49 questions that drive how to accomplish the 6 key goals of a proposal process

A goal-driven proposal process is far superior to one based on steps or milestones because it is more adaptable and is easier to tailor to your company's specific needs. You can see how this works with a framework based on accomplishing 6 goals and with 49 questions that point you in the right direction for how to accomplish the goals that you can tailor to your circumstances.

The challenge with a goal-driven proposal process is determining the best way to achieve your goals. The questions below lead you to that. The result is a process that can adapt as needed to maximize your win probability. Following the same steps over and over doesn't enable you to do that.

When you read the questions below, make sure that you answer them with the best way of achieving the goal in mind. In a goal-driven process, you don't do things just because you're "supposed to," you do them to achieve the goal. Achieving the goal is more important than the procedures used.

Goal 1: Discover what it will take to win 

Before you can build a proposal around what it will take to win, you must be able to articulate what that is. Then you must also understand what to do about it. The questions below will help inform you of these.

1. How will leads be qualified?
2. What gates or milestones do you need to prepare for?
3. How will you make bid/no bid decisions?
4. How will you itemize what it will take to win?
5. How will you track and report progress towards being ready to win at RFP release?
6. What do you anticipate needing to know about the customer, opportunity, and competitive environment in order to prepare the winning proposal?
7. How will you accumulate an information advantage for use in the proposal? 
8. What format should information be kept in during the pursuit for future use in the proposal?
9. How will the pursuit budget be managed?
10. Who will be involved and in what capacities?

Goal 2: Design the offering based on what it will take to win 

What you should offer in your proposal is a separate consideration from you should write in your proposal. Designing your offering by writing about it is not an effective engineering approach. The questions below will help you design an offering based on what it will take to win.

1. How will you determine what to offer?
2. Who will need to be involved?
3. What form will your pre-RFP offering design take? 
4. How will your offering design be documented for use in the proposal?
5. What will differentiate your offering?
6. How should your offering be positioned?
7. How will you assess its competitiveness?
8. How will you assess the price to win?
9. How will you validate that you have the right offering?
10. Does the design of your offering sufficiently reflect your win strategies?

Goal 3: Prepare a proposal content plan that defines quality and addresses what it will take to win 

In order to write a proposal based on what it will take to win, you must account for what it will take to win in a form that is organized according to the document structure. This is not likely to happen if you just start writing and try to figure it out as you go. A proposal content plan should also enable writers to validate that they have fulfilled the plan. This means it should incorporate your proposal quality criteria so that fulfilling the proposal content plan achieves what it will take to win. This enables proposal reviews to be based on something intentional and validated instead of opinions about what sounds good. The questions below can help guide you to create an effective proposal content plan.

1. Will you use a compliance matrix to create your proposal outline? If not, then how will you account for the customer's instructions/expectations, evaluation criteria, and requirements in the proposal content plan?
2. How do you define proposal quality?
3. What are your proposal quality criteria? Are there criteria specific to each bid?
4. What do you need to be able to articulate before the proposal writers start writing? 
5. What questions do you anticipate the proposal writers might have, and can you answer them?
6. What must be accomplished in between having an outline and being prepared to start writing?
7. If the writers follow the instructions you are giving them and fulfill the quality criteria, will it produce a proposal that fulfills what it will take to win and meets everyone’s expectations?
8. What do you expect the proposal writers to figure out on their own, and what do you need to provide them?
9. How will you communicate and document not only what to write, but how to present it?
10. How will the writers know if they have properly completed their assignments, before they turn in their assignments?

Goal 4: Write to fulfill the instructions and quality criteria in the Proposal Content Plan 

Proposal writing is not primarily an exercise in creativity or in proving how great you are. Proposal writing is the act of offering something that fulfills the customer's needs in a way that proves you are their best alternative. In practice, this takes the form of fulfilling the proposal content plan, where the customer's needs and all other considerations have been accounted for in the context of what it will take to win. Doing this needs to be managed, with the schedule, assignments, resources, issues, and other aspects of project management being addressed. The questions below will help you ensure that the writing phase of the proposal accomplishes this.

1. How will you track and report progress during proposal development, and in particular during proposal writing?
2. How will you identify and resolve issues encountered during proposal development, and in particular during proposal writing?
3. How will writers self-assess whether they’ve not only fulfilled the proposal content plan, but have written a section that reflects what it will take to win?
4. How will proposal files be managed?
5. How will stakeholder expectations be coordinated and managed?
6. How will access control be managed? (Don’t forget your teammates!)

Goal 5: Validate that the draft reflects your quality criteria 

To consistently be effective and improve your win probability, your proposal reviews need to be based on something more than the RFP and the reviewers' personal opinions regarding proposal writing. If quality is defined based on written quality criteria, then quality can be assessed far more thoroughly and objectively. The questions below will help you transform your proposal reviews into assessments that validate quality instead of the collection of opinions.

1. How will you use the instructions given to proposal writers and the quality criteria you have defined during proposal reviews for proposal quality validation?
2. How many reviews do you need to validate all of your proposal quality criteria? How long will the reviews take?
3. When should the reviews be scheduled? How will you monitor review readiness and schedule?
4. How should each of these reviews be conducted? Which will be formal and which will be informal? 
5. Who will participate in these reviews?
6. What orientation and training should be provided to reviewers?
7. What is the production impact, if any, of each review?

Goal 6: Produce a final copy without any defects for an on-time submission

The last thing you want is to lose because of a mistake made in the final rush to submit the proposal. The final production and submission of the proposal should be a careful, deliberate act with detailed quality control checks to ensure there are no defects. This is completely different from making sure you've said everything in the best way possible. That must happen before final production. The questions below can help guide you to what to focus on during final production.

1. How will you manage and track proposal completion?
2. How will the submission copy be prepared?
3. When and how will you inspect the final copy for defects prior to submission?
4. How will the submission be conducted?
5. Who will perform the submission?
6. What could possibly go wrong and how do you prevent it?