Training Day XIV
The Power to Win BusinessThe Rapid Turnaround Commercial Proposal Process
Best practice processes honed for government proposals and applied to rapid turnaround commercial proposals can yield positive results. My government proposal background enabled my transitioning to working primarily commercial cost proposals, frequently five or more at a time, for diverse product lines and technologies with very short submittal times. Commercial proposals often have no prescribed outline, specifications, point scores or due dates compared to government proposals requiring full compliance to regulations and formal evaluation criteria. How can we ensure commercial proposals are managed to successfully submit on time? Although common proposal management elements for commercial and government proposals are kickoff meetings, drumbeat meetings, and costing, implementing the structure and discipline of the government proposal process has improved on-time submittal and win rates of commercial proposals.
Liz Chamberlain
Liz Chamberlain is a Proposal Manager with SMA, and is currently on assignment with General Atomics. Liz has 30 years as a proposal professional having worked within multiple areas of the proposal process. She has led, managed, and written competitive proposals for government and commercial proposals.Lost in Translation: Defining Proposal Terms and Activities
Many proposals involve partnering among highly diverse organizations: large businesses, small businesses, academic institutions, government laboratories, non-profits, and more. Their capabilities and sophistication in proposal efforts, and even the language they use, vary widely. This interactive discussion will explore approaches to effective communication and teamwork under these circumstances. What disconnects commonly occur, and when during the process do they arise? What do we do to prevent and overcome them? How do we assure that all team members have a common understanding of the processes and terms that we will use during capture planning, proposal planning, and proposal development?
Faye Farmer, CP APMP
I have improved the competitive nature of over $100M worth of proposals at ASU to multiple funding agencies by creating efficient paths between intelligence gathering and institutional collaborative networking, alongside predictive opportunity forecasting. Certified as an APMP Practitioner. To create a community of practice, I deliver six formal workshops and host a monthly informal working group open to students, faculty, and staff designed to introduce industry best practice in proposal management and codify best practice. At ASU for over 10 years, worked in variety of positions, but have spent eight years working exclusively on increasing research productivity of faculty and research scientists, irrespective of their discipline or sponsor agency.Things I Wish Proposal Writers Knew About Word
Microsoft Word. A seemingly easy tool to use, but a tool with many features and optimum ways of using those features to assist our proposal development activities. If only your authors knew the dangers of cut and paste. What do you mean, use the “styles”? How to deploy proposal templates. That’s not how you make a hanging indent! And other mysteries! Based on years of having to incorporate author content into winning proposals, an hour of basics (and some not so basics) on how Word works and what we can do to get proposal writer to be a help, not a hindrance, to proposal development.
Dick Eassom, CF APMP Fellow, aka Wordman
Dick Eassom is a Vice President at SMA, a certified APMP Fellow, past APMP Chief Executive Officer, recipient of the APMP Founders’ Award, and a presenter at twelve APMP Annual International Conferences and numerous APMP chapter events. Dick authored over forty “Wordman’s Production Corner” articles published in the APMP Perspective, and has over twenty years’ experience developing and leading proposals of all shapes and sizes to a wide variety of market sectors in the USA, UK, Canada, Australia, and Germany.Flying Cars and Tofu Bars: The Future Proposal Industry
A key tenet of Innovation Diffusion theory is that that the adoption of new processes follows a clearly definable timeline. This timeline ends when the market share of process adopters reaches a finite saturation level – and by that point, new innovations threaten to make the process obsolete. From its beginnings, the modern proposal industry has followed this model. But market forces, changes in technology, growth in the number of practitioners, and new processes – new innovations – threaten the status quo. This presentation will discuss the past, the present, and our future.
Randy Richter
Randy Richter is President of Richter & Company, the industry leading competitive intelligence and price to win support firm, and a long-time supporter of APMP. His company has helped clients win billions of dollars in new business over the last 10 years by turning open source data into actionable intelligence—news clients can effectively use.It’s Tough Creating a Winning Price Proposal
The price proposal is your avenue to the Government to show not only what a great price you offer, but also demonstrate that the price is reasonable, and responsive. Simultaneously, you have to express your financial strength at the best price. Pricing decisions make or break your organization financially, provide great value, and keep you focused on your goals. Along the way, you have literally thousands of pricing decisions to make, review, and repeat before the bid is ready to submit. We take you on a tour of those tough financial decisions on your way to a winning price.
Marsha Lindquist, CP APMP, NCMA Fellow
Marsha Lindquist, President of Granite Leadership Strategies, brings more than 30 years of experience as a cost proposal manager and contracts professional. She is an expert in cost proposal/grant management and development, pricing strategy, and pricing techniques that win, and has especially deep expertise assisting scientific and high technology companies. What distinguishes Marsha from others is her ability to provide innovative solutions to problems you face in today’s dynamic business environment. Ms. Lindquist is a National Contract Management Association Fellow and has achieved APMP Practitioner Level.Best Practices for Effectively Managing Proposals in a Virtual Environment (Panel)
For many of us, and in most of our industries, the “good old days” of having an entire proposal team working on a proposal, in-person and collocated in one proposal war room, is long gone. To add to the challenge, many proposal development groups now consist of staff located at different locations…be it working from home, from a client’s site, or from different geographic sites within our companies. Through the amazing advancements of communication and collaboration technology and software, proposal teams can do things that were completely unheard of 10 years ago, yet, proposal leaders and teams face many new issues when faced with this new approach. Come listen to proposal experts who will share their experiences and tips. Be prepared to ask questions and share your own solutions at this panel session
Steve Koger, CPP APMP Fellow (Moderator)
Aerojet Rocketdyne
Cynthia Mastro, CF APMP
VSP Vision Care
Jacque Keats
SMA, Inc.
Krystn Gull, CPP APMP
Burns & McDonnell