Great analogy, great discussion and it would appear you two are in violent agreement.

My two cents (ok, maybe the whole nickel!) -

As I’ve said many times, it’s the process that will allow you to do great things. And the analogy I use is that of the ‘rules of the road’ when driving.

On most any US highway with a posted speed of 55, you could, assuming you had the necessary driving skills and vehicle, travel at speeds in excess of 100mph fairly safely (as in the event of an emergency such as getting someone to the hospital.)

We can do this because there’s a process and we expect most of the drivers to adhere to the guidleines (granted, someplaces – Mass. comes to mind – this might not be quite ‘most’ of the drivers). Drivers don’t, for the most part, change lanes on a whim, stop in the left hand lane, etc. The actions of the other drivers are fairly predictable.

Now, imagine if there were no rules. How fast could you go? It’s probably safe to say the highway would immediately become grid locked and no one would be moving at all.

So yes, we need process. And as pointed out in the discussion, this needs to be the right amount. Not too much, not too little. And as Jeff would tell you, you need to know when and how to NOT follow the process something to get things done :-)

I’m not sure we disagree at all! I’m certainly not arguing that organisations shouldn’t have processes in place, clearly defined, with all who sail in them duly trained. And we’ve helped lots of clients out there to develop some really neat process handbooks and toolkits, with lots of checklists to use at the right point of the bid.

My concerns are when proposal managers become slaves to the process, tied to a large and detailed operating manual (”you must fill in every box on every checklist”) – rather than using well-thought-through processes nimbly, to support sensible, pragmatic decision-making on each proposal effort. It’s about ensuring consistency – at the same time as giving the proposal manager the chance to do the creative things that are needed to make this proposal team buzz for this proposal effort to this customer.

And I also get worried when processes focus too much on internal governance to the detriment of producing a first-class proposal. I often see process manuals that revolve almost exclusively on the ‘risk should we win’ – to the detriment of ‘what we can do to win’. And I also observe far too many proposal managers spending hours on end filling in internal checklists to the extent that “I really don’t have time to look at the proposal itself today”.

There needs to be a balance – appropriate governance, yet not some complex bureaucratic edifice standing in the way of effective strategy development and content design, value-adding peer review, and so on.

And I hate to admit this, but I know from personal experience that even small teams — or, in my case, a single writer — with a lot of excitement can turn out merely ‘complete and compliant’ responses! But I believe in process, and the better I get at following ours, the higher the quality of my output. Should we burn the operating handbook in the flames of passion?