How we took a client’s bid team from overworked to organised

In summer 2023, we supported one of Britain's leading health IT systems providers during a high-pressured peak period.

The demand on their small bid team was too high, meaning that bid quality suffered, and team members were stressed.

What’s more, their team was going to be even more stretched while they invested in hiring new staff. We deployed a skilled writer for two months, alleviating their workload and stress levels. Our writer supported the client across four bids, and all were submitted either on time or early.

Internal bid teams face peaks and troughs. We can help.

Our client got in touch because of unpredictable bidding demands driven by an inconsistent number of opportunities from month to month. This meant their team was getting burned out and bids weren’t resourced evenly. ?

This is something we see a lot when working alongside in-house bid teams, so we were able to rapidly provide a targeted solution.

Within 20 minutes of their enquiry, our BD team had responded and started to put together a plan of action with the client. From our very first call, we built up a thorough understanding of their situation, and recommended the best way forward through this busy period.

We agreed with the client that a secondment would provide best value. Why?

It’s second nature for us to work alongside our clients and immerse ourselves in their teams. Our staff are quick to build rapport, and rapidly become effective, embedded, and highly valued resources. The secondment system worked because it offered:

A ready-to-go service: Rather than investing time and resources in developing new writers, our client immediately gained a writer with thorough training and prior experience on relevant bids.

An efficient and reliable solution: By fully integrating into our client’s team over the course of a couple of months, our writer was able to build up knowledge of our client’s products and ways of working, reducing the time taken to complete each bid.

Flexibility with out-of-scope services: Our writer was ready to assist in non-bid-related activities such as proofreading case studies and procedural documents, offering our client added value.

What secondment activity looks like:

On this project, our writer provided end-to-end support, from liaising with bid managers to leading calls with subject matter experts and other bid writers and writing responses.

They crafted responses for four different bids, easing stress on the bid team during the busiest period of the year and ensuring that responses were produced to the highest quality.

As a result, the client submitted all their bids either on time or early. Both our writer and the client have expressed enthusiasm to continue the partnership in the future, showcasing the strength of the long-term relationships we like to build.

Could a secondment structure be right for you?

If you’re interested to scope out whether this could be a solution for your bid team, get in touch with our BD team on 0118 449 2506 or [email protected] today.