6 Common Unforced Errors in Proposal Development

An unforced error is a common sports term for those actions that could have been easily avoided. The internet is full of examples of those who celebrated their "victory" too early, only to find out that they didn't win. For instance, I've seen countless breakaway touchdowns where the man crossing the end zone releases the ball a yard or two before crossing the line. Because he was so far out in front of the opposing team, he decided to release the ball early. No touchdown and sometimes the opponent picked up the ball and recovered it as a fumble.

Consider the biker who raises his arms in celebration a hundred meters before crossing the finish line only to be passed by two or three close cyclists. 

Those are unforced errors that didn't have to happen.

1. Not following instructions. 

I'm not referring to the 250 requirements that the customer has scattered throughout the PWS, SOW, or evaluation section. Those can be missed by the best of teams. 

I'm referring to when the Instructions clearly spell out "Times New Roman or Arial 11 pt" or "one inch margins on all sides." Anything other than those two fonts at those two sizes or one inch all around the document is asking the proposal NOT to be read. It's an unforced error. With limited page counts, everyone is trying to squeeze that extra few lines of text. Not following clearly laid out instructions is not a good tactical move on the contractor's part. 

2. Complicated graphics. 

The government is not interested in seeing every single detail of your wonderful quality control plan or your organizational chart, especially if it doesn't add value to the bid. Make it so simple, even an executive can understand it in 20 seconds. Your government evaluator probably won't have much more time than that to glance over it when she first sees it. If you can't explain it to your 9-year-old, then it's probably too complicated. If, however, your page counts are unlimited, then by all means, create several graphics, but make them simple. 

3. Taking too long to make a Go/No-Go decision. 

When you have 30 days to submit a bid, and management takes a 10-14 days to decide or to line up a team, then you might want to reconsider bidding. Certainly you have great proposal managers and writers waiting in the wings to pull you out of this self-induced predicament, but you're not being fair to them. They will do their best but you've tied their hands before they've called a single meeting or written a single word.

I was on the team where the client waited until day 21 to bid, praying that the Government would extend the due date. Fortunately, you can count on the government to be disorganized every day of the week, so they filed an extension. But the point is that those writers and experts didn't have a fair shot at writing the bid with only eight days remaining. It's just not even fair. 

A better option is to make the Go decision on day 2 or 3. If you have to cancel on day 15, fine. Sure it's frustrating for the team, but at least you've given them a much better chance to make it happen. 

4. Too much text; too few graphics. 

We all know the ideal is to have one graphic per page of text. Well, that's what it would be in an ideal world with a fully staffed graphic design team taking requests and writers who think in graphics each day. If we get a graphic on every third or fourth page, we're lucky. What tends to happen is that the graphics seem to have their own little meeting on pages 7-9 and 12-13. The government's designed the requirements so that largest graphics can only be located near other graphics. When you view the document from a high level, sure enough all those graphics got together to have a meeting, and you weren't even invited. Break up the text with relevant call out boxes and bullet points.

5. Using passive voice. 

I've written elsewhere that we should really clean up our content so that we are only using active voice wherever possible. At the very least, tell me who is implementing your solution or installing that device. Don't let the Government guess because you will not like what they come up with. 

6. Unclear writing.

This goes hand in hand with the previous point. Clarity of the hallmark of good writing. Again, don't let the Government guess at what you're trying to say. Use simpler sentences. Break up that 70-word sentence into three or four sentences. By the way, I'm not exaggerating with those 70 words. It may be clear to you what you're trying to say, but to outsiders, it's a lot of words and commas. Get to your point quickly and end the sentence. Don't wait for other clauses to nuzzle their way into that sentence. Give them their own sentence. They'll be happier and the Government will be happier.

I'm certain there are several dozen more of these unforced errors that we can all avoid. I'd love to hear about them. If you've been in the industry long enough, they'll come out as "pet peeves."