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Heading straight for disaster

5/28/2008

6 Comments

 
Posted by Jon
​
BJ and I often play with techniques drawn from the world of improv, many adapted from the work of our good friend Izzy Gesell (author of the highly-recommended “Playing Along“). We’ve been having fun with our colleagues recently, having asked them to suggest “the worst opening line imaginable in an Executive Summary.”

I started the ball rolling by proposing either: “”We were quite astonished to receive your RFP after all of our recent troubles” or “This project is doomed to failure.”
​
Here are a few of the team’s submissions – we’d love it if you commented with your own ideas!
Graham – “We’re really sorry for submitting this proposal so late.”

BJ – “While we’ve never done what you’ve requested before we’d sure like to give it a try.”

Natalie – “We didn’t want to bid for this project initially but as we weren’t busy we thought ‘Why not?’”

Natalie – “While we might be twice the price of our (less than gr8) competitors, you will find our attention to detail ‘n’ quality 2nd too none…”

Graham – “Disclaimer: Please note that we accept no responsibility for any content written herein. We have no trust in our team and didn’t :ave time to read the document either.”

Richard Jenkins, in the UK, offered a real-life example:
We have been supplying goods and services to the <Customer> group for over 10 years. Despite this, complacency is something that is never considered an option.
Richard Buijs has the last word, though, with:
“Our company was founded 50 years ago.”
Actually, much as I love this as an example of bidder-centric writing, I rather hoped that Richard would submit something in Dutch, as he runs our business in the Netherlands. I think he would have stolen the prize with an opening line that was in a language that few if any of the readers could read.

Over to you to join in!
6 Comments
Connie Sanford
3/26/2016 03:43:12 am

We are pleased to provide you with a proposal that is as easy to understand as your RFP.

Reply
Lesa C
3/26/2016 03:43:19 am

Ha! Good one, Connie!

Reply
Tony Eyles
3/26/2016 03:43:32 am

here’s our bid. We know we’re just making up numbers but it good practice. Cheers.

Reply
Izzy Gesell
3/26/2016 03:43:46 am

Having never submitted as proposal before, we bring a fresh, untainted perspective.

Reply
Robin
3/26/2016 03:43:58 am

Because you hired a consultant that bills by the hour, who developed a ridiculous proposal with 300 questions to prove their worth, making the cost of responding to this RFP more than the first year’s revenue we would realize if we actually won the business, we hope you don’t mind that we included OUR hourly rate in your fees.

Reply
Jon
3/26/2016 03:44:08 am

Love the suggestions!

(Izzy – great to see you here. Those of you who don’t know Izzy should click on the link and check out his website. If you ever need someone to bring an original insight to team building, or to address a major conference, Izzy’s your guy).

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