How to manage an effective bid review process
A good bid review process should help you to refine your responses and make sure they are as strong as possible by the time you submit. By following these six steps, you’ll be able to get the most out your reviews and improve the quality of each bid you work on.
Step 1 – Set your expectations
At the start of the bid, agree up-front how the review process is going to work. You need to set realistic deadlines and stick to them. At this stage you should decide:
We often work to tight deadlines in bidding, so agreeing these deadlines early means that everyone is on the same page from the outset.
Step 2 – Clarify the purpose of each review stage
You need to make sure each reviewer knows their job and the purpose of their review. Are they proofreading, conducting a content review, or checking the tone of the response? Defining these purposes early on means each review stage will yield the intended results and keep your plan on track.
Step 3 – Make sure everyone knows what stage the bid is at
Similarly, everyone should be clear about how mature each response is when they are reviewing them. Are they looking at a first draft or a response that’s ready to submit? Don’t spook a reviewer who is expecting perfection with a ‘gappy’ first draft! This can cause unnecessary tension in the team and derail your original plan.
Step 4 – Decide how reviews will be conducted
Make sure you establish how reviews will take place. Will you share online versions or send offline versions back and forth? Should the reviewers edit directly in the text or leave comments to suggest edits?
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Each of these methods can be effective but they must remain consistent across the review process to make any changes much easier to track and implement.
Top tip: Remember, Microsoft Word has a function that allows you to lock a document for editing. This will ensure that reviewers can only leave suggestions in the comments, if this is the process you have agreed with reviewers.
Step 5 – Stay on top of document management
Having to send documents back and forth between multiple writers and reviewers has the potential to get very confusing, and content can get lost along the way, so manage document control like your life (and the bid) depends on it! Staying vigilant when sending and receiving will make everyone’s lives way easier when you get to submission.
Step 6 – Communicate well with reviewers
Engage with reviewers to clarify comments and discuss input where needed. Clearing things up early on will save you time in the latter stages of the review process by making sure that reviewers don’t have to clarify the same comments twice.
Remember, you are closer to the response and there may be detailed reasons why it’s not possible to include something that sounds ideal. ?Make sure you communicate these reasons well so that reviewers don’t think you’re simply ignoring their suggestions. Stick with your instincts but incorporate as much good information as you can.
Get in touch
If you’re wondering where your bids are going wrong, why not contact us for a review? With your responses and the evaluation criteria, we can mark your bid like a Buyer would. We’ll then send you a report that highlights what you’re doing well, and where you can improve. We can conduct reviews before submission, increasing your chances of winning work. Alternatively, we can review your bids post-submission, to give you advice on how to improve your future bids.
Your bid will be reviewed by one of our senior staff members. Depending on availability, you can also request our Managing Director, Alan Kittle, himself. Alan spent years as the director of a central government department, so he's seen procurement from both sides of the table and will guide you accordingly.
If you’re interested in using Kittle Group for a review, get in touch with our Business Development team on 0118 449 2506 or [email protected] today.