Get over it?
I found a kindred spirit recently in a sales manager with whom I’ve been doing some work.
I mentioned that I’m extremely competitive. So is he.
I explained that I don’t lose many opportunities on which I work. Neither does he.
I commented that I still feel frustrated by the bids I’ve worked on that have been lost. Him too.
Between us, we then listed the brands that we respectively boycott, having been involved in unsuccessful bids to the organisations concerned. And we realised that between us we avoid shopping in a fair percentage of high-street stores as a result.
Anyone else find that they only lose a few deals, but find it hard to forget the ones they do?!
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Out of all the hundreds of RFPs I have done (many of which I can’t remember) I have lost two and still get that Grrrr feeling when I think of them:
1. 1989 DoD contract for a technical support center for the B-2 Stealth Bomber
I should have had this, we already did a very successful support center for the B-1B Bomber, but the competition promised them a new GUI called Windows. They got the contract but failed miserably trying to get a complex UNIX weapons system to run under the original Windows (ha ha).
2. 1995 UnitedHealthcare
They stayed with the encumbent. For the next couple of years we concentrated on taking every bit of business away from that encumbent. Ultimately, it would have been better for the encumbent to have passed on that contract ;-)
My favorite pep talk? “If we complete and we don’t win, it means we are the LOSER!”
Maybe it’s just me….
…but I don’t think so.
I’m as competitive as the next guy, maybe more so. And I like to win. I think most people do.
But, as strange as it might sound to some people, especially coming from a seasoned proposal professional such as myself, I don’t mind losing, so long as I’ve given it the absolute best shot possible. Proposals are a ‘game’ and in every game, someone wins and someone has to lose. Sure I want to win. But I don’t expect to win every time. Heck, lots of times, I’m with a team that knows going in that the primary purpose for releasing the RFP to shake up the encumbent and there is no real intent to change…and the decision was made to bid for valid reasons.
Said different;y, anyone can win all the time if they never take a risk. If you do take some qualified risks, eventually you’ll lose a deal. I don’t like when that happens, but I’m okay with it. I learn from it, use it to improve my chances of winning the next deal. (One must remeber, the baseball players who hold records for the most home run hitters typically hold records for most strike outs too. :-)
Barbara – I’m glad to see someone else who reacts in the same way.
BJ – I agree entirely regarding the ones that I work on where we set out to lose – i.e. I help a team knowing they can’t win a deal, but with a clear plan up-front to undermine the incumbent or position the company for a future deal. They can be amongst the most satisfying – provided the strategy is agreed up-front, and provided it works. That then isn’t “losing”, in my books, as one’s achieved one’s stated objective. (Of course, too may teams use this as an excuse – they tell people, “We never expected to win,” *after* the event, not beforehand!).