The Hybrid Approach: Balancing Collaboration and Virtualization in Proposal Development
Proposal development has experienced a revolution as virtual tools allow teams to assemble bids with contributions from geographically dispersed contributors. Despite the obvious benefits of these new technologies, co-location still has a place in the field and provides significant advantages in promoting creativity and collaboration. This presentation outlines a hybrid approach that combines both in-person and virtual proposal development depending on the stage of the process, the work required, and the desired results. Combining the best aspects of both approaches allows proposal teams to reap the collaborative benefits of co-location and the increased productivity and cost savings of virtualization.
Developing High-Performing Proposal Professionals from Diverse Educational Backgrounds
What makes a strong proposal team member? As bid development continues to gain credibility as a profession, how we mentor and guide entry-level individuals will determine their professional future and the future of our field. Proposal leaders also need to know the most effective ways to capitalize on their employee’s strengths. This panel brings together three people with both director-level experience and diverse academic degrees (humanities, STEM, and marketing) to discuss the strengths and weaknesses of their educational backgrounds in becoming a high-performing proposal professional. After introductory statements about the strengths and challenges of their academic degrees in proposal development, the panel will engage with the audience to discuss the best strategies to employ in order to motivate, support, and guide personnel from each degree path. The panel will then welcome questions and topics from the floor.
Building from a Solid Foundation: How to Integrate Themes and Solutions into Proposal Narrative
Learn about how to win by writing proposals clearly and concisely. This presentation will describe the needs of clients and how to develop and document focused themes and solutions to meet their missions. It helps participants learn how to translate these skills into each proposal section by leveraging strong coordination and proposal management. This presentation provides a background to developing strong themes and solutions and clear tips to building off a solid foundation to construct a great proposal through support and reviews.
Winston Churchill: The Best and Worst Proposal Professional
Five-minute, Ignite style talk.
As someone with a PhD in British history, I cannot help but admire Winston Churchill. A dynamic leader who is regularly referred to as the "last lion" of the British Empire, his professional and personal life provide lessons for proposal professional. This talk details what Churchill’s strengths, and weaknesses, would have been as a proposal professional. He was a great leader who could rally people to their best. He was a master of strategy, and was a great communicator. Churchill had a great sense of humor and wit, which we all know are necessary to get through those hard proposals. However, he had many shortcomings. He was overly verbose. He was incredibly stubborn. He had a tremendous ego. In short, he epitomized what we aim to be as proposal professionals, and everything we dislike about proposal professionals and contributors. This talk provides an informative, humorous look at proposal development.
An Incredibles Approach to Turning Your Proposal Reviews Inside Out: Using the Pixar Brain Trust Model for Proposal Color Teams
The color team review – for most bid teams, there are no scarier words. Endless debriefs and unhelpful, even mean-spirited, comments can quickly destroy the morale and drive of proposal contributors. However, the proposal review cycle does not need to be combative, confrontational, or destructive. This presentation lays out a new model for reviews built on candor and openness. It uses filmmaking pioneer Pixar’s Brain Trust review process as a model. By treating bids as a creative, collaborative process, proposal development professionals can improve the quality of comments and their reception by the bid team. This presentation begins with an overview of the Brain Trust concept as articulated by Ed Catmull, President of Walt Disney Animation and Pixar Animation Studios. Secondly, it will discuss the main barriers from an organizational perspective and how to overcome them. Finally, the presentation provides clear actions to apply this approach at the individual bid level. This method provides bid teams a more supportive, positive operating environment and results in better comments and proposals.
