How do you maintain a proposal schedule?

A handover from capture to proposal is missing in this part of the article. You may not have a Capture Manager per se but someone (e.g., business development, account management) should have been responsible for capture management activities and have valuable information to share. Good capture can accelerate certain tasks in your proposal plan (e.g., win strategy, determining suitable case studies and resumes)

I always start by creating a project charter with the team. Aligning to the project goal, what is in and out of scope for the project, major work streams, and team member roles sets the proposal on the right path.

Understanding the scope and objectives is really a baseline activity and the most important in the whole process. Understanding these ideas are what the whole proposal rests upon - bid win 🥇 themes, customer expectations, value proposition etc which will be interwoven through the proposal document.

The proposal creation process is hampered greatly when an opportunity is chucked over the fence with a deadline and zero “win angle” - particularly when it’s a quick turnaround or contains multiple volumes, partners, etc. The handshake between BD and Proposal is essential to a great proposal, even if the opportunity is wired for an incumbent or preferred offeror.

As mentioned, it is the first and the most important step. Clear understanding of the scope and well definition of the objectives involves identifying the specific deliverables, and requirements of the proposal. Through this you will ensure that your team members are in the same page and will provide solid foundation for the schedule development.

Work breakdown is important. Luckily, most proposals follow a similar patten. You can map out key tasks ahead of time and assign roles and timelines when the proposal is released.

Maintaining a proposal schedule requires careful planning and coordination. Start by creating a detailed timeline with key milestones, such as kickoff meetings, draft reviews, and final submission dates. Allocate specific tasks to team members and set clear deadlines. Regularly communicate progress and address any delays promptly. Utilize project management tools to track tasks and deadlines, ensuring everyone stays on schedule. Continuously monitor and adjust the schedule as needed to adapt to changing requirements or unforeseen challenges. Collaboration, communication, and flexibility are essential for successfully managing a proposal schedule.

Breaking down the work and estimating effort is key to managing a proposal schedule. - Use a Work Breakdown Structure (WBS) to divide the project. - Consult with subject matter experts for accurate estimates. - Leverage past project data for better resource allocation.

If you are looking to maintain a proposal schedule, I'm not sure why you would use a WBS to organize the capture phase work...but... I do agree that you should break larger tasks into "micro" tasks so the push doesn't seem as strenuous. It's also important to work into the schedule items that may require more time, such as wet signatures, financial statements, insurance coverage, etc...

Effective work breakdown and effort estimation are pivotal for proposal success. Assign deliverables with timelines using trackers for visibility. Employ a Work Breakdown Structure to organize tasks by phases. Meticulously estimate effort, duration, dependencies for each task, leveraging historical data, expertise, or parametric models. Allocate resources judiciously, ensuring accountability. This structured approach fosters efficient planning, resource optimization, and seamless execution.

These are the minimum reviews I fit in, with compliance checked at every review, no matter how tight the proposal timeline is. 1) Annotated Outline Review 2) Initial Narrative Review (80%) 3) Improved Content Review (95%) 4) Management Review (100%) 5) White Glove for Submission (105% 😁) This really drives the schedule and determines the amount of time available for writing and recovery. With AI tools being used in proposals, it helps shorten the time needed in the writing and recovery phases - but it doesn’t lesson the importance of stakeholder feedback and iterative changes.

Agree with everything Jennifer said above. I’d also make sure you include key personnel scheduled days out. The reverse engineering of the timeline is crucial. Then manage to this timeline and make adjustments as needed be. Adherence + flexibility for the win.

To create the proposal schedule and baseline, use software tools like Microsoft Project or Excel. Input tasks, durations, dependencies, and resources, adjusting dates based on client deadlines and availability. Define milestones such as meetings and deliveries. Then, set a baseline, which is a snapshot of the original plan for comparison and tracking progress. Project Manager skill is a must to develop an acertive and realistic proposal plan.

Regular check-in points are essential in order to keep everyone updated. A well designed schedule, with appropriate sub-tasks, saves precious time which otherwise would be spent in meetings. Work smart.

I find building float into the schedule, checking in with individual contributors and adding milestones to team member's calendars are important in managing a proposal schedule.

I like to know in advance what the hinderances to the proposal schedule could potentially be. Although, I recognize this isn't always possible. I aim to mitigate delay as much as possible. A way that I accomplish this is by asking. During the kick off I ask all participants if there is any PTO or business related travel coming up before the deadline. This allows me to buffer in time to accommodate these interruptions. While simultaneously building good will between me and the response team.

Monitoring and updating the proposal schedule is an ongoing task. I hold regular check-ins with the team to review progress and address any issues. Tools like Gantt charts and dashboards provide a visual representation of the project’s status, making it easier to identify delays and adjust timelines as needed. Flexibility is key here; being able to adapt to changes without losing sight of the overall objectives is crucial for success.

Plans are worth nothing. Planning is worth everything. Create your proposal schedule but monitor it and update it everyday. Adjust as the development process progresses. But also demand that the proposal development team respect the schedule. Just capturing slippages and missed milestones adds no value. Get the schedule right and make sure the team knows what is required.

Reviewing and improving the proposal schedule is about continuous learning and adaptation. - Conduct thorough debriefs after each proposal. - Use AI to analyze performance data for patterns and improvements. - Ensure each new proposal benefits from lessons learned for more efficient scheduling.

Please, stop using email and excel to manage proposal schedules. Instead, centralize your whole proposal management in a flexible project management app (inexpensive, web-based), then use stacked views (board, calendar, Gantt) and functionalities (tracking, reminders, milestones) on top of the same data (your team, your RFP, your proposal).

I feel that this article highlights the key difference between proposal versus project management. Proposals have fixed due dates and they are rarely changed. All proposal schedules are worked backwards from that date. (All processes need to be in place before you start responding to RFx.) Projects have a specific end date but if an issue arises, you can negotiate an extension. It's not ideal but possible. I have found this to be an issue when working with SMEs, they lack the sense of urgency when responding to RFx thinking there could be an extension. It's just a different way of thinking that needs to be addressed to make sure everyone is on the same page and hitting that due date for the response.

All the baseline tools are there for us (i.e.: Shipley, Automated Third-Party Tools, Time Management, etc.), to make it work in a team setting is a combination of secret sweet sauce and adherence to the structure and rules represented to the team at the onset of the opportunity in Kick-off Meeting(s). Alan is correct, it is highly simplistic, as one size doesn't fit all. It is harem scarem at times - but if you are a good communicator and get team buy in you've won half the scheduling battle.

I find this to be highly simplistic and makes gross assumptions about the individual organization’s management requirements, the type of solicitation to which the proposal is responding, and the role of proposal manager/scheduler, amount other considerations.

In some ways my experience is contrary to Hannah's. In the market I worked in recently there were a lot of extensions (UK Local Government / NHS) to submission deadlines. The issue the bid team then faced was what to do with the bid schedule, informing SMEs etc. The danger was that everyone 'relaxed' and timescales for completion of work simply slid - so we gained no real additional time for final reviews, pricing etc of what were generally large, complex bids. We took the approach that if the extension was short we would usually ignore it and aim to complete to the original timescale. If longer (more than 2-3 weeks) we would reset the timetable, informing SMEs etc - and time to address any changes to customer pricing regime/question etc .