Evaluating boring proposals is akin to biting into a cardboard cake. As a poor evaluator sinks their teeth into the unappetizing content, the effect is predictable and rather expected.
Highly readable text is paramount to getting a great score for your proposal. To be persuasive and appealing to the evaluator’s senses, your proposal text has to have compelling content and correct structure. It should use metaphors and stories to make it more engaging and vivid, and less flat and one-dimensional. It should also use appropriate language and be so simply written and accessible that even a high-school student could understand your offer.
Winning proposals is a team effort. Even if you are a one-person shop, you have to find someone to check your work. It is easy to miss or misinterpret requirements because they are so numerous. Someone else also has to review and edit your writing because you are too close to it. Proposal reviews are a best practice, and you should have at least one, no matter how quick is the turn-around.
When you respond to large proposals, you will need to involve numerous parties to shape your proposal into a winner. Your and your teammates’ Subject Matter Experts have to participate and lend their technical know-how and ingenuity to find innovative solutions to customer’s problems.
GSA schedules, also referred to as the Federal Supply Schedules (FSS) or Multiple Award Schedules (MAS), are lists of prequalified suppliers in their respective areas of discipline, who will have submitted their price lists and other qualifying information to the Government in the form of a GSA proposal. GSA vets companies to provide to the rest of the Government a wholesale supply source for millions of products, services, and solutions. According to BGov analysts, as of 2011, roughly 7 percent of all Government contracting is done through GSA schedules.
GSA includes a Federal Acquisition Service (FAS) and the Public Buildings Service (PBS). Basically, any company in good standing, registered as a Government contractor, can apply to obtain a GSA schedule.
You need to know as a business developer that it is not always advisable to get a GSA schedule, nor is it required to sell to the Government, contrary to what many unscrupulous businesses around Government contracting might tell you.
Good teaming partners are like parking spaces in an office building’s parking lot. The closest ones to the building get taken by those diligent souls who arrive to work before 7 am and have half their day’s work done before their colleagues roll in at 9 am. If you are one of those people who come in after 9 am but before the lunch break has started or morning meetings have ended, you might have to circle around the lot to find the spot that’s furthest away from the door, the one that no one wanted.
The key to success is to start the teammate identification process early, so that you don’t find yourself teaming in the 11th hour with companies that will bring you no closer to winning than bidding by yourself.
Graphics, focus boxes, paragraph order, structure, text layout, and flawless spelling and grammar are all the necessary attributes of a great proposal. After spending years in proposal management, however, I have noticed that one important attribute, readability, is often overlooked. Since editors frequently refrain from making in-depth content edits, it is the technical writers’ task to make their sections more readable before their sections go to editors. The problem is that many people tasked with technical writing do not know what readability means or how to make tangible changes to make their sections more readable. This article offers a tutorial on improving readability that proposal writers could start using immediately.
You submitted your proposal, and then waited anxiously to hear whether you won or lost. You had your hopes up, and maybe got exactly what you were wishing for: the contract is awarded to your company. You have millions of things to take care of since you now need to start up the program. You may not even have enough time to plan your win party because you are so busy. Or, maybe you have lost and are thoroughly disappointed. After all, you have given it your best, spent scarce resources and sleepless nights, and witnessed heroic efforts from your entire team putting the proposal together. Whether you won or lost, however, you cannot consider your proposal effort complete until you have asked the Government for a debrief. You are bound to win a lot more proposals if you consider lessons learned after each pursuit to improve your proposal management process, your knowledge of your customers, and your offers.
