Proposal Reflections

  Many of us are familiar with crutch words in speech—those filler words that give us more time to think about our response or next point. Common crutch words we may use when we talk include: umm like er ah right and so anyway okay well like I was saying I guess you know. In oral proposals, we commonly practice our presentations and questions responses while minimizing these crutch words. This is because crutch words quickly become distracting to the evaluators and detract from our main points. But did you know that we tend to use crutch words in our proposal writing as well? You may have heard crutch words called by other names—fluff, filler words, or weasel words. However, these all refer to the same bad habit of cluttering and diluting our message. In this week’s blog, I’ll review some common proposal writing crutch words and present some strategies from removing these from your text. Avoid Words That Indicate Quantity But Lack Precision Some c...

  According to a 2017 US Government Accountability Office (GAO) report, spending by federal agencies on indefinite delivery/indefinite quantity (IDIQ) contracts accounts for about a third of total government contract obligations. With IDIQ contracts becoming more and more prevalent in the US federal government space, it’s critical that companies not only invest in the pursuit of IDIQ vehicles, but also establish a successful task order response machine. In this week’s article, I’ll discuss how to do just that! First, I’ll quantify the Government’s task order spend to understand why having a successful task order process is so important. Next, I’ll review the steps necessary to establish a successful process, including establishing the infrastructure, conducting capture activities and using baseline resources, establishing and leveraging proposal management resources, generating and using boilerplate sections, and generating and using task order templates. I’ll review how to estab...