Proposal or bid writing

Let's think before we write

To write a proposal for a call or bid for a contract is a time-consuming business - as the international donors are fond of complete information to make careful decisions. It is important to make sure that the time and money you invest are not in vain. 

We support you at this. When you consider contracting us, we stage a meeting to get to know each other, and will propose to proceed as follows: 

• In our first meeting we will extensively discuss the strategy that your organization or company follows and how you mentally and commercially relate to international development donors as your client. We may explore the possibilities for you; share the trends and developments in the different donors and their different project or contract facilities; and brief you on the requirements that you will have to meet to be eligible. Normally we would focus on a specific call or tender to illustrate this.

• After this meeting we would elaborate a profile that we can use to screen leads. Should we get into business, we will analyse the international donor market in the areas that your organization or company is active and (help you) check the outcoming calls and tenders for those that match your distinctive qualities and track record. We can also assist you to make a "go/no-go scan" of the possible leads, analysing your possible score on the selection criteria to the likely competitors.

• When a matching promising call or tender is found we can assist you in a couple of ways to submit your proposal or bid. The most common thing we do is to do an extensive intake, elaborate a bid plan for the specific call or tender and stage a so-called "war room" at your offices. One (or more) of your staff members works together with the Tenders2Go bid writer as a team, possibly also with staff from your consortium partners. The team goes through the bid plan and divides the tasks to find or elaborate the different documents that are needed for the specific sections of the concept note, full proposal, expression of interest of full technical and financial bid. This may mean that others who are not part of the team will have to be contacted. The Tenders2Go bid writer normally monitors the progress and assumes team leadership, and also take direct responsibility for drafting the documents that are going to be submitted, with the inputs of the team members. The team members are always involved in reviewing the documents. After a final check by the final responsible persons in your organization, the documents are prepared for submission, with precise instructions.

• You can also opt for a more advisory or mentoring role from our side, or request us to only take care of the final editing. Sometimes we are requested to give a second opinion or undertake a pre-submission evaluation of the proposal or bid. We find it important to customize our services to your demands.

• Whatever you may decide to be most fit: we take responsibility that you can entrust the proposal or bid writing to us without any doubt - and ensure that a flawless, convincing, coherent and well-written document is ready for submission in time, before the deadline, and the regular submission stress is taken away.

After the submission, there is always the donors' granting decision. We always assist you to evaluate the grounds behind this decision, for institutional learning. When the project or contract is won, we celebrate this with you, and prepare you for the contract negotiations and contract management challenges. In the rare case that the decision was not favourable, we assist you to sharpen you submission in upcoming calls or tenders and/or to find reliable additional consortium partners.