Use the introduction to place the proposal in context. This section should be one or two pages max. Don’t over-whelm the reader with background material. They can find more details about your organization on your website and in press releases.

So, what goes into the introduction?

1. Identify the Government bodies involved in this procurement process, for example.

The Health Department encompasses five counties in the greater London region. These are…

2. Identify any strategic plans that relate to the success of this project

The London Region, which encompasses the administrative areas of counties X, Y, Z, adopted a Strategic Management Plan in 2002.

3. Identify significant data that the bidder must be made aware of, for example,

The administrative area of this region has a combined population of 500,000 and covers 10000 sq Kilometres.

4. Next, outline your goal:

We now wish to review and replace 2002 Strategic Management Plan in compliance with the Waste Management Act 2003 and the Waste Management Regulations, 2005.

5. Identify other preliminary work that has been performed:

The new plan shall make reference to the existing Waste Management Plan, existing preparatory work, the recently commissioned Waste Management Study, EPA National Waste Database, EU Waste Management Plans and all other relevant documentation and legislation.

6. Close with reference to legal documents and supporting materials.

The new Plan should take account the Government policy statements:
• Changing our Ways
• Recycling Waste
• Waste Management Moving Forward

In the next lesson, we’ll look at how to write the Supervision section.

Related posts:

1. 6 Ways To Write a Better Executive Summary
2. Consultancy Proposal – How to Define the Table of Contents

Over the coming weeks, we’ll look at how to write a proposal for Consultancy Services. This will be of use to government agencies or other bodies that want to procure the services of a consultancy firm, for example, an advertising agency, a PR or HR firm or another type of company that provides specialist services.
This type of proposal differs from contracts where, for example, you want to use a specific product, piece of equipment or have very exact specifications in mind.

In a proposal for Consultancy Services, you want to determine the most appropriate firm based on their expertise and capacity of deliver based on your needs.

There are several ways to do this.

To get started, I will create a table of contents for each of the main sections and then drill-down into each section.

Here is the table of contents

1. Introduction
2. Supervision
3. Deliverables
4. Consultation – Meetings schedule
5. Reports & Presentations
6. Programme
7. Award Criteria
8. Information to be submitted
9. Fee Proposal
10. Conflict of Interest
11. Terms of appointment
12. Ownership of Documents and Copyright
13. Termination of appointment
14. Dispute Resolution
15. Tax Clearance Certificate
16. Withholding Tax
17. Professional Indemnity
18. Confidentiality
19. Submission of proposal

In the next lesson, we’ll look at how to write the Introduction.

Related posts:

1. Why The Table of Contents Is The Heart of Your Business Proposal?

Your success as a Proposal Manager depends on your ability to respond to Request For Proposal documents, understand the procurement process, write compelling responses, and coordinate your team during the writing process. However, even with the best will in the world, unless you have guidelines, templates and checklists in place, you may jeopardize your own efforts, especially if you overlook one key requirement in the bid document. Here’s how to avoid this.

Request For Proposal Evaluation Guidelines

Unless you organize the Proposal development process, your success as a Proposal Manager will be severely under-minded.

One way to avoid this is to create easy to use checklists that your Proposal writing team can follow. And, more important, help automate the writing process as much as possible.

You can start on this by creating Action Plans that itemize the key steps, actions, and action owners so everyone on the team understands their role. Here’s a list of the items you need to capture:

1. Proposal – Selection

How to identify, review and select Request For Proposals.

• Sales Manager schedules meeting to review new Request For Proposals.
• Sales Manager & Bid Manager decides which Request For Proposal to bid for.
• Review selected tenders in advance of Monday meeting.

2. Proposal – Meeting

How to schedule, assign and plan Request For Proposals responses.

• Sales team organize meeting.
• Review last week’s proposals, highlight issues, and plan week ahead.
• Discuss Proposal Team members and who will write each bid document.
• Contact staff members required to contribute to the tender, e.g. Developer.
• Agree date for proposal to be completed, e.g. 48 hours before submission date.
• Update the Proposal spreadsheet on the Intranet.
• Take and share meeting minutes

3. Proposal – Team Actions

How to organize the bid team for each Request For Proposal.

• Read the RFP before starting any writing.
• Clarify any points that are unclear with the RFP issuer
• Circulate the replies to team members.
• Notify Project Coordinator if resources are required and/or impact existing schedules
• Notify Proposal Owner of major issues, i.e. schedule conflicts

4. Proposal – Draft Stage

How to write, edit, and gather information for each Request For Proposal.

• Use the Business Proposals template.
• Confirm financial details with Finance Dept.
• Confirm resumes with Human Resource Dept.
• Team members return completed sections to Proposal Author for compilation.

5. Proposal – Review Stage

How to proof, review, edit each draft document.

• Proposal Author circulates compiled Draft 0.1 to team members.
• Team members review draft copies.
• Proposal Author collates next draft.

6. Proposal – Quality Assurance

How to test, proof, and circulate the draft Proposal.

• Send Draft to Proposal Manager 24 hours before deadline. Late documents cannot be fully checked.
• Proposal Manager checks Draft documents. Resolve queries with contributors.
• Proposal Manager returns Final Draft to Proposal Author.

7. Proposal – Production

How to print, proof, and product the draft Proposal, especially if you need a hardcopy.

• Proposal Manager prints required number of hardcopies.
• Inform Proposal Manager in advance
• Proposal Manager checks quality of final print.
• Prepare labels for large envelopes.
• Create CD-ROMs with company logo.
• Include cover letter from Sales Manager

and in case we forget, here’s number eight.

8. Proposal – Post Production

How to archive, share, and prepare status reports on the Proposal.

• Proposal Manager files ‘Final Draft’ on shared drive.
• File supporting proposal documents in a sub-folder for reference.
• Update team members at Monday Meeting.

What have we missed?

About the Author: Ivan Walsh provides business proposal writing tips, tutorials, and templates on the Proposal Writing Course every week. Get his free proposal writing newsletter here.

Related posts:

1. 34 Ways to Check Your Request For Proposal Submissions
2. Request For Proposals: Writing the Format Section
3. Proposal Manager: Starting a Career in Procurement

Post written by Ivan Walsh. Follow me on Twitter

Sandra wants to know where is the Styles menu option in Microsoft Word 2007. She wants to update her new business plan and add Notes, Messages, Quotes and other pre-formatted styles. The Styles in Microsoft Word 2003 and 2007 seem to be different.

He’s right. The Microsoft Word user interface in 2003 and 2007 is very different.

1. The best way to add Styles, such as Notes etc (2007) is to go to the Home tab. It’s the default.

2. Click the little arrow button under Change Styles.

3. This opens the Styles menu along the right-hand side of the page.

4. Select the text you want to change.

5. Scroll down and find the Note style, for example.

6. Change the text.

Does it work?

<styles would be saved but in my “styles” drop down menu, I do not see these styles.

Do you see the little arrow under Change Styles. Click this and the Styles will appear! If not, drop me a line.

PS – if you’re looking for tips on writing user guides, then check out I Heart Technical Writing.

Related posts:

1. How to Stop Your Business Proposal Files From Crashing – Part 1
2. Kate Winslet’s 7 Smart Ways to Read Business Proposals