Gary Everett

A company/bid-team must perform effective pre-bid marketing actions to position itself to win. A Bid Decision Board of senior management must assess whether these activities were effective enough to prepare a winning proposal.

The Board should evaluate the strength of the company’s readiness to bid based on the questions given below.

1. Do the technical requirements fit our company business model, and do we have strong corporate experience?
2. Do we understand the customer mission and purpose of the contract? Does the customer know us?
3. What customer contacts have we established by name/responsibility?
4. Do we have qualified, solid key personnel and a key technical team in place or available through subcontractors/partners?
5. Do we have a clear assessment of the competition, and can we beat them?
6. Do we have winning proposal themes? What are they and are they believable?
7. Can we be price competitive?
8. What concerns/hot buttons of the Government program managers are not stated in the Solicitation?
9. Can we write a winning proposal in the given response time?

Whether the company is large or small, this step is necessary in order to ensure the wise investment of resources. If the questions above can be answered in the affirmative, then the company is justified in making the investment needed to prepare the proposal.