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Is your job tied into the proposal area of marketing? Would you like it to be? This guide is an invaluable resource for understanding proposals and the processes involved.
What Is a Proposal?
In simple terms, a proposal is a sales presentation providing someone with a product or service during a specific time period at a specific price. Proposals can take many forms: letters, quotes, multivolume texts and oral presentations. Although the format, content and complexity of the proposal will vary from customer to customer and from type of work or product being solicited, every proposal requires you to provide answers to these questions:
- Who is going to perform the work/provide the product?
- How is the work going to be accomplished/how is the product going to be delivered?
- For whom have you done this type of work/delivered this type of product before?
- What is the cost?
The proposal development process extends from the identification of the opportunity through the contract award. You can break this process down into a varying number of phases -- or steps -- to match your company's culture, policies, methods, structure and people. Regardless of whether your company uses a three-step or six-step model, the tasks to be accomplished are the same. This article features a three-step model.
Step Number One: Assessment (Pre-Proposal)
The assessment phase begins when your company identifies an opportunity and ends when the potential customer releases a draft request for proposal (DRFP) or issues a request for information (RFI). During assessment, you build long-term customer relationships and position your resources to gain a competitive advantage. Marketing, sales, and technical management research the potential customer and opportunity to determine where they fit within your company's strategic plan. You assess your company's capabilities and the capabilities of your competition, evaluate program risks and come to a bid/no-bid decision. Then, you establish the core of your proposal team and write the capture plan.
Step Number Two: Proposal Development
The proposal development stage typically begins one to six months before the RFP or request for quote (RFQ) is released. For complex and large dollar value opportunities, development may begin up to a year in advance. Your company moves into the proposal development phase when you receive the potential customer's RFI/DRFP -- their invitation to join in the prequalified competition. The core team (capture manager, proposal manager, volume leaders and proposal coordinator) handles the front-end planning and preparation: gathering program intelligence, initiating baseline design and preparing the proposal outline, proposal work breakdown structure and schedule. The proposal team responds to the DRFP/RFI, develops section content, mocks up the draft proposal and writes straw man (or placeholder) text.
The next step is a review by management to determine how well the proposal communicates the themes and discriminators established in the capture plan. Final development of the proposal begins when the RFP arrives. Final development is a systematic team effort based on a milestone and task schedule provided by the proposal manager. Section writers create compliance checklists and rewrite their sections accordingly. Following a final management review, the proposal is submitted.
Step Number Three: Post-Submittal
Sometimes you do most of your most critical work after you submit the written proposal. When an oral presentation is requested, there are scripts to write and practice sessions to conduct. Your post-submittal work will convince the customer you care about the contract and are responsive to its needs and requirements. This is also the time to develop discussion and pricing strategies that will reinforce your strengths and eliminate or mitigate your weaknesses. The proposal team responds to requests for clarification. Management prepares strategies and attends discussions. The team writes, reviews and then submits the best and final offer (BAFO). Management develops a negotiation strategy and negotiates the contract. For research and development efforts; bidders may also be required to give live test demonstrations of perform site surveys.
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