Chet’s Blog

BASELINE MEETINGS PROCEDURES AND PRODUCTS

I developed the idea of baselines for winning bid development for my company, Datawrite, Inc. (www.datawrite.com) over twenty years ago. This process was published in “Building a Contract, Solicitations/Bids and Proposals,” by Chester P. Shinaman, National Contract Management Assoc., Vienna, VA, 1990. Now many new business disciplines incorporate these ideas. However, I have improved and sharpened this approach since that time and have been able to lend them to recent wins including the KC-45A for Northrop Grumman Corporation over Boeing Corporation in March of 2008. Although I will be writing about these improvements in the future (including an advanced graphics procedure) this post introduces the basic baseline approach.

MATCHING STRATEGIES TO REQUIREMENTS

Once the kick-off meeting has been held, it is time to start developing base lines. These baselines will all flow out of the high level strategies published for the kick-off. Base-lines capture your approach and solution to the program requirements. The baseline captures the lower level strategies for each of the major requirement paragraphs. These strategies should reinforce the high level strategies. This approach applies to both products and services. There are as many baselines as there are requirement categories, usually including: technical, management, logistics and cost. Baselines are the first attempt to match approaches to RFP requirements. I refer to it as base-lining rather than strategy development because strategies are a byproduct of the exercise, a very important product. But until you piece together the rudiments of your approach to high level requirements you cannot derive meaningful strategies. Don’t worry about it. I will walk you through a mock baselining session in future posts.

BASELINE MEETING PRODUCT

The best way to accomplish these baselines is with well structured, productive meetings during which a trained facilitator captures the ideas of his team. The final product is published to the team on a shared drive.

As each requirement for each discipline is reviewed, the facilitator captures the approach, substantiating data for the approach and benefit to the government on a white board or flip chart. This data is captured in tandem on a computer spread sheet.

BRIDGE TO THE NEXT STEP IN BID DEVELOPMENT

Strong baselines will allow the team to create better storyboards. These roadmaps to the draft go to the next level of detail in proposal development. They provide the guidance that allows personnel to create the best work in their individual sub categories before a first draft is attempted.

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STORYBOARD DEVELOPMENT

Introduction

Storyboards are a method of capturing proposal material in shorthand before a first draft is written. They are tools to help capture management evaluate the strategies, approaches and substantiating data for approaches in a clean, easily editable format. Once the draft is written it is much harder to see this armature, or framework of baseline ideas. Storyboards are also a good place to begin envisioning or conceptualizing graphics which will support your approaches.  Datawrite (www.datawrite.com) uses an engineering friendly approach to this phase that concentrates on information and not a complicated set of forms.

This phase, begun by the great Jim Beveridge “the Anatomy of a Win,” is often adhered to, but given lip service by many organizations. It is a hard discipline in that it calls for engineers and management personnel to do original work. Everyone can’t do everything well. A brilliant engineer may need help to articulate this level of communication even though they have a solution in mind. That’s where Datawrite personnel step in and work with your team to ensure that this step is meaningful.

Once storyboards are complete there is a wall walking review by management. It is the one time that they will get to review a snapshot of the entire proposal before it goes into hundreds of pages of text. The reviewers can move ideas back and forth between the boards until they have achieved a convincing and responsive solution for the evaluator. It is an opportunity to synergize the entire proposal. Boards are marked up directly on the wall by the facilitator. Once they are signed off on they are given to the authors. At this point the authors will have a roadmap on how to assemble and write the first draft. Although this draft will not be polished, all of the right information will be in the right places.

TIPS& TRICKS

Give a short training seminar after every Monday morning status meeting to prepare the team for the exercises of the week. Since they will need to achieve the milestone you are teaching them to prepare for that week, they will all be more likely to listen and to take notes.

Here is a sample storyboard format. Anything more complicated will be hard to review and revise. Simple is better.  I call it engineering friendly.  There is no duplication of effort and all information developed will be used in the first draft.

SUMMARY

The Storyboard allows the development of a thematic sentence, substantiating material and a graphic all tied to the requirements in the proposal outline. In just a few pages you’ve captured a roadmap that will lead the team through the development of a solid first draft.

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STRATEGY DEVELOPMENT PROCESS

INTRODUCTION – HOW TO MAKE A COMPELLING CASE

Strategy in bidding is much misunderstood. Strategy, simply put, describes a customer centric approach to specific requirements stated in the SOW or Specification that achieves an advantage over the competition and at the same time gives benefits to the customer. The strategy is the basis for the approach.  It is an area that Datawrite consultants teach your team as a part of our development process (www.datawrite.com).

For example, a strategy could be to use 85% off-the-shelf (OTS) technology for an entire system, thereby lowering program risk. Following this, an approach for a particular requirement could be to use modified off-the-shelf technology for a particular module. The reliability and availability of that OTS equipment could be shown to lower system risk by xx%. The strategy and it’s corresponding approaches are used as the basis for sections and paragraphs within the proposal. Once mentioned, strategies and approaches must be slavishly substantiated so that the evaluator has proof that they are valid.

Once the proposal team has its initial kickoff meeting, members are ready to begin developing detailed program strategies to enforce the High Level Strategies published by the Upper Management. These are a part of the kick-off meeting package.

“You must have completed your first baselines before meaningful strategies can be developed.”

STEPS TO ACHIEVING WINNING STRATEGIES

Strategy development sessions need to be held with the teams derived from the core proposal team and subject matter experts.

STEP ONE – STRATEGY DEVELOPMENT SESSIONS

First, have the Chief Engineer and Subject Matter Expert brief the group on the results of their part of the baseline meeting. You might want to have some of the Proposal Plan pages hung on the wall. This should be a short show-and-tell. The discussion should always be related directly to an RFP REQUIREMENTS! Even if this is a draft RFP, always relate what you do to the customer’s requirements. This should be fairly simple if you have all ready developed baselines.

Second, a trained Facilitator runs the strategy development sessions. The participants are a mix of SMEs, authors and management from the specific requirement area being addressed. The facilitator’s job is to draw out information from the group that can be used in storyboards and then in the proposal draft. One of the best ways to achieve this is to put four columns on the flip chart:

Table 4-1. STRATEGY CAPTURE CHART

REQUIREMENT
 

APPROACH
 

FEATURE
 

BENEFIT
 

PROOF

Here are a list of possible considerations when developing approaches:

    * Define Product Assemblies/Subassemblies
    * Detail internal and external product interfaces
    * Identify COTS/GOTS/NDI
    * Identify Make or Buy decisions
    * Identify areas of technical risk
    * Identify competitor strengths in similar product.
    * Identify and assign action items.

Once the approaches have been agreed to the facilitator has the chart keyed into an Excel spread sheet. This work becomes the basis for the “Approach” section of the storyboard development.

As the subject area expert speaks, the facilitator (will note individual thoughts for a requirement in the Feature Column.) When the speaker is finished (try to limit it to a half an hour per subject) there should be a number of approaches documented for each of the major requirements in the section the experts are responsible for. At the end of the discussion the facilitator will address each of the features/approaches captured and request consensus from the group before including it in the final list.

STEP TWO: DEVELOPING APPROACH/FEATURE / BENEFIT/PROOF

Once an approach is taken, the feature of that approach is discussed. We will look at a simple example.

Approach Example: If the requirements for a Display Processor Reliability Specification 3.2.4 was a minimum mean-time-between-failure (MTBF) of 400 hours, the approach might be to use a modified commercial-off-the-shelf (COTS) equipment that can meet this requirement. This approach would be low risk to the government. It might even be possible to slightly modify COTS to achieve this goal. In either case you would have an approach that met the specification without a large design effort.

Feature Example: The equipment chosen has a high reliability of 450 hours. Also, in this example, the reliability can be traced to several aircraft in the current inventory. This again lowers risk since the equipment can be shown in existing military inventory.

This isn’t a bad Approach/Feature for the governments’ requirement. It gives them a trusted supplier that meets the requirement in their specification.

Benefit Example: Determine if your approach has any benefits to the customer. Benefits must fall out of your approach.

Proof Example: Show the formula used to develop the MTBF. List each of the critical items that are weak links in the chain (those with the lowest MTBF). Like a mathematical equation, do your proof. This is what will convince the evaluator that your approach is valid.

This is a good place to stop and point out a cardinal objective of this exercise.

We’re in the business of out scoring the competition. Everything matters. If there is a point to be made on the evaluation, you must use proof to seize it!

List each of the benefits for the approach and features. These could include the additional reliability hours, the ease of procuring COTS, and the ease of system interface. Each benefit must give the client something from your solution that they might not otherwise gain with the competitor’s solution.

Once your approaches, features and benefits are lined up with requirements you are ready for your first review (Table 4-2).

Table 4-2. Develop A STRATEGY CAPTURE TABLE

REQUIREMENT
 

APPROACH
 

FEATURES
 

BENEFITS
 

PROOF

3.2.4 Display Processor Reliability
 

Use Modified COTS
 

- In service

- 450 hr MTBF versus 400 required
- ease of interface with existing aircraft

- in current inventory
 

All data associated with MTBF

STEP THREE: STRATEGY REVIEW

Reviews highlight the data in your proposal development and give everyone the option of shaping the course of your total approach. The more reviews the better. You can’t put your work under enough scrutiny.

The Strategy Review should be done in a “Round Table” Review. Distribute hard copies of the completed strategy tables at the meeting and use overheads from your projector. Bring together the core team. They will go through each of the collected strategies to ensure:

1- They are in line with the high level strategies

2- They are low risk for the overall approach

3- Strategies are in sync and do not contradict one another.

STEP FOUR: PUBLISHING STRATEGIES

Share all published strategies to the team on a secure shared drive.

SUMMARY

We have seen a simplified approach to a complicated subject : strategy development. Using a step-by-step process it is possible to create strategies that flow down from the top level strategies for each of the major requirements in the RFP. It is then necessary to have a rigorous review of those strategies to ensure they fall in line with your overall solution.

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FRANK and I SORT IT ALL OUT

One day Frank and I were sitting in a huge war room in the middle of nowhere trying to put together a difficult proposal volume. The draft we had received from the team didn’t follow the approved storyboards and there were no graphics included in the text. We had two days to go before Red Team.

“We ought to write out the golden rules of proposal development and hand them out to these guys with every kick-off package,” said Frank.

“That would be great,” I said, “But they’d never read them.”

“Don’t be so negative,” said Frank. “They might be desperate for humor.”

So it goes in the proposal game.

INTRODUCTION – RULES THAT YOU MUST ALWAYS FOLLOW

As we drill through many successful proposal developments there are a number of truths that fall out of each process. These truths cannot be spoken enough, cannot be followed enough and cannot be known well enough. They must be marked down on the walls of the cave and read by the flickering light of the camp fires as the rest of the tribe falls asleep. And in those late night contemplations they must ring like the bells of Notre Dame, like the sirens song, like the call to battle, like…well you get the picture. So without further ado here are the rules that I’ve written for Datawrite (www.datawrite.com):

RULE ONE

Write to the Evaluator. You are always responding to a requirement so that the evaluator can score you higher than the competitor. This is your number one mantra. Say it over and over.

What does this mean? How can you talk to the mysterious evaluator?

First and foremost you’ll want to respond directly to the requirement you have read in the RFP package. This could be one line in a specification or statement of work. It could be an overview statement leading into an RFP section. Use some of the requirement words in your lead-in so that there is no doubt of your intention. Give your approach statement which includes your strategy so that the evaluator will see what your company’s solution is for this requirement. Suppress any of the following negative statements; but…, however…, we will not…., etc.” Although it may seem important to you to explicate every shadow of doubt you have about your approach, stay on the high road. Also, never tell the evaluator what you don’t intend to tell them, “We will not discuss the following….”

Another important ingredient in speaking to the evaluator is to recognize the structure that they have asked you to follow in Section L “Proposal Instructions,” of the RFP and the scoring criteria that they have set forth in Section M “Evaluation Criteria.” First, you have structured your proposal response using their instructions. This should be clear in your numbering scheme. Secondly, the evaluator must use his rating criteria to score you so recognize that in your text. Give emphasis to the highest of the criteria. Let them know that you have gauged your response to receive their highest score.

These are the most important elements in “speaking to the evaluator.”

RULE TWO

Treat everyone on your team as you would want to be treated. Proposals are pressure cookers. People can be mean when they’re under pressure. Remember, when it’s all over you’re still going to have to work together. Make friends – they’ll be yours for life.

Working with a team through long hours and over a long period of time can be taxing. People miss their families. They miss dental and doctor appointments. They feel disconnected from their normal life. On top of this they are taking criticism as their proposal sections go through the review process. Some people don’t take criticism no matter how well it is intended.

Therefore, make your team comfortable. Bring in meals, give people time off as they need it. Have frequent status meetings. Applaud good efforts and help those who are struggling. This is the time to make your proposal work and it takes a lot of “people skills.” Always be diplomatic and find opportunities to bring humor to your relentless drive towards success. Remember to set goals that can be met. If they reach them let them stay home for the weekend. They can always be on call.

RULE THREE

Work hard to meet every major milestone. By keeping to your schedule, you ensure the best possible product with the fewest all-nighter casualties.

A well run proposal development operation depends on meeting those major milestones for reviews. If the effort is put in to establish a daily status and to meet action items head on, you can meet these schedules. And as long as your team meets these critical dates they will cut down on the late night hours.

We’ve had clients remark that they would have been up all night the last few nights of any other proposal development. They said this as we sat around the afternoon before delivery watching the final volumes being printed. And yes, they won that one.

RULE FOUR

Use Government nomenclature and numbers in your responses. This will ensure clarity of response and the highest scoring.

This is a part of your “talk to the evaluator,” mind set. As you build those compliance matrices and outlines always use the exact nomenclature and numbering system that the government does in its RFP package. In this way both your review teams and the government evaluators will always be absolutely sure of what you are responding to. Never allow a maverick to convince your team that “we call that something else here.” No one on the government side will care. They’ll just be confused.

So if the RFP Specification has a paragraph entitled “3.2.3.1 Subsystem Assembly,” that’s what the number and title of your paragraph should be. That’s right, you should have a corresponding Section 3, subparagraph 2.3.1 called Subsystem Assembly. Underneath that you can have names for the assemblies of your actual design. Introduce them first of course.

RULE FIVE

You must respond to every requirement to make the technical cut. If you don’t your proposal will not be evaluated. Use a compliance matrix to ensure that you check each requirement off.

So, where the rubber meets the road is the first line of evaluation. This is usually done against requirements check-off lists created right from the specification, Statement of Work and Section L instructions. Since you used all of these to create your master outline you should be in good shape to check your own work.

This first line of evaluation is meant to weed out those who did not make the technical cut either by not following instructions or by not fully responding to all of the requirements. It would be foolish to say the least not to make this cut. In some cases groups will totally rearrange requirements and respond to them as they like. The excuse they will use for not following the government’s lead is “We gave them a cross reference matrix. They can use that to find our responses.” This is not true. For after searching for a while even the best, hardest working evaluator will give up and fail you. Remember, they won’t spend time looking for all of your responses. Just follow the lead and ensure that you make the cut.

RULE SIX

Every claim that you make in your proposal must be substantiated by fact. This can be in the form of a trade-off-study, scientific demonstration, past performance or other hard data. Substantiate every claim with back-up data. An unsubstantiated claim will not receive points from the evaluator.

This rule takes us to the difference between boasting, motherhood and real proposing. Some engineers disdain unsubstantiated claims as “flowery language,” as well they should. Once you have an approach and a strategy you must gather enough facts to back it up. That’s the purpose of filling in the substantiating data part of the storyboard form. Remember when I pointed out that this is the time to do your homework. You might have a discourse on a demonstration that still has a few blanks to fill in. You might site test results before all of the data is gathered. But you will have looked in to what data you intend to present is and how this data will “substantiate” your claim.

In the case of using past performance for substantiation there are several things to remember. One, is the past performance data readily available and is it validated? This is important in case the government goes to the administering office for that previous contract. If your data cannot be validated by the client you may receive a deficiency report after proposal submittal. Always ensure that your substantiation can afford hard scrutiny.

RULE SEVEN

No one person writes a good proposal. Use a strict review process to ensure that everyone gets a cut at the final.

This rule brings up personality. It is hard to drive personality out of the proposal building process. If someone works night and day to create storyboards and draft text they have ownership. So when the rigorous review process begins there is always the chance that some folks will get their feeling hurt. It is the proposal manager and program manager’s job to ensure that they are made to feel a part of the process and that they are not being singled out for criticism. For it is the criticism and help they will get from others during the review process that will strengthen and enhance their work.

RULE EIGHT

Check your proposal for “Auditability.” Can you trace a task in the Statement of Work to a box in your Work Breakdown Structure to a cost in your Cost Volume? Run numerous cross checks on all of your costed items and tasks.

We used to have a Program Manager at one company I worked at that had a method for checking the auditability of the proposals he was in charge of. He would have one of the section leaders called into his office. He would then take a single proposal paragraph and ask the following questions:

1. Show me where this work or hardware/software is reflected in the Work Breakdown Structure

2. Now show me where this will be performed or procured in the program schedule

3. Next show me if this affects any other task or delivery

4. Next, show me the cost associated with this task or procurement

And so on until he was convinced that every piece of this proposal entry could be verified throughout the rest of the proposal. That is auditability, and it is necessary in proving to the client that you have a convincing, low risk approach to their RFP requirements.

RULE NINE

Strategies are the drivers for every approach you take in the proposal. They must be consistent from volume to volume.

One of the benefits of using storyboards is that they allow you to take a quick snapshot of all of the materials that will appear in all of your volumes before they are committed to text. This approach allows you to take your carefully developed strategies and ensure that they are woven into each of those volumes prior to draft development. Evaluators will take note of these common threads and give you higher scores. They will also notice if they have not been consistent.

Arrange strategies so that they flow down to the lower paragraphs where they can be further detailed. In the case of claiming high reliability for a proposed system, make sure that the paragraphs that address each of the system lowest replaceable units (LRUs) address their individual reliability data. This will give a high visibility to your over all system mean time between failure (MTBF). In the management volume under the make/buy paragraph or as a lead-in to your hardware/software lists you can talk to your selection of components and LRUs based on reliability. By the time you are finished you will have a neat volume-to-volume discourse on reliability supporting your claims.

RULE TEN

Hang everything on the wall to give high visibility to all of the data your team has developed.

We talked about the storyboard development and review which required wall space. We also covered clarification and deficiency reports using the wall. It makes a good place to review your work.

The wall can also be used to hold data relevant to cross volume work. Have a place that allows system diagrams, common graphics, organization charts, lists of acronyms and common program terminology. This will allow authors to browse this material at will. Information posted in this manner gives everyone the same idea of what is being proposed. Without this type of visibility people tend to remember different versions of important program elements.

You will also cut down on repetitive art work which can bog down your graphics resources. The wall can be used as a way to highlight exactly what is going on through out your proposal effort.

RULE ELEVEN

Strike out all bull crap and flowery language. The only words that belong in your proposal are claims, features of claims, benefits and substantiating information. Even executive summaries must be loaded with facts and value.

We have touched on this subject in several places in the book. Nothing is worse in a modern technical proposal than useless claims and hyperbole. It may seem to make sense when the author wrote it because he or she was trying to insert what they felt was “marketing speak” into the proposal. But this type of language can do more to hurt your proposal than to enhance it. In the world of page limited responses there isn’t room for fluff. Just edit it out. You’ll have a better product to show for it.

SUMMARY

We have given eleven hard and fast rules for proposal development. Each of them is a mere component of a very complicated effort. Yet, it never hurts to have rules. It gives you a basis for the decision making process.

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Virtual Reviews enable teams with remote groups to have a single, cohesive review while saving travel and schedule costs. With a part of the core review team present in the war room, the remote sections of that core team use a tool like NetMeeting and speaker-phones to follow the flow of the review. In this way the entire review team can converse and agree or disagree on what comments are captured on the wall.

Process

A Facilitator will ensure that both on site and off site reviewers can address the boards as the Facilitator moves them through the following disciplined process:

1- All Storyboards are hung in the war room by volume and section at eye level. Each section and volume is in large bold lettering on a placard above the storyboards so that reviewers instantly know where they are in the Proposal Outline. Storyboards can be multiple pages (one below the other with graphics attached below them).

2- The Review Team is made up of Corporate Officers and two to three members of the Red Team acting as a Steering Committee. This approach ensures that major direction and approaches are on course well in advance of the first draft review and the subsequent Red Team Review. In this manner the Red Team becomes a polishing session rather than a rewrite exercise. This approach mimics the insight of the evaluators who have followed your pre-solicitation marketing approach and are knowledgeable of your capabilities and approach. The trick is to first capture the approach on the storyboards.

3- Writers of the Storyboards and subject area experts that have given inputs to them are on call to answer reviewer questions.

4- Copies of the RFP Sections are left open on the war room table for reviewers to refer to when they are assessing individual requirement responses.

5- A copy of the Volume outlines and Requirements Interface Matrix are attached to the War Room wall. All of this reference material will be e-mailed to the virtual participants before the review commences.

A Requirements Interface Matrix (RIM) goes beyond but includes the compliance Matrix. It is a comprehensive outline and statusing device that connects all of the dots. It is a proposal development product that I created for the Datawrite (www.datawrite.com) proposal method. Once your team has been assigned, they can go to the matrix and see exactly which requirements from each part of the RFP that they are expected to respond to in each assigned area. It also tells management where that assignment is in the sign-off cycle (Storyboard, draft, review level) and more. Otherwise, it is a single matrix that tells me where the proposal is in development at any one time. I boil this down to stop light chart for morning status meetings.

6- The Facilitator reads the header on the first board. Since there are personnel on the conference call, the Facilitator briefly walks through the board noting approaches. Other reviewers can stand and read the storyboards independently. Remote reviewers see the storyboard on NetMeeting.

7- After a storyboard has been addressed by the Facilitator the floor is open to discussion and critique by the reviewers and virtual reviewers. This focus is critical to the success of the session.

8- The Facilitator captures comments agreed to by the team directly on the storyboards with a Sharpie. A designated person also captures the comments on an excel spreadsheet. Notes on yellow stickies are discouraged since they can fall off and be lost once the boards are taken down and copied. All notes are initialed by the reviewer involved so that when the writer has a question while writing the first draft he or she knows who to ask for clarification.

9- As the review progresses, reviewers may want to revisit previous storyboards to cross-thread approaches and other relevant data from one storyboard to another.

10- When the reviewers agree that a section is completed, the Facilitator signs them off.

11- The storyboards are then removed from the wall and an insurance copy is made for the master review folder held by the Proposal manager.

12- The original mark-up is returned to the writer as a Roadmap to use in creating the updated draft (Integrated into the first SBMC draft).

13- After the draft copy is updated an edit is performed to remove mother hood and other superfluous data. The copy is brought down to the agreed upon page count and a First draft review is scheduled. This review allows team members to assess the overall volume before the Red Team.

14- During the First Draft Review, the electronic comments captured on the spreadsheet are used to assess whether or not the draft has followed the previous review comments.

15- The Proposal Manager maintains a copy of all review comments.

At the conclusion of the Storyboard (Pink Team) Review, the writers have all of the information they need to flesh out a meaningful first draft with accompanying graphics.

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CONSULTANT’S CORNER

On the last day as Frank and I walk out of the war room and say good by to all of our new friends we always feel both elated over the job we accomplished and sad to leave everyone. It is, however, nice to be going home and I must admit that after a few months and midway into a new assignment we will find it hard to remember most of their names.  They will have all been displaced in the brain’s ROM for a whole new set of  names and faces.  This is just the nature of the work.  But the one thing that stays consistent through each of these endeavors is the discipline explained in this book.  The same approach wins aircraft contracts, insurance contracts, high performance computing contracts, system engineering service contracts and so on.  It’s not the product or service, it’s the capability to understand the problem and the ability to devise approaches to winning those contracts that counts.  Now you have the secret to fire.  But don’t forget to bring in an experienced fire eater to augment your team.

INTRODUCTION – A FEW GUIDELINES FOR THE CONSULTANT TEAM

A Proposal Team needs a great deal of talent including leadership, volume leaders, subject area experts, editors and production personnel.

As a company entering into a large scale proposal effort you will need to assemble a team of these talented folks who can respond to all of the requirements in the request for proposal (RFP).  Using consultants will often help to ramp up quickly for these efforts and will allow you to augment your team with the types of specialized individuals you may not want to hire on a full time basis at a later date.

As with every team building effort the job starts with a strong, experienced leader.  Once the leader is in-place, he or she can start building the rest of the team.  Without clear leadership nothing will happen.

THE TRAVELING LIFE
Once you have signed your contract and have agreed to your rate, it’s time to travel to the client’s site to begin work.  That’s right, travel.  Life for a proposal consultant is spent on the road.  Forget about all of that telecommuting business you hear about.  You’ll be working with highly proprietary material, sometimes classified material and your client won’t take kindly to a consultant who doesn’t want to work shoulder-to-shoulder with their team on-site regardless of the price of gas.

CONSULTANT RULES
Here are a few points of etiquette when it comes to dealing with a client.  Especially if you want repeat work:
• Show up a half an hour before the client and prepare for the daily status meeting
• Take lunch and dinner when the client does
• Never leave the premises without letting someone responsible know that you’re leaving and when you’ll be back.
• Be the last one to leave in the evening.
• If it is a classified job ensure that the safe’s are all locked and that there are no classified documents left out on anyone’s desk.

CONSULTANT EVALUATION LIST
Here are some of the ways you can tell if you’re NOT being well-served by your proposal consultants:
• On day one, more than three consultants are dropped on your doorstep.  Most consultants don’t become productive until the basic ground work has been accomplished.
• You are sold a complicated process that requires a three inch binder
• The process the consultants use requires redundant paperwork which forces engineers to rewrite their inputs many time over in slightly different ways
• The consultant’s review process require days of additional paperwork that results in material that the authors cannot use.
• Consultants are arrogant and have a “you must do it my way” mind set.

Here are some of the ways you can tell if you ARE being served well by your current proposal development consultants:
• On day one a proposal lead and a staff analyst arrive.  While the lead works with your staff, the analyst quickly accomplishes a requirements matrix and volume outlines
• A close to paperless trail is kept active with an online process and wall hangings
• Simple storyboard sheets, once signed off, act as the approved roadmap for the first draft.  All approved material is used.
• The review process ends with writers quickly receiving original approved comments for direct incorporation into text and graphics.
• You’ll never need an all-nighter because the proposal lead sticks to a milestone oriented schedule.
• Consultants are master diplomats and act as investigative reporters to help get the best data out of your staff.

THE SUBJECT OF WIN RATE
Many proposal development companies talk about their high win rates (85% and above).  How real is it to say that you as a consultant or direct employee in charge of proposal development have directly affected the win rate?  Not very much unless you are directly responsible for coming up with the final cost. 

I’ve long said that we have a 100% success ratio, because as I see it, it’s our job to make sure that the proposal makes the technical cut and gets to BAFO.  That means that it is 100% responsive to the requirements of the RFP and the cost is auditable throughout all volumes.  We at Datawrite have never not made the technical cut.  That is something anyone can be proud of, and as a proposal manager it is your most important goal. 

Make the technical cut, ensure that your cost is in the competitive range and have winning strategies are woven throughout your proposal.  You will be a winner!

SUMMARY

This is the end of our journey through proposal development using the Datawrite Proposal Response Organizational System (PROS).   Although much of the material has been touched on lightly as in a primer, the Datawrite staff of proposal experts is available for hire under contract to bring your company more fully into the system.  Once established, the process becomes a routine that will allow you to rapidly address incoming RFPs with a consistent, winning approach.

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