6 Strategies To Tackle Tight Page Limitations
Tight page limitations are becoming a more frequent
challenge as contracting officers continue to look for ways to streamline their
acquisition processes. When faced with tight page restrictions, we often find
ourselves struggling with trimming five pages of material into two pages of
allocated space. However, sometimes the content we are working with is so long
because it is simply overly wordy. Here are my tricks for removing the waste:
- Use Active Voice
- Eliminate Redundancies
- Strip out Empty Words
- Simplify Your Word Choice
- Use Graphics and Tables Strategically
- Focus Your Text
1. Use Active Voice.
With active voice, the subject of the sentence comes first and performs the
action in the sentence. Active voice is more straightforward and concise than
passive voice. It typically results in shorter, sharper sentences. So not only
does it take up less real estate, it flows better and is easier to understand.
2. Eliminate
Redundancies. Remove redundancies that take up extra space and don’t add
value. Replace redundant phrases:
- actual experience; replace with experience
- advanced planning; replace with planning
- close proximity; replace with proximity
- consensus of opinion; with consensus
Concise writing makes your
response clearer and easier to evaluate.
3. Strip out Empty
Words. Avoid empty words such as high, numerous, and highly reliable. Substantiate all empty claims with
proof points and metrics, quantified if possible. Also, avoid clichés that add
no value; for example, world class, best of breed, and silver bullet.
4. Simplify Your Word
Choice. Writers sometimes feel
the urge to add emphasis to their prose by using extra words or phrases that
don’t contribute much to the meaning (and sometimes obscure it). Consider the
following swaps:
- absolutely vital; replace with vital
- quite unique; replace with unique
- due to the fact that; replace with because
- utilize/utilization; replace with use
- in the amount of; replace with for
- in the event of; replace with if
- in order that; replace with for or so
- commence; replace with start
Visit https://plainlanguage.gov/guidelines/words/use-simple-words-phrases/
for a more comprehensive list.
5. Use Graphics and
Tables Strategically. We’ve all heard the old adage, “A picture [or
graphic] is worth a thousand words.” If used correctly, graphics are
compelling, easy to understand, informative, and help to communicate your message
faster and more clearly than words alone. Graphics can help evaluators to
easily read data, understand processes, and identify patterns or potential
opportunities. Graphics and tables typically also receive some font size
relief—so if used appropriately and strategically, they can help to save you
some valuable proposal real estate.
6. Focus Your Text. When
page limitations are tight, it becomes even more critical to focus your text on
the instructions and evaluation criteria. Look for areas where the content
strays to work in tangential proof points, and move the unfocused text to the
more relevant section or sections. Frequently you’ll find that the proof points
or content are already present in the more relevant sections, and that you can
just eliminate the text as redundant content. If you find that the content
doesn’t really fit another section well, remove it completely since it does not
support the proposal evaluation.
Final Thoughts
As tight page limitations become a more frequent challenge,
we need to approach our proposals with a strategy for keeping our content lean.
By focusing our text, using active voice, and simplifying our word choice, we’ll
begin the revising process with shorter narratives. Going back and stripping
out empty words, eliminating redundancies, and using graphics and tables
strategically will help to tighten our content further. Not only will you find
that your content is shorter, but you’ll find that these strategies actually
help to make your content clearer. If the evaluator actually understands what
you are writing, that will help them award you the score that you actually
deserve. In the end, though it might seem tedious, this trimming exercise can
become a win-win situation for everyone involved.
Written by Ashley Kayes, CP APMP
Senior Proposal Consultant, AOC Key Solutions, Inc. (KSI)
https://www.linkedin.com/in/ashley-kayes-cp-apmp-a3750413/
Good Article but Simplify Your Word Choice will affect our communication right, using absolutely vital; replace with vital may affect the tone in which the author is speaking.
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DeleteSo precise
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ReplyDeleteQuoting Einstein - "If you can't explain it simply, you don't understand it well enough."
ReplyDeleteThis is very useful.. indeed the most useful to understand how to present your data in a short & Crisp Manner.
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