I thought readers of the blog might like to join me in congratulating BJ, who’s just formally completed the process of qualifying as a proposal “Professional”, the highest level in APMP’s accreditation scheme. It’s lovely to see him getting recognised with such a prestigious award, and absolutely fitting that BJ should be one of the first people worldwide to be officially certified as operating at the very highest standards in our profession.

It’s fantastic to see the success that APMP is having with the scheme, and heartening to know that proposal managers now have a route to gaining a credible professional qualification. The original accreditation discussion was led in the US, and I can remember kicking off the UK side of the debate when I was running the APMP “chapter” over here five years or so ago. The pace of progress since has been spectacular, and all in the profession owe a huge vote of thanks to Cathy Day, the marvellous program director.

Customers always write fantastic Invitations to Tender, Requests for Proposal and other such documents, don’t they? (Ducks to avoid formation of pigs swooping low overhead).

My latest favourite? We’ve just worked with a client on their response to a procurement document which insists that vendors must “bare all costs incurred in relation to their proposals”.

When I presented to a CEO and his staff recently, my client - the VP of Global RFP Management for a large Investment Management Company - introduced me as “a consultant”. She then went on to highlight my credentials, the successes I’ve achieved for other clients, my professional accreditations, etc.

I have never been comfortable with being a ‘consultant’ and I stated this in my opening remarks. I said that what comes to mind for me when I think of a consultant is a rather young (and I’m certainly not that as Jon will be quick to point out!), possibly straight out of school (that too was some years ago) intelligent (don’t go there Jon!) and bright individual (OK Jon, go ahead, take your best shot.).

But, giving all consultants a bad name, sadly all too often such an individual probably has little to no actual hands-on experience and may in fact know quite a bit less than those whom he or she is consulting. Indeed, the assignment they’re on may be the first time they ventured into that particular industry or area of work and yet they believe they have the right to tell these more experienced and knowledge people how to do things better.

Based on comments I heard (and some great jokes of which I’ll share a couple of favorites in a bit so keep reading!) this general view of consultants is held by many people in the business world. In fact, I think a recent Dilbert comic summed up many people’s view of consultants pretty well –

(Read on …)

Here I am, sitting in a meeting room waiting to run a pre-proposal planning workshop later this morning, having arrived ludicrously early after an amazingly traffic-free drive. We’re in a brand new hotel that’s obviously given real thought to their design and branding. Every participant has a lovely folder in front of them with a free mousemat; the hotel has kindly provided a fact sheet about its services.

Apparently, while I am waiting, I can go and enjoy “a selection of notorious Costa Coffee’s”, which – never minding the guest appearance of an itinerant apostrophe – is a rather worrying concept. I’m picturing the barista’s framed gallery of newspaper front covers – ‘Coffee poisoning: five rushed to emergency ward’ or ‘Coffee shop tragedy: “It tasted fine at the time,” comments victim.’

The leaflet proceeds to tell me that each drinks is “made from freshly ground Costa granules and perfectly made as only it should be.” Many a proposal writer would be proud of creating such a glowing description of instant coffee were they selling it in a tender.

As for the local attractions: “for the thrill seekers there’s Drayton Park Manor & Zoo”. I’m not sure I want to know….

I know from conversations with colleagues that I’m not the only proposal manager to have been challenged at some point by a content contributor bearing a copy of the ghastly “Eats, Shoots and Leaves”, published a couple of years back. They’ll argue over some obscure proofreading point or other – when they’d be far better off focusing on improving the inherent quality of their content!

Huge, huge kudos to author Lynne Truss for managing to sell hundreds of thousands of a book about punctuation. But those of you who share my dislike for its sometimes-overly-fussy approach might enjoy Louis Menand’s brilliantly scathing review from The New Yorker:

The first punctuation mistake in “Eats, Shoots & Leaves: The Zero Tolerance Approach to Punctuation” (Gotham; $17.50), by Lynne Truss, a British writer, appears in the dedication, where a nonrestrictive clause is not preceded by a comma. It is a wild ride downhill from there.

Both the book itself (for all my reservations) and (especially) this particular deprecating review are great reading for anyone who loves writing.

Imagine knowing exactly who on your team is the best resource to help solve a particular crisis. Or knowing what personal characteristic of an individual might cause problems ”in the heat of battle.” This is not only possible but essential for a high performing team.

One of my favorite parts of the proposal ”game” is the opportunity to create and work with a successful team. There is certain energy to a group people who are all performing at a high level and focused on a common set of goals. It’s been said that there is nothing more serious than a child at play, and I think a bit of this applies to a proposal team that really has its act together. They’re actually playing, not working. (Jon and I often refer to our work as such, but please don’t tell our clients…they might not be so inclined to pay us for having such fun.)

I’m often complimented on my ability to help a group of people – very often a diverse set of folks whom I have never met and worked with before – to become a tight unit that functions extremely well together and to do so in a very short time (often in only a day and sometimes in mere hours!)

It is, of course, most flattering to receive such compliments. But the reality is, as with most of the processes I use and suggest, it is not ”rocket science” to create and manage a successful team — it just takes a good solid, logical, common-sense approach.

For each of the proposal engagements I’ve undertaken over the years, no matter what the size, the steps I’ve followed have been the same. And here I’d like to highlight one of those steps – that being the uncovering, discussing and understanding of the strengths and the challenges that members bring individually and collectively to the team.

My approach is to have team members present, as the last part of an introduction exercise (and we do an introduction exercise even if everyone knows and has worked with each other*), what they see as their talents and their traits. As with each component of the introductions, I frame this very carefully, so that team members will provide the pertinent information.

I start by pointing out that by understanding what each member brings to the team in the way of talent we can, especially when the going gets tough (and it almost always does at some point!), play to that person’s strength. The same goes for traits.

Talents - I ask each participant to consider what they bring to the team. I point out that that I’m not looking for academic knowledge or past experience (we’ve covered this previously in the intros). Here I’m looking for, to put it in sports terms, when they are the “go-to guy” (using “guy” generically here of course) for the team. Perhaps the team member is highly organized and a great planner. Other roles a member might assume are as “big picture” person, or the person who knows it’s time for everyone to take a break. Maybe he or she can diffuse a tense situation with a bit of humor. All these “skills” will typically prove to be necessary and valuable in the course of a proposal effort.

Traits – Here I ask each person to consider and present, “What about you is going to drive the rest of the team crazy after we’ve worked with you for 3 hours, 3 days or 3 weeks?” Team members typically laugh when I ask this – indicating to me that they know exactly what I’m looking for, as well as showing that they’re slightly nervous about admitting such things. I highlight things that typically make others a little nuts – such as the person who is always seeking perfection (to a fault!) or the person who is always late, or perhaps the person who constantly interrupts. Or how about the person who insists on adding his or her two cents, even when the topic doesn’t concern them? By getting such traits on the table and most importantly, by having the person who displays these traits present them and own them, the team can then refer to them without the risk of being the first to point these out. In that way, the team can (hopefully) deal quickly and effectively with the trait and get on with the work, without the embarrassment and associated anger that would typically happen. (Once a trait has been offered up by a team member, referring to it usually provokes humor (and a sheepish, “I know” grin) rather than anger.

So next time you’re getting your team together – present and discuss the talents and traits each of you brings – and I’m sure you’ll find your team is much the stronger for having done so.

*I include an Introductions exercise as part of each and every team kick off. Even for teams that know each other well, this allows the team to refresh their memory as to who is on the team, i.e., what they bring and how best their talents and traits can be put to good use.

Also – ‘cause I know you’ll ask :) - my introduction exercise typically include –

• Name - (Here I highlight honoring what the person wishes to be called, hopefully avoiding the difficulties that arise when someone inadvertently refers to someone named Susan as “Susie” and such.)

• Experience with proposals - (Looking to understand the level of understanding this person has coming into this effort so I ask for this with both the current company and any previously experience.

• Role within this proposal team – (And if this is different than expected this is later discussed and resolved)

• Personal objective for being on the team – (Critical to understand as this, and not necessarily the overall goal, is what will provide motivation for this individual.)

• Potential challenges – (Looking here for those things that could prevent or limit this individual’s contribution to the team - time constraints, upcoming events such as vacation, training, etc.)

• Talents and Traits.

An interesting discussion with participants on a recent course regarding the use of acronyms and abbreviations. I was asked about the impact on the reader if they don’t understand such a term in a proposal that they’re reading.

Here goes with my rough list of possible sub-conscious reactions from the evaluator, facing an unknown abbreviation:
• “I’m confused”
• “I feel stupid”
• “I don’t understand what they’re talking about”
• “I guess they mean that….” (risky all round, if their guess is wrong!)
• “I can’t follow this – I won’t bother reading the rest of the answer”
• “I can’t follow this – it’s a poor answer – I’ll give it a low score”
• “Working with this vendor would be really tough. I’d never know what they’re talking about, and would always be made to feel stupid”.

In the circumstances, it’s probably not worth taking the risk: avoid abbreviations where possible, and explain them clearly when you do decide to use them.

The Times had a perfect illustration of this in its corrections column a couple of weeks back:

The first two queries to arrive online referred to last Saturday’s report on the G8 summit, which mentioned “Russia’s most prominent NGOs”. Both readers wanted to know what an NGO is, a timely reminder of the old maxim that a newspaper should never underestimate the intelligence of its readers, but never overestimate their knowledge. It stands for non-governmental organisation, and we should of course have spelt it out at the first mention.

* TLA – three letter abbreviation. (But then I assumed you would know that!)

BJ commented recently on tactics for submitting proposals via electronic systems (sometimes known in the trade as “eRFP” or “eRFX” processes).

With my purchasing background, I was given to ponder what the buyer is trying to achieve by using one of these systems, as that might inform the debate. Perhaps sales teams have ultimately scored an own goal here – much of the drive to using the technology is caused by frustration with the quality and compliance levels of the proposals that buyers have seen in the past.

So, whist goals will vary from organisation to organisation (and from individual buyer to individual buyer), I guess it’s some or all of:
• qualify potential bidders (less serious players might not bother bidding, hence pruning the field straight away to a more manageable number of proposals to evaluate)
• ensure that all vendors provide the necessary information
• ensure that proposals are easy-to-evaluate (all answers appearing in the same order and format)
• makes it easier to compare proposals (e.g. “answer 25 from Vendor A vs. answer 25 from Vendor B”)
• bring more of a focus onto price (the “written stuff” can be compared and contrasted to make sure all vendors reach the baseline, before we look at the costs)
• making sure that timescales are adhered to rigidly
• reducing timescales (“it must be quicker for them to fill in boxes than format a huge document, surely?”)
• making it easier to circulate the relevant sections of proposals to the relevant evaluators for scoring, and (potentially) helping to collate their scores and evaluation notes in a consistent manner
• makes the process more efficient (debatable!).

There’s possibly a degree of corporate purchasing muscle-flexing here:
- we’ve bought (or been sold?!) a new system and we’re sure going to use it
- we think the system will help us get focus internally from colleagues across our business on the RFP process
- (perhaps increasingly in the future) making it easier to charge bidders for bidding (making sure that only serious suppliers bid – perhaps more than a desire to make money to offset the cost of their procurement exercise).

I guess my starting point for responding to an eRFX might be to understand why this particular customer is using a new process!

Now, all of that is fine, PROVIDED the system achieves these objectives AND doesn’t inhibit bidders from producing the best possible solutions/proposals:
- forcing them to spend more time concentrating on the technology (e.g. getting to understand the system, copying data into this new electronic format) at the expense of developing great content
- a poorly-designed set of questions and/or poor structure, that stops a supplier from “painting the big picture” and describing their best possible solution coherently
- imposing a format that restricts bidders from offering creative options.

And, of course, if you go back to purchasing theory, there’s certain categories of supply arrangements that might lend themselves to this sort of approach better than others. A “Strategic Critical” purchase (few vendors, hard to change, high spend, less price sensitive, security of high-quality supply being key) would potentially suffer more from a lack of creativity than a more commoditised purchase.

From a mail sent to me by someone who attended the APMP conference in New Orleans. I think this might take first prize for ‘Most Unintelligible’* text.

Dear ‘Proposal Guys’,

I just returned from the Big EZ, where I hurt after laughing throughout your presentation!

Just ran across this in an Executive Summary - can you believe it? Makes me want to cry…

“We are firm believers in the opportunity that organizations have to leverage technology to help with the challenges that you have defined and has worked with many organizations to help them quickly operationalize systems that can deliver immediate benefits in optimizing customer management. In these engagements, we utilize [our] software to allow our clients to truly optimize their customer contact strategy designs across offers, customers, channels, and time. To execute these strategies, in both real-time and batch environments, we enable strategies that have been designed in our [software] to be deployed within our leading business rules decisioning engine.”

The first sentence alone breaks just about every rule you could possible think of – multiple ideas, confusing wording, multiple tenses (amazingly, this text uses past, present AND future tenses – all in one sentence), run-on sentences (43 words), made up words (‘operationalize’???), repetitive words (optimize).

And can someone tell me what a ‘decisioning engine’ is????

Hey Jon. Perhaps we should have contest and solicit entries for this?

The recent “Open” golf championship took place at the Royal Liverpool course, just a few miles from my parents’ home. Much as I detest the game, the location in itself was enough to make me glance at the screen a few times to watch such a famous event taking place amidst such familiar scenery. I was glad I did – the closing moments when an emotional Tiger Woods sank the winning putt were extremely moving.

I took to watching the interaction between the participants and their caddies. Some golfers obviously viewed their caddy merely as someone who’s there to make their life easier. “Carry my bags for me and check I’ve filled in my scorecard correctly” appeared to be the order of their day.

Others consulted, listened, took advice. Sure, the caddy carried the bags and checked compliance. But they brought some knowledge of the course, of the weather conditions; they advised on which club to use; they coaxed and cajoled and motivated.

I’m hazarding a guess that the latter camp of caddies have a greater impact on the player’s chances of success. That’s probably similar to the relationship between account manager and proposal manager – are you there to carry the bags and see them through the necessary internal checks, or is your role to contribute to their chances of winning?