As I mentioned in a recent post here, I’ve been traveling quite a bit and doing lots of presenting. I’ve also been doing a fair amount of work helping clients develop their proposal capabilities (developing processes, reviewing/revising content, staffing, etc.)

And it’s all been going great, the presentation have been very well received and the participants have, very flatteringly, said they’ve found them very beneficial and enjoyable. And the work with clients is producing tangible benefits and we’re doing great things together.

But as rewarding as all this work is, I really miss being involved in a ‘real deal’. It’s been about 6 weeks or so since I last supported a live effort. (This was for an insurance company, was fairly complex and had a very short lead-time…and it was considered a ‘must win’ opportunity…and there was no shortage of pressure or focus on this!).

And what, you ask do I miss about working on a proposal effort like this? Well, everything I guess. I miss the planning, the strategizing, the team work and camaraderie, the crafting of answers and pieces of content. I miss the excitement of competing and doing everything possible to ensure we receive the maximum score and that the proposal produced puts us in the best position to win. Heck, I even miss the collating!

Does that make me strange? I don’t think so. I think those people who have had an opportunity to work on a proposal and to do some really creative work with a great team will know exactly what I mean.