “concept” that gets “woven throughout the proposal” to “call attention to the benefits” you offer? Definitions like that can't be acted upon. Because themes are defined in such a nebulous way, they often end up being overly-broad claims of greatness that do nothing to persuade the customer. When I review proposals I often see unsubstantiated slogans that sound like

I remember early in my career working on a proposal with someone who was complaining that it “didn’t sell!” Unfortunately, he couldn’t say why. It turns out that what drives selling in writing is how well your writing reflects the right win strategies and themes, and whether they are written from the customer’s perspective. There are a lot of things to consider and approaches to take when thinking about which themes you should use in a particular proposal. We’ve taken those considerations and tu

If you tell lies like those below, you hurt your credibility. Even when you tell them with good intent, they still hurt your credibility. Even if you believe them, they hurt your credibility. Yet it seems like everyone does it. And if you tell the same lies that they do, your proposal will lack differentiators. You'll all be the same, lacking credibility while feeling superior. Even though people know that customers only buy from people they trust, they tell lies like these that the customer can

In most companies, proposal development is the most immature part of the company. But they don’t realize it because they’ve bought into myths that enable them to think all that work they’ve put in amounts to more sophistication than it really does. Often what they do is different from what they say they do. Because of the myths that people have bought into, management practices that would not be tolerated in any other part of the company become expected as the norm in proposal management. These

Recently I talked to a government employee who was transitioning to the private sector. He asked me if I could recommend any particular contractor because they all sound the same. I thought of all the articles I’ve written about good and bad proposal writing habits and the things I see over and over again when I review proposals for companies and realized it’s true. If the problems I see are in most companies' proposals, then to the customer, those companies must all sound the same.  Thinking ab

Obsessing over the deadline and resource pressure that defines most proposal efforts can make you forget about other important things and limit your ability to maximize your win rate — not to mention it can also lead to total burnout. It’s a curious dilemma and a bit counter-intuitive, but obsessing over getting your proposal done can help you lose. So take a moment and put away your deadline and resource pressures. Take a moment to think about the purpose of it all. Because the purpose is more

Definition: Proposal triage is a best practice for when you have too many proposals, get a late start, have an ineffective or immature proposal process, or have a proposal that is broken. It is similar to the concept of medical triage, in which doctors categorize patients to decide who gets treated first, based on factors such as the likelihood of recovery, the severity of their issue, and whether the patient can wait for treatment. Proposal triage is based on prioritizing corrective action base