Erika Dickson

The quality of every proposal should be explicitly validated This means you should confirm that the key aspects of the proposal are what the company wants them to be. Proposal Quality Validation confirms that what you have in the proposal meets your needs and expectations. It avoids disasters that result from teams that work in isolation, creating a proposal that is not what the company wants to submit, and is only discovered when it is too late to do anything about it. You should validate each decision and approach, the thoroughness of the information you have incorporated, your compliance with and fulfillment of the requirements, your message, and your score. See also: Proposal Quality Validation Validating proposal quality means reviewing it to confirm that reflects your definition of proposal quality. Proposal Quality Validation goes beyond making sure everything in your proposal is “right” and helps increase your win probability. It is based on defining proposal quality criteria to the specific elements of your proposal that should be validated. It separates consideration about what needs to be validated from the methods you use to perform the validation. Proposal Quality Validation overcomes the problems inherent in traditional approaches to reviewing proposals. Traditional approaches to proposal review that are based on milestones where people are handed a draft and asked to read it and comment do not: Produce consistently effective results because they are inherently subjective. Focus on specific quality criteria which in turn are based on a written definition of proposal quality. Provide a mechanism to ensure that reviewers pay attention to the right things. Proposal Quality Validation resembles Independent Verification and Validation (IV&V). It is different from other methods of proposal review because it: It is organized around what you need to validate instead of being organized around colors or milestones. As a result, it achieves better traceability and accountability. The document is compared to your quality criteria, which in turn is based on what it will take to win, which is based on the RFP and the customer, opportunity, and competitive intelligence you have gathered. It accommodates validation of any type, giving you the flexibility to adapt to the needs of the opportunity and your organization. It can be tailored to reflect what it takes to win based on the nature of what you are offering and your customer's concerns. It is based on a definition for proposal quality that can be turned into review criteria to enable the content of the proposal to be validated. It can accommodate different methods of review and levels of formality, while providing a mechanism to ensure that the planned amount and methods of validation are sufficient to meet the needs of the proposal and your organization. It provides a method for documenting your validation plan to properly set expectations, while streamlining the process to keep it from becoming burdensome. It inherently provides more guidance to participants and reviewers, helping to ensure that reviews are focused and effective. It gives you the means to change how people conduct proposal reviews based on lessons learned and strategic goals for increasing win probability. Premium Content for PropLIBRARY Subscribers It amazes us that companies create proposals without ever having a written definition of proposal quality. So we've defined proposal quality for you and built our proposal quality validation process around it. Here are some more items from our MustWin Process library related to proposal quality validation: Sample quality criteria for proposal reviews. Implementing proposal quality validation. Guidance for itemizing what it will take to win and turning it into a list. How to create a proposal quality validation plan. Checklist for reviewing your proposal quality validation plan.

The number and names of the phases are not important. What really matters is that each phase has defined activity, roles/responsibilities, and a means to track performance. See also: Introduction Marketing. Marketing is the combination of the things you do to make potential customers aware of you, and the things you do to discover and better understand your customers. Marketing takes place before the CapturePlanning.com MustWin Process starts. Lead Identification. Once marketing efforts result in a lead, the CapturePlanning.com MustWin Process can begin. Lead Qualification. The Process divides the time before the RFP is released into phases so progress can be tracked and measured. Intelligence Gathering. Each pre-RFP phase has specific goals and ends in a progress review. Intelligence accumulates with each phase. Bid Preparation. As RFP release draws closer, the Process turns the intelligence gathered into information that is ready for use in the proposal, which is the only way it can impact the closing of the sale. RFP Release. The Process is designed to prepare you like a runner at the starting blocks for the release of the RFP. Proposal Planning. Proposal activity is planned, but planning efforts are expedited and fully validated. Proposal Writing. The Process is designed to determine what should be written, provide the information writers will need, and guide and facilitate their efforts. Proposal Validation. Plans, goals, and execution are all validated to ensure that the proposal produced is the right proposal. Proposal Production. Proposal production is a separate activity from writing and is where the proposal in its final form is prepared. Submission. Delivery to the customer is verified. Post-Submission. The process provides for clarifications and questions received after proposal submission. Award. The process ends with the award of the contract.

The CapturePlanning.com MustWin Process is an opportunity pursuit process that starts as soon as a lead is identified so that the way intelligence is gathered supports the closing of the sale with the submission of a proposal. Most “Must Wins” are already lost when the RFP comes out. Even companies who start early often find that time slips by and end up feeling unprepared when the RFP is released. The CapturePlanning.com MustWin Process provides you with a way to track and measure progress so that you can maintain momentum, achieve a competitive advantage, and position your company to win. The CapturePlanning.com MustWin Process provides: A means to get everyone on the same page. Written standards and processes to expedite the process. Clearly defined roles and responsibilities that make it easier to work together and set expectations. Planning tools to ensure that everyone has the information needed to execute their role. Tools to measure progress and provide constant feedback so that everyone knows where they stand. Validation to ensure that every aspect of the proposal is right. Applicability The MustWin Process is designed for written business proposals. While it's designed to meet the requirements of preparing government proposals, we avoid using government contracting jargon so that the process can be used by commercial firms or anyone with a non-government RFP. It can even be used for proposals where there is no RFP if you understand your customer’s expectations. There are many, many different kinds of proposals: information technology, engineering, landscaping, construction, grants, research, products, services, staffing, healthcare, etc. This process was not designed around a specific type or industry. We encourage you to customize it to reflect any specific requirements for your industry or offering. The questions that specify the intelligence to be collected for each of the Readiness Reviews are a good place to start any customization. What is a Must Win? A Must Win opportunity is critical to the company for either financial or strategic reasons. Recompetes are often Must Wins because the company relies on them financially and uses them as qualifications, and people’s jobs are often on the line. Must Wins can also be strategic, such as breaking into a new customer, releasing a new product, or launching a new service line/capability. In each of these cases, you need something that you can cite as a reference, so your first customers are critical to your success. They often merit extra effort to secure the win.

This process was designed to support the pursuit of a business opportunity that requires the development of a large, complex, RFP-based proposal that will be produced by a team of people. Description See also: Introduction It also designed to meet the requirements of preparing government proposals. However, we avoid using government contracting jargon so that the process can be used by commercial firms or anyone with a non-government RFP. It can even be used for proposals where there is no RFP if you sufficiently understand your customer’s requirements. There are many, many different kinds of proposals: information technology, engineering, landscaping, construction, grants, research, products, services, staffing, healthcare, etc. This process was not designed around a specific type or industry. We encourage you to customize it to reflect any specific requirements for your industry or offering. The questions that specify the intelligence to be collected for each of the Readiness Reviews are a good place to start any customization. What is a Must Win? A Must Win opportunity is critical to the company for either financial or strategic reasons. Recompetes are often Must Wins because the company relies on them financially and uses them as qualifications, and people’s jobs are often on the line. Must Wins can also be strategic, such as breaking into a new customer, releasing a new product, or launching a new service line/capability. In each of these cases, you need something that you can cite as a reference, so your first customers are critical to your success. They often merit extra effort to secure the win.

Introduction to the MustWin Process The MustWin Process provides documentation for pursuing and capturing important business opportunities The MustWin Process was first published in 2007 as a workbook that enabled you to simply begin at page one and start completing the steps and activities. As a “workbook,” it was intended to be used by those participating in the pursuit, and not just sit on a shelf. See also: Introduction Today, the MustWin Process is published online. It is still simple, practical, and useful, only you click through it. This enables us to link to topics and information as needed, so you can go straight to the issue you are facing and find everything we've published that's relevant. The MustWin Process focuses on: Discovering what it will take to win in writing Turning that into quality criteria to guide proposal writing Providing quality validation that traces back to what it will take to win The MustWin Process scales to support any size proposal or proposals without an RFP on any schedule. It supports government proposals, but without the use of government contract jargon. It is also used for international proposals. It is intended for use on specific business opportunity pursuits that require a proposal to win. It starts with lead identification, provides support for the pre-RFP phase of pursuit, and at RFP release provides the process you need to win the proposal.

Instructions Answer the following questions to provide the context for writing the technical approach after the RFP is released. Keep your answers short. The less narrative the better. After the RFP is released, your responses here will enable the Proposal Content Plan to be prepared more quickly and to contain better instructions for the authors who will write the proposal narrative. Questions that drive your strategies Since this is intended for pre-RFP response, anticipating the final outline is difficult. You can however, anticipate the topics that will be relevant to a Staffing Plan. Apply each of the following questions to each of the topic below. See also: Proposal writing before the rfp is released What results are the customer looking for? What matters to the customer about the technical solution? What will we offer or do that’s different from our competitors? What will we offer or do that’s different from the previous contract (if any)? Why are we doing things the way we are? What trade-offs will we face, how will we make them, and why make them that way? What will the customer get out of working with us as opposed to a competitor? What will the customer get as a result of our qualifications? How do our capabilities exceed the requirements of the RFP and those of our customers? What will the customer get as a result of them? What risks are the customer concerned about? What risks are we concerned about? Why should the customer trust our technical approach? In addition, you should review the Technical Approach guidance in PropLIBRARY’s Recipe Library.

Instructions Answer the following questions to provide the context for writing the Staffing Plan after the RFP is released. Keep your answers short. The less narrative the better. After the RFP is released, your responses here will enable the Proposal Content Plan to be prepared more quickly and to contain better instructions for the authors who will write the proposal narrative. Questions that drive your strategies Since this is intended for pre-RFP response, anticipating the final outline is difficult. You can however, anticipate the topics that will be relevant to a Staffing Plan. Apply each of the following questions to each of the topic below. See also: Proposal writing before the rfp is released What matters to the customer about the staffing plan? What will we offer or do that’s different from our competitors? How will we do things differently? Are our staff immediately available? What is our approach to filling proposals that aren’t already filled at contract start? What is our approach to handling turnover? Why are we staffing this project the way we are? What results can the customer expect from working with us? What risks are the customer concerned about? What risks are we concerned about? Why should the customer trust us?

Instructions Answer the following questions to provide the context for writing the Management Plan after the RFP is released. Keep your answers short. The less narrative the better. After the RFP is released, your responses here will enable the Proposal Content Plan to be prepared more quickly and to contain better instructions for the authors who will write the proposal narrative. See also: Proposal writing before the rfp is released Questions that drive your strategies Since this is intended for pre-RFP response, anticipating the final outline is difficult. You can however, anticipate the topics that will be relevant to a Management Plan. Apply each of the following questions to each of the topic below. What matters to the customer about the management approach? How will we manage things in ways that are different from our competitors? Why are we approaching the management of this project the way we are? What results can the customer expect from working with us? What risks are the customer concerned about? What risks are we concerned about? Why should the customer trust us? In addition, you should review the Management Plan topics in PropLIBRARY’s Recipe Library. These include: Teaming Project Management Organization Risk Project Schedule Tools, methodologies, and techniques Customer involvement Security Legacy Issues Change Management Training and Support Deliverables Transition Plan Quality

Instructions Answer the following questions to provide the context for writing about Past Performance and Corporate Experience after the RFP is released. Keep your answers short. The less narrative the better. After the RFP is released, your responses here will enable the Proposal Content Plan to be prepared more quickly and to contain better instructions for the authors who will write the proposal narrative. Past performance and corporate experience and usually evaluated as separate things. Past performance is simply a reference check, but is also evaluated for relevance. Corporate experience may or may not also be evaluated, but it is usually a good idea to show the depth and breadth of your experience, often using matrices and statistics to summarize it. See also: Proposal writing before the rfp is released Questions that drive your strategies Since this is intended for pre-RFP response, anticipating the final outline is difficult. You can however, anticipate the topics that will be relevant to a Staffing Plan. Apply each of the following questions to each of the topic below. What matters to the customer about our past performance (typically relevance/size/scope/complexity and reference check)? What in our experience is a differentiator? How does our experience prove our ability to deliver on schedule and within budget? What trade-offs did we face, how did we make them, and why did we make them that way? How does your experience prove you follow through on the promises you’ve made in the proposal? What will the customer get as a result of your experience? What performance risks are the customer concerned about, and how did we handle them in the past? What does your experience demonstrate about your ability to manage risks? How does your experience prove that you are trustworthy? Which references will you use? What are the strengths/weaknesses for each one in the areas of: Relevance (size/scope/complexity) Reference Will you include references from your subcontractors? How do the strengths/weaknesses of our past performance selections support or contradict our other strategies? Do we have any gaps? Do we need to select different projects or conside adding a teaming partner?

The best way to get an early start is to prepare to articulate the strategies, points of emphasis, and context that should be incorporated into your response to the RFP requirements. Description The best way to get an early start on the proposal is not to try writing to the anticipated requirements. In fact, the less narrative you produce before you see the RFP the better. You want the text of the proposal to be built from the ground up around what it will take to win, according to the RFP instructions and evaluation criteria. Until you have the RFP, you can’t do that. What you can do is prepare to articulate the strategies, points of emphasis, and context that should be incorporated into your response to the RFP requirements. For each section of a typical proposal, we have prepared a list of questions that should help you draw out the right information. The questions in each section are designed to provoke thought and not to produce specific answers in a specific format. Feel free to add questions if you think of something related. Step 1. Answer the Questions For each question, make a bullet list of possible answers. If you can’t answer a question or aren’t sure what it means, then skip it. It’s probably not a driver of your strategies. See also: Proposal writing before the rfp is released If you think of something and aren’t sure what question to put it under, just put it at the end. Capturing your ideas is far more important than matching them up to questions. You can put in notes, annotations, placeholders, action items, and even questions for other participants. You can even put in weaknesses that you aren’t sure how to counter. Think of this as a container that will be passed around until you have everything in it that you need. Try to identify what things will drive the strategies and context for the proposal. Don’t try to nail the final wording, just identify the elements. If the same element could go under different questions, just put it under one of them. There is no need to be redundant with your responses. Step 2. Convert the answers into strategies and context The goal of the effort is to arrive at RFP release being able to describe the strategies, conclusions, and context that the authors should substantiate. This should enable you to prepare instructions for proposal writers that go being simply responding to the RFP requirements, and instead instruct them how to respond to the RFP requirements in a way that: Explains how your response to the RFP requirements matters Shows what the customer will get out of what you propose Differentiates what you propose from the competition Substantiates the conclusions you want the customer to reach Identifies the key points of emphasis you’d like to make In the final version, you want to have the source material to improve the instructions you will give to the proposal writers when you prepare the Proposal Content Plan after the RFP is released. Premium Content for PropLIBRARY Subscribers Questions to answer when preparing to write the: Staffing Plan Past performance response Management Plan Technical Approach

Sometimes proposal writing is done by a specialist, and sometimes it's done by a subject matter expert. A Proposal Writer: Writes finished copy. Helps plan the contents of your sections before actually writing them. Incorporates detailed instructions into your writing. Delivers your sections by their deadlines. A Subject Matter Expert: Describes approaches and provide technical details. Delivers information and details instead of finished copy. Makes sure the proposal is technically accurate and complete. Makes sure the solution is executable and best-in-class. Proposal Writers create the proposal under the leadership of the Capture Manager and Proposal Manager, in much the same way that musicians create the music under the direction of a composer and a conductor. Proposal Writers are generally responsible for creating the text, with formatting being performed by Production Staff. See also: Role and responsibilities Subject Matter Experts bring knowledge to the proposal. They may write to deliver that knowledge, but are not responsible for providing finished copy. Instead they are responsible for providing complete, accurate technical details that another Writer can incorporate into a finished proposal section. People are depending on you to deliver finished sections of the proposal, according to the instructions of your assignment, and to deliver it by the assignment deadline. In order to complete your assignment, you may have to invent some or all of the approaches to fulfilling the project. If you cannot fulfill any part of your assignments by the deadline it is vital that you say so loudly, clearly, and early so there’s a chance they can find someone to fill the gap. Writers may also be Subject Matter Experts. It’s a special bonus when that’s the case. However, not all Subject Matter Experts can prepare finished copy. Sometimes a Subject Matter Expert can be paired up with a Writer in order to get the right combination of knowledge and writing skills. The MustWin process is designed to identify everything that should be included in a proposal section and check it to make sure it’s complete and correct prior to its being written. For some Writers, this will be a tremendous help. You will not have to work from a blank page, and will be able to easily check what you’ve written to see if it fulfills what you were asked to do. For some Writers, this will seem like adding extra steps when you could just write it. Those extra steps are needed to objectively define whether a completed section fulfills the assignment and to prevent Writers from having to do extensive rework. Book Bosses/Volume Leads. Large proposal efforts with multiple contributors per section are often organized with a leader for each section. These leaders are commonly referred to as a Book Boss or Volume Lead. They are typically responsible for developing the solution as well as overseeing the writing.

The Proposal Manager: Has the lead role for developing the proposal process, plans, schedule, and assignments. Gets involved shortly before the RFP is released to help ensure that intelligence gathered is staged for use in the proposal and that plans can be drafted. Should avoid putting pen to paper and personally creating the proposal. Instead, the Proposal Manager should manage the process, staff, and other resources to develop the proposal. See also: Roles When the RFP is released, the Proposal Manager should have everything staged so that the proposal can take off like a runner at the starting blocks. This can only be accomplished if the Proposal Manager is involved early enough before the RFP is released. The Proposal Manager is responsible for defining and overseeing the proposal development process. This means the Proposal Manager is in charge of assignments and schedules. The Capture Manager will identify the staff who will participate in writing the proposal. The Proposal Manager will guide them through the process. The Proposal Manager and the Capture Manager form a partnership to develop the winning bid. The Capture Manager is responsible for deciding what the winning approaches will be. The Proposal Manager is responsible for getting them on paper in a form that will win.

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, and quality control. Responsible for maintaining configuration management once production begins. In some companies, the Production Manager oversees word processing and document changes. In organizations that are lucky enough to have professional editors, the Production Manager also oversees editorial support. This is becoming more and more rare in favor of people entering their own changes. The Production Manager functions as a single point of contact for production assistance, tracking, and quality control.

The Process Administrator provides support for the implementation of the proposal process. Maintains process records. Frees the Proposal Manager to focus on the message, assignment completion, and quality validation. See also: Roles For a large MustWin proposal, it’s a good idea to have a person dedicated to administering the process. It facilitates the process if someone is available to help people complete forms and maintain process records. With a Process Administrator to maintain the records, the Proposal Manager will be able to focus more on the message, ensuring people complete their assignments, and quality validation. Traditionally a Process Administrator has been referred to as a Proposal Coordinator, but the difference between a Proposal Coordinator and a Proposal Manager is less clear than the difference between a Process Administrator and a Proposal Manager.

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 for identifying the graphics, but they don’t have to have the specialist software expertise or illustration skills to render the graphics. Companies that do lots of proposals typically have someone in the Proposal Department to provide graphics support. Graphics can also be rendered by consultants.

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 support involved in proposals may include human resources, facilities, and others. You should take advantage of all of the resources available within your company. These may include: Contracts Specialist. A Contracts Specialist is almost always involved in responding to a Government RFP. A company may or may not use them in response to commercial solicitations. When available, a Contracts Specialist should review the draft and final RFPs. Contractual issues like Organizational Conflict of Interest (OCI) can be a Bid/No Bid determination. A Contracts Specialist should also review any contractual terms specified in the proposal and may also review the terms of any subcontracting or teaming arrangements. The Contracts Specialist should participate in the validation of the proposal plans, to ensure that they have adequate opportunities for review. See also: MWPST Help getting started Pricing Specialists. Most large, complex proposals use Pricing Specialists who have the accounting expertise, spreadsheet skills, and access to sensitive cost data necessary to complete the pricing proposal. If the Pricing Specialist is involved with assessing the pricing of the competition or if the pricing involves collecting a large amount of data, then they may need to be involved before the RFP is released. Otherwise, the Pricing Specialist will get involved at RFP release. The pricing proposal needs to be validated and developed through stages, just like the proposal narrative. The initial pricing model (structure, strategy, and approach) should be validated as a plan prior to completing the draft. The draft should be validated and then the numbers refined to produce the final pricing. Typically, the Pricing Specialist will be responsible for preparing the entire price section or volume. Often, at least in government proposals, the pricing volume must be packaged separately from the other volumes and sealed. The Proposal Manager needs to discuss the preparation of the pricing and incorporate the needs of the Pricing Specialist into the schedule, validation plan, and other proposal plans. The Capture Manager will need to meet regularly with the Pricing Specialist to provide data and guidance towards preparing a winning bid. Human Resources/Recruiting. Some RFPs require you to provide the names and/or resumes of staff being bid. Sometimes you will have to recruit staff in order to do this. You should take advantage of your company’s Human Resources/Recruiting function to assist with this. Facilities. You need the help of your Facilities Manager to locate space for the proposal, obtain badges/entry clearances for consultants and subcontractors, and locate space for the project after award.

Key responsibilities include: Opening the doors to resources Setting the tone Fighting indecision Providing oversight Approving the review plan The Executive Sponsor’s hands-on involvement with the proposal may be extensive or could be very little, depending on his or her interests and priorities. If you are the Executive Sponsor for a proposal, even if you never touch the proposal itself, you can have a major impact on the success or failure of the overall effort. Here are some things that you can do to make a big difference to the proposal that do not require a lot of your time or require you to get down into the weeds and micromanage things. The Executive Sponsor Opens Doors to Resources See also: Roles and responsibilities Instead of the best staff being assigned to a proposal, most proposals are done by staff who happen to be available. This often means staff who have never done any proposal writing before. The number one thing that you can do to help a proposal is to make sure the best resources are assigned to the proposal. Often proposals do not need a lot of people participating; what they really need are people with experience who are good at proposal writing. These people tend to come at a premium and are often highly in demand and swamped with requests for support. The Executive Sponsor has the clout to get their time, whereas the Capture Manager and Proposal Manager may not. If you want to win, you should push resources on the proposal team instead of waiting for them to ask for resources. Most staff have had managing to a budget drilled into them for their entire career. They are used to compromising and working with the limited resources available. They may not even think about using staff on priority projects or that report to other business units. They may be too quick to accept the resources made available to them instead of getting the right resources. In addition, you will usually have more experience and know more people in the organization. In addition to staff, you can suggest other things that might not normally be considered, like training or the use of consultants. If you want to win, you will make sure that your staff are not pulling their punches regarding resources, and open doors that normally wouldn’t be open to them. The Executive Sponsor Sets The Tone The staff contributing to the proposal will usually not report to the Proposal Manager. The Proposal Manager will need your support in order to drive the staff working on the proposal. Don’t wait for an issue to develop before providing that support. Instead, set the right tone from the beginning. If the proposal may require an all-out effort, then tell your staff that is what you expect. Tell them what the stakes are and how the organization will benefit if you win. Tell them that you expect them to work late or on weekends if they need to in order to meet their deadlines. It’s so much easier for the Proposal Manager when staff have already heard from their supervisor. It means something different when it comes from you. When it comes from the Proposal Manager it may mean a power struggle or passive resistance (which can be even worse). The Executive Sponsor Fights Indecision Indecision can kill a proposal. Proposals get started late because people can’t decide whether to bid. Writing assignments are late because people have trouble making trade-off decisions regarding what to bid. When decisions are made, they are often revisited when people have second thoughts or others get involved. If you want them to make the decisions on their own, then tell them that (and avoid the temptation to second guess once they are made). It helps to make your expectations clear. As the Executive Sponsor you can help force decisions and make it hard for people to revisit a decision once it’s been made. Sometimes all you have to do is say from the outset that you want people to be decisive and stick to their decisions once made. If you want them to bring decisions to you, then tell them. The Executive Sponsor Provides Oversight Do you want to participate in reviews? If so, which ones? Do you want to be the last person to read the proposal and make comments before it goes out the door? Unanticipated change cycles can be a major problem in a deadline-driven situation. Your level of involvement may depend on whether you just need to be comfortable that they are doing a good job or whether you expect to read every word and personally do everything you can to improve the document. You need to be upfront about your expectations so that the team can anticipate and accommodate them. As the Executive Sponsor, you also need to provide some level of oversight to make sure that the team is working in a way that will produce the level of quality you expect. As the Executive Sponsor, you define the standards for quality and performance. If you want the team to take the review process seriously, you need to communicate to them that you take it seriously. The Executive Sponsor Approves the Review Plan Sometimes the team will anticipate an Executive Sponsor’s involvement in a review, only to find that the Executive Sponsor doesn’t have time to commit to it. Executive Sponsors often show up to review meetings without having read the RFP or even the proposal itself! If you don’t have hours to dedicate to a review, then let the Proposal Manager know so they can assign someone else to that spot on the review team. They can still provide you with a copy so that you can look at it when you have time.

Key responsibilites include: Capture Managers must not only sell to the customer, but also must sell internally to gain support and resources for the pursuit. A Capture Manager must know about the customer, the opportunity, the scope of work, project management, budgeting, pricing, contracting, proposal writing, and how to obtain, allocate, and steal resources within the company. Congratulations! You have the most challenging job in winning new business. It is also the most important. A Capture Manager has all of his or her eggs in one basket, being dedicated to the pursuit of a Must Win opportunity until it is awarded. If the Capture Manager is not dedicated, then they may be pulled in too many directions to give the opportunity the attention it needs. If it is truly a Must Win opportunity, then it deserves to have at least one person dedicated to its pursuit, and that person is the Capture Manager. If you aren’t dedicated, then you’re being pulled in too many directions and can’t give every opportunity the attention it needs. See also: Capture management The Capture Manager will take over a lead that has been identified and initially qualified. You should immediately qualify it yourself, and continue to do so every day. Is it real and is it worth investing in its pursuit? Sometimes the best thing you can do for your company is to terminate a pursuit rather than to invest further in it. The sooner you kill an opportunity that is not worth pursuing, the easier and better it is for the company. When you are asked to be the Capture Manager for an opportunity you should not say “yes” until you have considered everything above. Do not play unless you know you can win. Initially, the Capture Manager works in partnership with the Business Development Manager who identified the lead. When the RFP is released, the Capture Manager works in partnership with the Proposal Manager who will lead the effort to develop the proposal document. Throughout the pursuit the Capture Manager is responsible for making sure that the right intelligence is collected so you can make informed strategic and tactical decisions. This does not mean the Capture Manager collects it by himself or herself — it means the Capture Manager must lead the effort and ensure the team gets what it needs. The Capture Manager is responsible for obtaining the resources to complete the proposal and for deciding what to propose. The Proposal Manager will assist by defining and administering the proposal process. But the process will only be successful if the company brings the right information and resources to the pursuit. To obtain the resources needed to capture the opportunity, the Capture Manager must take advantage of everything he or she knows about the company and the people who work there. This is where the Capture Manager must be able to persuade internally — the Capture Manager must convince people that the opportunity is worth the effort in order to get the right people assigned. The most important thing the Capture Manager does is make decisions: What should the win strategies be? What should the approaches be? What should the pricing be? Be decisive. Many teams go wrong by taking too long to make key decisions or worse by waffling. The Capture Manager must lead the team to make decisions, validate that they are correct, and then stick to them.

Key responsibilities include: Pursuing as many new opportunities as possible. Developing customer relationships that facilitate discovering and researching new business opportunities. Becoming the expert on what the customer really wants. Helping to position the company to win. Gathering intelligence and making sure the proposal reflects it. The Business Development Manager is expected to gather intelligence about the customer, the opportunity, and the competition that will be crucial to winning the opportunity. Any intelligence you gather that indicates an opportunity is not real or worth pursuing is just as valuable as the intelligence that makes that opportunity look good. See also: Roles and responsibilities The Business Development Manager does most of his or her work before the RFP is released. Once the RFP is released, the customer may no longer be willing to talk, so the Business Development Manager must anticipate the questions that people will have during the proposal process and get the answers before the proposal even starts. When the RFP is released and people ask questions that you didn’t anticipate, the Business Development Manager will try to get answers. If the company has to proceed without answers, the Business Development Manager may be in the best position to guess what the answer should be. When a Capture Manager is assigned, the Business Development Manager will help get the Capture Manager up to speed on the opportunity, customer, and competitive environment. The Capture Manager will continue to need input and to take advantage of your customer relationship throughout the process. When the proposal phase begins, the Business Development Manager should personally make sure that the proposal reflects what the customer wants and what you know about the competition. The Business Development Manager’s knowledge about the opportunity, customer, and competitive environment should go well beyond what is in the RFP and is vital — no one else may have that insight. Business Development Managers rarely take a writing role in a proposal effort, but they should make sure that those who do have writing assignments take into account everything they know about the opportunity, the customer, and the competition. The proposal that does the best job of speaking to what the customer actually wants (regardless of what it says in the RFP) is the one that is most likely to win. The Business Development Manager’s job is to give the company that edge. Preparing the proposal will require addressing many, many tradeoffs. The Business Development Manager’s understanding of the customer’s preferences should be used to help the team make the decisions the customer would prefer. The Business Development Manager should participate in the strategy sessions to offer this insight, and should review the proposal and make sure that it speaks to what the customer really wants. The Business Development Manager may need to coach the proposal team and give them the information they need to make sure that the right story makes it into print. If it doesn’t, then all of the careful positioning and work may have zero impact on whether your company wins the opportunity.