Posted by Jon under Processes & best practice | 
When considering the proposal in the context of the overall bid effort, it’s always important to think ahead to the negotiation phase. After all, few customers are simply going to give an immediate “yes” to the document that you submit; they’ll try and push you to improve your solution and lower your price before entering their Purchase Order or signing on the dotted line of the contract.
The proposal content needs to reflect this, ensuring that what you offer up-front:
(a) is sufficient to put you clearly out in front of your competitors, to become the bidder with whom the customer wants to move forward in negotiation, and
(b) leaves the necessary room to manoeuvre in the negotiation phase.
If you’re interested in reading more about negotiation, might I point you towards an excellent new book by a friend, Tom Beasor, with whom I’ve worked in the past and who’s acknowledged as an expert in this area. “Great Negotiators: How the Most Consistently Successful Negotiators Think And Behave” is fascinating stuff – a mandatory read for salespeople who drive negotiations, as well as for proposal staff who need to appreciate “what happens next” after the proposal and presentation. It’s available from Amazon in the UK and US. Who knows: if enough of you order copies, Tom might even buy the beers next time I see him!
Posted by BJ under APMP & accreditation |
I’m getting a fair number of inquiries regarding APMP accreditation and one of the recurring questions is, “Why should I become accredited?”
I had to consider this question myself prior to undertaking the process myself. I have now been through the process to obtain ‘Professional’ level accreditation and with Jon (who has also achieved Professional Level accreditation) have presented the Foundation Level Exam Preparation Workshop and coached others through the higher levels of accreditation I’ll offer my view on this question.
There are several reasons to seek accreditation –
1. You’ve earned it and deserve to be recognized.
If you have more than a year’s experience and have a good solid understanding of the basics of proposals you are eligible to take the Foundation Level exam. Successfully passing the exam is your opportunity to demonstrate that you’ve learned the relevant lessons well. And being awarded “Foundation Level” accreditation will let others know you are serious about your chosen profession.
2. Career advancement.
Achieving APMP accreditation provides tangible proof to your employer of your knowledge of proposals. Each level of accreditation achieved demonstrates your having gained more experience and validates the significant contributions you’ve made within your organization and to the profession of proposals. This should translate into career growth, promotions and the associated increases in salary.
3. It looks good on your resume (and is showing up these days as a ‘desirable’ during recruitment of proposal personnel).
APMP accreditation on your resume is proof of what you’ve don e and learned and helps you stand out among the other candidates.
4. To be part of your professional community.
As more and more individuals within the world of proposal seek and obtain APMP accreditation and in turn, both your fellow proposal professionals and employers will no doubt view this as one of the benchmarks of a person’s proposal capabilities. I’ve no doubt that having APMP accreditation will be seen as necessary within the next couple of years and you’re going to want to become accredited eventually, so you might as well get started now, right?
Watch for upcoming entries on our experiences going through the APMP accreditation process as well as our coaching and preparing others.
Posted by Jon under Processes & best practice |
I talked a little while back about the need to establish empathy with the customer in your proposal – especially, from the outset, in the Executive Summary.
It amuses me to see how some teams set about establishing said empathy. They’ll cut and paste copious extracts from the client’s web site and RFP, describing their corporate history and achievements. They’ll patronise the readers by playing back macro-level issues of the type that keep the CEO awake at night – but which bear little or no relevance to the hopes and fears of the team working on this particular initiative for the client.
In fact, in seeking to demonstrate understanding, they’ll actually achieve the exact opposite. Buyers are hoping to see that you have really understood their needs; that you can paraphrase, interpret, add insight. They’re not testing your ability to use Ctrl-C and Ctrl-V.
