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Kickoff meetings can help get everyone on the same page, with the same set of expectations The Proposal Manager should determine the schedule, agenda, and goals for the kickoff meeting. The Proposal Manager should coordinate with the Capture Manager, Executive Sponsor, and other key stakeholders prior to the meeting, and then lead the meeting when it is time. Kickoff meetings are held to announce the start of the proposal.  At the kickoff meeting you may:

You should make a conscious decision whether a pursuit is worth investing in Think about the price of continued investment and not what you have already spent. Discipline is required to “no bid” opportunities that are a bad match, not worth pursuing, or simply questionable. The burden should be on justifying pursuit of the opportunity, and not on cancelling it. Deciding whether to bid an opportunity is not just a matter of guessing how much mone

If we had to pick one thing to change that would have the most impact on an organization’s ability to win, it would be how they approach bid/no bid decisions. If you think of them as just being about deciding whether to bid, you’re missing a tremendous opportunity, because they can have a much greater impact on how you bid, than just on if you bid. Do you know what percentage of bids you drop at each stage or do you never drop anything? Do the things you bid reinforce your strateg

Making effective bid decisions: Every pursuit progress review should be considered a “Bid/No Bid review.” Bid decisions should be about return on investment and not gambling. At each step, the decision should be whether to commit the resources required to get to the next decision point. You can't accurate predict your chances of winning, but you can assess whether you have met the conditions required to bid with a competitive advantage.

If you complete all of your opportunity readiness reviews but the RFP does not come out on time, you should put a monitoring program into place. Your plans are based on the earliest anticipated RFP release. But what if it gets delayed or comes out later than that? The Business Developer and Capture Manager should take advantage of that time. The Executive Sponsor should set up a schedule (weekly, bi-weekly, monthly?) to review the status. Suggestions for what to monitor while you are wai

The MustWin Process will not break if you start late. In fact, it tells you exactly what you need to do to get caught up. Regardless of how much time is available, you still need to identify, assess, and achieve what it will take to win. Whether you can achieve it depends on how much time is left after you've identified and assessed it. The MustWin Process accelerates these steps by providing the questions you need to answer and what you need to do. The rea

A Strategic Plan, in addition to identifying markets and targets, also defines the high-level positioning for your company. Unless it gets ignored. Most proposals are conducted without any consideration of the strategic plan, and all of the positioning elements like win strategies and themes are re-invented in isolation. Sometimes people who have read the strategic plan try to keep it in mind. The list of questions, goals, and actions items that the Readiness Review methodology uses gives

Readiness Reviews are a methodology we invented to ensure that the pre-RFP process delivers the information you need to write the winning proposal. They do this by making better use of the time available (whatever that ends up being) between when you identify a lead and when the RFP will come out. Readiness Reviews prompt people with what to do and provide a means to track progress and even measure effectiveness. They make the pre-RFP pursuit less of some kind of mysterious art and more of a sci

The Capture Manager is responsible for assessing the intelligence collected by the Business Development Manager and turning into the win strategies necessary to win the opportunity. The last Readiness Review is conducted in two parts, one completed by the Business Development Manager and the assessment completed by the Capture Manager. The completion of the last Readiness Review also completes the hand-off from the Business Development Manager having the lead role for the pursuit, and the Captur

The following scoring sheet summarizes the questions to be answered, action items to be accomplished, and goals to be achieved for this review. Each one should be assessed to determine if the pursuit is on track to be ready to win at RFP release.   Question, Action Item, or Goal Guidance Score Opportunity Intel Do you know the final scope/customer requirements? Has anything changed? Time is running out to take corrective acti

The following scoring sheet summarizes the questions to be answered, action items to be accomplished, and goals to be achieved for this review. Each one should be assessed to determine if the pursuit is on track to be ready to win at RFP release.   Question, Action Item, or Goal Guidance Score Opportunity Intel Describe the scope/customer requirements in detail. What do you anticipate will be included or excluded? Include eve

The following scoring sheet summarizes the questions to be answered, action items to be accomplished, and goals to be achieved for this review. Each one should be assessed to determine if the pursuit is on track to be ready to win at RFP release.   Question, Action Item, or Goal Guidance Score Opportunity Intel Are you sure about the scope/customer requirements? The scope can change as the customer looks for consensus, feasib

The following scoring sheet summarizes the questions to be answered, action items to be accomplished, and goals to be achieved for this review. Each one should be assessed to determine if the pursuit is on track to be ready to win at RFP release.     Question, Action Item, or Goal Guidance Score Opportunity Intel What is the scope of the opportunity? What does the customer require? Include everything necessary to estimate the

Readiness Reviews are where the measuring of progress takes place. Without them, progress is uncertain, and you will probably find yourself unprepared at RFP release. The Executive Sponsor is responsible for performing the Readiness Reviews.  The goal of the Readiness Reviews is to track progress towards being ready for RFP release. In performing the reviews, you should do more than simply assess any deficiencies. Wherever possible, you should identify the

Within the CapturePlanning.com MustWin Process we measure progress and quality against what it will take to win.  During the critical pre-RFP phase of the pursuit, we use Readiness Reviews to ensure measurable progress towards discovering what it will take to win. Readiness Reviews bring structure to the pre-RFP phase of pursuit and help ensure that you arrive at RFP release and begin the proposal prepared to win. Each Readiness Review has specific questions, goals, and action items that mu

You need someone to do all of these things. But it’s far more than one person can handle. So we’ve categorized them according to the roles as we define them in the may have to play multiple roles. But everything on the list needs to be assigned to someone. Some can be shared, but there always needs to be someone with primary responsibility. For each role, we’ve listed primary and secondary functions. Executive Sponsor Lead the bid/no bid review Conduct readiness reviews Approve budg

The only thing harder than winning business is having to work with other people to win business. First you've got all the hand-offs, from marketing to business development to capture to proposal to production. Then there is the natural tension between technical staff and those involved in marketing and sales. People in different positions have different perspectives.  It only works when people work together. And to work together people need to know what to expect from each other. The

Most companies have many departments that might get involved with supporting a proposal A Contracts Specialist: Reviews the RFP. Assists with Teaming Agreements. Reviews contractual terms to be included in the proposal. Reviews and prepares any certifications or representations required by the RFP. A Pricing Specialist: Gets it on paper. Leads the proposal process. Other corporate suppor

Graphics specialists are often used to prepare graphics for the proposal.   Graphic Specialists render the graphics, and may or may not be involved helping to conceptualize the graphics. Responsible for complying with instructions regarding graphic composition, completion of forms related to graphics, and maintaining configuration management of graphic files. Specialists are often used to render graphics.  Proposal writers are still responsible fo

The Production Manager is responsible for final formatting, graphics, editorial support, reproduction, binding, and packaging for delivery. Responsible for the implementation of the Production Plan and compliance with RFP instructions regarding formatting, packaging, and delivery. The Production Manager also oversees the rendering of graphics and their insertion into the document. Functions as a single point of contact for production assistance, tracking, a