An Open Letter to the Friends and Families of Proposal Professionals
As proposal professionals, most of us well understand the idiosyncrasies
of the profession. We have become accustomed to the extreme ebbs and flows of
the workload, the heightened stress levels leading up to final submission, and the
internal panic of changes within the three days leading up to your scheduled
printing.
As we all know, this fluctuation in workload and stress
level can negatively affect our personal relationships. If your personal lives
are anything like mine, our partners, friends, and families aren’t always the
most understanding when we have to work on vacations, change our plans because
of a work fire-drill, or even wake up extra early on a weekend to make the
schedule for the day work. We often receive resistance, side commentary about
how much it sucks that we have to work, and other pushback from our loved ones.
This can be polarizing, especially when stress levels are at their highest. So
I wanted to send out this reminder for our loved ones, especially when our
stress levels are at their highest.
Dear Proposal Professional
Family and Friends,
As proposal season
starts to approach its peak, I wanted to send out a few reminders about our
work situation and how we feel when stress levels get high.
1. We really would rather be spending time with you. Trust us, we get it. It sucks that we have
to do work while on vacation. Or while friends are in town. Or early in the morning
before a fun outing. We would much rather be spending all of our time with you
and enjoying the things that we may be missing out on. But we have deadlines
and a lot of pieces of the pie that we don’t have any control over. People catch
things in the final hour. It’s also not uncommon for leadership to put off
reviews and want to make last minute changes. We do our best to prevent these
things from happening, but we have to get the job done regardless. We are
sorry. Please don’t make us feel worse about the situation.
2. Please cut us some slack. When we overreact to a comment you view as harmless, please know that
we don’t mean to take our stress out on you. Many of us work very hard to keep everything
together and maintain composure for our teams, which can be exhausting. We are
doing our best to keep ourselves together both at work and at home—but we are
human. We are sorry. Please understand that we trying our best.
3. Your support means everything to us. Because we are dealing with so much stress at work, your support means
the world to us. We can’t put into words how much it means when you make small
efforts to relieve some of the stress for us. Taking things off our plate like
errands and household chores, bringing dinner when we are stuck at work burning
the midnight oil, stopping in with little treats (or sneaking them into our
bags so we find them while we are at work). We really do appreciate these
efforts, and trust us, they do not go unnoticed. If we don’t say it enough
while stress levels are high, thank you for all the things that you do to help
keep us sane.
The life of a proposal
professional can be a tough one—and I can image it can be difficult to have us
in your lives. As with most situations where miscommunication occurs, we can
probably all be better about communicating and making sure everyone is on the
same page. I know this is difficult when stress levels are escalated. Please
keep in mind that we are doing our best, and we will try to remember that you
are doing the same. Try to remember that we really do feel bad enough already
about missing out on time with you. Try to cut us a little slack if you can.
And remember that your support really does mean the world to us.
Cheers!
Your Beloved Proposal
Professional
Final Words
I’m not sure if you are as guilty of this as I am, but I
tend to be a much better communicator at work than I am at home. Do you have
successful communication strategies for these common issues above—or are you
still honing those skills, like I am? I’m curious to hear how you manage and cope!
Written by Ashley Kayes, CP APMP
Senior Proposal Consultant, AOC Key Solutions, Inc. (KSI)
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