How do you leverage technology and tools to optimize proposal delivery processes?

One approach I've found makes a huge difference is to build a centralized proposal management plan using a flexible project management app (the ones that allow you to configure views like tables, Kanban, Gantt, calendar, cards, etc., on top of the same data). Then, use this as your bid management workstation and try to move as many real-time communications as possible to asynchronous alternatives.

Not necessarily. Proposal management software can be a double-edged sword in more cases than they are helpful. Unless you have a strong content curation and knowledge management process and, more importantly, execution of these processes, your proposal management software will be more of a bane than a boon. Your standard collaboration tools can be integrated with a content management system to deliver a much more appropriate set of reusable content suggestions that do not force you to leave your corporate environment. As Javier Escartin suggested below, I would focus on reusable artifacts, templates, and effective style and editorial guidelines instead.

RFPs are a team sport that require the participation and collaboration of many! Schedule weekly check ins throughout the duration of your RFP with your sales teams and SMEs to ensure their deliverables on track. If there are gaps, hiccups, or concerns with anything pertaining to the RFP, these meetings help facilitate these discussions and serve as a great reminder on accountabilities for each individual.

One of my favorite things to come out of AI for proposals is the fact that we don’t have to depend on boilerplate anymore. Sure, an AI tool can learn your writing style based on past content - but the need to copy and paste content from one proposal to another to save time is no longer critical. Now, the time you would have spent digging for reusable content can now be spent communicating with capture, solutions and the customer to make sure AI has the details it needs to write a decent first draft. Why is this a good thing? Boilerplate is content written in the past for another customer, another problem, and another evaluator. This will always be a risk - because what resonated for one customer may not resonate for the next.

An important aspect of reusable content is ensuring that the content remains accurate. Regular reviews of reusable content should be performed to ensure the reusable content remains relevant and accurate. Capturing new responses that may be candidates for reuse is also critical to building a reusable content database.

I would say, use the functionalities of Microsoft Word and PowerPoint to the fullest. There is an exclusion dictionary option in Microsoft Word that I use to avoid using words like leverage, enable, and ensure, which are prohibited words in proposals at Capgemini, and for VERY good reasons. Likewise, you have the option to set keyboard shortcuts for different styles, I cannot emphasize enough, the importance of this feature as it allows me to format as I proofread, and without exaggerating at all, lets me format a page in under 20 seconds. Likewise, in PowerPoint, we have the customization toolbar and, more importantly, the pen tool and the merge shapes tool options, which are amazing when creating infographics, saving you time and effort.

Ensuring compliance is a critical aspect of proposals. An approach I've found that works very well with complex RFPs is to build a compliance matrix where all the requirements are highlighted and classified (AI-powered tools are great help with this) and then distribute those to the contributors as part of their tasks, explicitly asking for checking compliance back once their drafts are ready.

Before even looking for tools, draw a flow diagram of your bidding process and identify inputs-actions-outputs at each step. By doing this exercise, you will realize where your bottlenecks are. Then, you can look for tools that solve those. The latest artificial intelligence advancements have unlocked hundreds of quick wins in bidding and proposals, but the first step is to know what problem you want to solve.