April 29th, 2010
I was discussing with a colleague the other day how tough it is to find really great government proposal managers. By great I mean proposal managers who can pull off a real feat: lead proposal teams to spectacular wins, while doing it in style.  They don’t only manage the proposal process, but also make sure that the actual content of the proposal, including the solution, is of a winning quality. They also lead in a way that makes it less stressful  on the team and more fun.
I started thinking – what specific skills make those proposal managers great? And I started making a list that went on and on. As I continued, it became increasingly clearer why it’s tough. I thought I’d share this list with you. You may find it useful for staffing purposes or even professional growth purposes – and please, let me know if I missed something really important.
So, here are the attributes of a great government proposal manager (in no particular order – this is a stream of consciousness):
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Tags: hiring proposal consultants, proposal management, proposal manager, winning government proposals, winning proposals
Posted in Hiring Consultants, Proposal Management | No Comments »
April 23rd, 2010
My 5-year-old daughter, when working on a puzzle, knows to glance at the whole picture first, before starting to assemble the pieces. She is up to 30-piece puzzles now, which have gotten quite complex. So, her process is to study the picture, and then find a corner piece to which she then starts adding pieces.
We, as adults, sometimes forget to take a step back and look at the whole picture first when we solve our own puzzles: how to grow our company, how to win a proposal, or how to bring in revenue. This is why, to win government contracts, it is important to step back and take a few minutes to ponder the full lifecycle of business development. This way we can be better at putting the pieces together.
A typical business development lifecycle for a government contracting company (covered more in depth at http://www.ostglobalsolutions.com/blueprint) consists of the following pieces: Â
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Tags: business, caputure, contracts, development, federal, goverenment, opportunity., proposal, strategic, winning
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April 15th, 2010
Join a one-time-only, 12-week, 30-hour webinar starting May 12 that provides a complete system for defining strategy, finding opportunities, marketing, preparing for proposals through masterful capture, writing winning proposals, and winning multimillion dollar contracts to catapult the growth of your small business in the federal market.
Unlike any other course, this webinar series takes you through the entire cycle of business development to launch you into an aggressive growth as a government contractor. It also provides a complete toolset to implement the knowledge: tools, templates, checklists, processes, lists of resources, and examples.
This course is for you if you:
1. Have been working for a while in a federal market, but are tired of our company taking too long to grow
2. Wonder how others – the insider companies to the federal market – reach 75% and higher win rates while most of the industry averages 33%
3. Develop business and write proposals as part of your daily work, but never had proper business development training
4. Are new to government contracting
The webinar covers everything from basic to advanced topics. It incorporates both lecture with the instructor explaining the material, and live question and answer sessions for you to apply the material to your own situation. Even the course curriculum itself will give you an insight into how you could streamline your business development efforts. Find out more and register at http://www.ostglobalsolutions.com/blueprint.
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April 2nd, 2010
A customer of mine just shared a quote with me that I found particularly inspiring, that I wanted to share with you. This is for you – for all the Business Developers, fellow business owners, and entrepreneurs out there.
This exerpt is from a speech Theodore Roosevelt gave on Citizenship in a Republic in Paris, France on April 23, 1910.
“It is not the critic who counts; not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles, or where the doer of deeds could have done them better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood; who strives valiantly; who errs, who comes short again and again, because there is no effort without error and shortcoming; but who does actually strive to do the deeds; who knows great enthusiasms, the great devotions; who spends himself in a worthy cause; who at the best knows in the end the triumph of high achievement, and who at the worst, if he fails, at least fails while daring greatly, so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who neither know victory nor defeat.”
Dare to dream and play big. You are better off no matter what is the end result.
Tags: business development, theodore roosevelt
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March 31st, 2010
Current economy is the driving factor behind the budget tightening trend – not only for households, but also for government agencies. Even if we are to believe cautiously optimistic forecasts about the economy, the evolution of acquisition laws with an ever-increasing demand for competition is continuing. For example, last year Congress passed the National Defense Authorization Act that mandates changes to contracting regulations, including more competition for task and delivery orders. Competition in proposals is tightening even further as businesses are getting smarter on how to write winning proposals, and have an increasingly harder time differentiating themselves technically from their competitors. Even among small businesses, the knowledge and skills of how to win government proposals are increasingly commonplace. Affordable graphics, production, and collaboration tools level the playing field even further.
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