Posted by BJ
I received an e-mail a few days ago from a past participant of a workshop I presented….in 2002!
This person said that she often referred back to the workbook from that course and that she had put many of the concepts into practice. She had recently joined a new company and was writing to introduce me to the head of business development for her company.
I received an e-mail a few days ago from a past participant of a workshop I presented….in 2002!
This person said that she often referred back to the workbook from that course and that she had put many of the concepts into practice. She had recently joined a new company and was writing to introduce me to the head of business development for her company.
As I was writing a brief introduction in response, I realized it might prove interesting to readers here.
“Bobbie (name changed just so I could say ‘name changed’ here.),
It is most flattering that you continue to find the information from the workshop valuable and that it’s helped you improve your proposals and win rates. Always nice to hear. And thanks for introducing me to Jake (not his real name either. Trust me Jake works much better.)
Jake,
In her mail to me Bobby said you are one of those who ‘get it’. That’s good to know as my experience says that having someone in your position who does in fact ‘get it’ is critical to a companies having the necessary proposal capabilities. (And my experience is that those who truly do ‘get it’ are not in the majority.)
The analogy I often use is one of ‘fires’.
There are those companies wherein the proposal folks are making a futile attempt at ‘putting out fires’ (reactive) using ‘buckets of sand’ (less than adequately resourced and over capacity). And in these same companies the ‘powers that be’ (sales director and above) often don’t even smell the smoke
Those companies wherein those powers that be DO ‘get it’, undertake initiatives (proactively) to ensure their sales force is equipped (supported) to submit a first-class proposal for every opportunity they pursue (and the significantly higher win rates reflect this!).”
So dear readers, ask yourselves –
If the answer is yes, maybe you need to undertake initiatives to make raise the visibility of proposal within your company and ensure you have someone on high who truly ‘gets it’.
- Are you ‘putting out fires with buckets of sand’?
- Do the ‘powers that be’ even ‘smell the smoke’?
If the answer is yes, maybe you need to undertake initiatives to make raise the visibility of proposal within your company and ensure you have someone on high who truly ‘gets it’.