Beyond Deadlines: Preventing Burnout During the Proposal Busy Season


With key legislation in place and the end of the United States Government fiscal year less than three months away, we’ve seen the busy season starting to pick up in the government contracting space. To navigate competing priorities and limited resources, it’s helpful to have strategies in place to handle the surge without burning out your team.  

Review and Prioritize the Pipeline Weekly

Pipeline reviews become even more critical during the proposal busy season because tough decisions may need to be made about which opportunities to pursue. Leadership should consider the various opportunities in the pipeline, the level of readiness of the team (i.e., how much capture has been done), and the resources available to support each opportunity. Sometimes pursuing an opportunity with a low win probability can take critical resources away from an opportunity with a higher win probability. 

Additionally, as part of the pipeline/milestone reviews, make sure you have a bid and proposal (B&P) budget set for each opportunity being actively pursued. You should spend less time, energy, and money on low value/low profit opportunities. You never want to spend more on responding to an opportunity than you will gain from winning—unless there is a very strategic reason to do so. 

Finally, if your proposal team doesn’t participate in the pipeline reviews with leadership, make sure to have separate calls to review the pipeline with the proposal team so that they understand which proposals are active, as well as which proposals are coming up on the horizon. Assign out proposal leads for each opportunity so team members can understand and plan for upcoming workloads (these can always be adjusted if solicitation release dates change). When making assignments, be sure to consider any vacation times team members may have scheduled.

Leverage Templates and Boilerplate When Possible

Having templates ready for your team to use will save so much time and energy. You’ll want the following tools ready to use and in a place that teams can easily locate:

  • Proposal calendars
  • Outline/compliance matrices 
  • Kickoff decks
  • Color team decks
  • Writing templates
  • Street resumes
  • Boilerplate for common sections (e.g., management, quality, past performance, etc.)

Having these templates ready will enable your team to hit the ground running. Instead of reinventing the wheel each time or searching for an old resource as a starting point, your team can focus their time on entering information into the schedule and compliance matrix templates, adjusting the writing templates to meet the formatting requirements of the solicitation, and moving forward with the proposal process smoothly and efficiently. 

Keep Your Team Fueled on Long Days

If your team is collocated, bring in snacks to keep your team fueled during long days (granola bars, peanut butter crackers, nuts, dried fruits—and a few sweet treats like Twizzlers or mini candy bars). When teams stay in the office late to meet a critical deadline, order in pizza or have sandwiches delivered. For remote teams that are working long hours to meet deadlines, consider sending electronic food delivery certificates (e.g., DoorDash or Grubhub) to keep the team fueled and morale high.

Schedule Breaks and Downtime

With multiple looming deadlines and an overwhelming workload, it can be so easy to try push through a long day without any breaks. However, it has been proven that this approach can negatively affect overall output. Taking breaks is critical for maintaining productivity. Short, regular breaks can help prevent burnout, improve focus, and boost overall performance by allowing brains to rest and recharge. But the right kinds of breaks matter. Studies show that scrolling on your phone or surfing the internet can overload your brain and leave you even more depleted. Better break choices include taking a walk, doing a small chore, meditating, or chatting with a friend or coworker. 

Have your team aim for a five-minute break for each twenty-five minutes of work. If this seems overwhelming, remember that even breaks as short as a minute—if they are effective breaks—can improve performance and productivity. 

Additionally, after your teams meet a proposal submission deadline, particularly if they have been working long hours, make sure to give them some time off if the schedule allows. This will allow your team members to recharge and come back ready to tackle the next project more effectively. 

Bring In Extra Resources if Necessary

Sometimes you might not have sufficient resources to handle all the opportunities in your pipeline. If this is the case, you may need to work with leadership to see if the B&P budget allows for bringing in consultant resources. Consultant resources may come at a higher hourly rate than your full-time team members—but they can be brought in for a short time to help meet surge demands, and then you don’t pay for them anymore once they are done with their assigned task(s). This is also generally a better option than burning out your team and then having to recruit and onboard new employees once the burnt-out team members leave. 

Check In with Your Team Regularly, But Keep Meetings Short

It’s critical to keep a pulse on how your team is doing when stress levels are high. Check in regularly with team members to see how they are doing and whether there are any issues/roadblocks keeping them from meeting any of their deadlines. Help provide them with additional resources, if necessary, or track down information they may have been waiting on from a subject matter expert or stakeholder. But don’t flood calendars with unnecessary meetings, or overly long meetings. Check-in calls can be great—but keep them to 15 minutes or shorter. Leverage email, chat, text, and quick calls where it makes sense.

Final Thoughts

The proposal busy season can be challenging, but with thoughtful planning and intentional strategies, you can manage the surge without burning out your team. By prioritizing opportunities wisely, leveraging templates and boilerplate material, keeping your team supported and fueled, and building in breaks and recovery time, you set your team up for both immediate success and long-term sustainability. Remember, a well-prepared, motivated, and rested team is far more effective than one that’s stretched beyond its limits. Take care of your people, streamline your processes, and you’ll be better positioned to meet deadlines, win more work, and maintain a positive, productive proposal culture—even during the busiest times of the year.



Written by Ashley (Kayes) Floro, CPP APMP
Senior Consultant and President
Proptimal Solutions, LLC
proptimalsolutions.com
LinkedIn

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