Writing Winning Tenders and Proposals Course

Public Writing Winning Tenders and Proposals Course

(Click here for Tailored Creative Business Writing)

The ability to write a winning tender is critical for many businesses.

This one-day workshop is designed to be interactive, engaging and fun with tools and techniques to help delegates to write successful tender documents.

Writing Winning Tenders and Proposals courses are run by Bronia Szczygiel - Joe Britto

Delegates will be asked to bring along a real tender or proposal that they have worked on or that they have access to. This will be used as the basis of several exercises during the day.

Click here for our Creative Business Writing Course - Effective Report Writing Course - Writing for the Web and Other Media Course - One to One Writing Skills Training

Writing Winning Tenders and Proposals Course Objectives

* Getting to the customers' real needs
* Understanding your offer
* Making a bid/no bid decision
* Understanding the competition
* Understanding and developing your writing style
* Producing a tender that is easy to read
* Focusing on the customers real needs

The Writing Winning Tenders and Proposals Course covers:

Customer Requirements
Preparation and Planning
Principles of Winning Tenders
Critique of Tenders

The Writing Winning Tenders and Proposals Preparation

Find a tender that you have written or been involved in or failing that, one that reflects the 'house style'. Bring three copies for other delegates.

Writing Winning Tenders and Proposals Course Programme

The course content may include many of the exercises listed below, and any additional material that the trainers feel is relevant to the delegates on the day.

Icebreaker

A fun exercise to get people loosened up a bit

Introduction to Impact Factory

There is not one right way, just a lot of wrong ones
Work to your strengths
Go for the smallest change to make the biggest impact
Building confidence
Miscommunication is the norm
Unpicking what we already know about how communication works

The Role of a Tender Document

We often feel as we sit at the keyboard that it would be so much easier to talk to the client directly and put our proposal to them face-to-face but there's a reason they ask for a tender document. So what is it?

We start the day by looking at why the prospective client has asked for a written proposal. We also look at the purpose for delegates in responding to the tender.

Getting to the starting line

About a third of all tenders have effectively been decided before the competing organisations have made their formal submissions. Here we look at all the questions that need to be asked before you put pen to paper.

Creating Client Confidence

We start by looking at what goes into creating good client relationships with an open discussion on what gains clients trust and builds confidence.

We look at the difference between you and your company's 'offering' in the context that 'it's you they buy'.

The foundation for the day is laid with a brief look at what skills you need to achieve this: effective information gathering, the 'teasing out' of relevant facts to help you understand their needs fully, how to discover what the best 'intervention' might be (rather than going in with pre-conceived ideas or simply accepting what the client says they need) and what's needed in order to deliver, persuade and convince clients of proposals they may not want to hear (delivering difficult messages).

We end this section with a couple of questions:

What already goes well with clients? What can go wrong with them?

The Fire on Their Desk

Getting inside the customer's head is a great place to start. Understanding how they see the world and why they are tendering right here and right now can help to frame the proposal. We all understand intellectually that people see things in different ways but sometimes it can be difficult to really get inside their skin and understand where they are coming from and what is important to them.

This fun visual exercise ends in a real application by delegates aimed at getting them to see things from the customer's perspective.

Assumptions

We all make assumptions and they are very useful things. Sometimes we need to question or test them to make sure we know what is going on.

Using the example tenders we will explore all the assumptions surrounding them, both about the client and the delegates.

Preparation and Planning

Delegates will work in small groups to look at all the things they need to do in the preparation phase.

We will examine different methods to help you plan. This will include mind mapping, fish boning, lists etc.

Proposal Structure

A three-part plan that will work with any proposal:

If our current model doesn't fit with the kind of proposal you wish them to produce, we will create a structure plan that will.

Introduction (including terms of reference and background)
Main body of the proposal
Conclusions

The executive summary (although written last, will be read first)

Principles of Quality Proposals

Just to continue the P theme we have a few of them for delegates to explore:

Position
Problem
Possibilities
Proposal

Putting Together an Excellent Tender

We'll start by having some fun looking at what would make a really bad response to a tender. Then we'll get down to business and look at how we can make the tender look like an interesting package that is going to be a joy to read.

Working in pairs we will look at the things that establish common ground between organisations. Some of the things to look at here are:

Previous experience

Often companies get a sense of security from knowing that you have done something similar for someone else so that this is not a risky venture. We're not suggesting you give them all the details of previous contracts (which may be commercially sensitive) but just enough to make them feel safe.

Demonstrating Knowledge of Their Business

We know this sounds like common sense but unfortunately, it is something often overlooked. Here delegates will practise including something relevant about their clients business as they write about their own company, making links between the two.

Using the Company Name

Just as mentioning a person's name creates empathy and a powerful bond so using the company name can help to create a bond with the client.

Using Their Jargon

It's really important to show that you understand their world, their language and their culture.

A Winning Team

Last but by no means least - the team. They need to be sold as much as, if not more than, the technical solution to the client's problem. People buy people and want to have confidence in the team. Presenting them as a single team even if they are from different companies is crucial. We look at how to do that effectively.

Playing with Tone

Our aim here is to highlight how shades of tone, from gushing warmth to cold jargon impact upon our readers.

We will look at how easy it is to identify tone. We will play with the idea that very small, subtle changes can shift the feel of our tender.

Personal Communication Style

It is important that participants are reminded of all the things that they do in their lives, both inside and outside of work, where they already communicate effectively. Written communication can then be perceived as merely a part of their style that may need tweaking, rather than something that needs an overhaul.

Engage the Client

Protocols and conventions may be left brain…so how might they be balanced and still retain and enhance our professional credibility? What is the right brain all about and how can that help our written expression?

What alternatives are there to bare words? How can we build empathy with our clients?

Looking at Prepared Proposals

Here we will go through each participant's proposal, identifying the purpose, as well as hearing about and discussing any difficulties the writer had.

Rewriting

This is an exercise in rewriting the executive summary of a sample proposal using the principles covered during the day.

Here we will be working on their Style looking at:

De-waffling techniques
How to write clearly and concisely
What works about your natural style?

Edit Effectively

Using participant's tricky samples we will share some simple self-editing techniques and ways to know if we are getting it right.

Using a variety of writing samples we will examine clarity and accuracy of expression and discuss what might work better for us as readers.

We will focus on sentences as "units of sense"
We will pin down what the effect is of using two, three or more words where one would do
We will discuss the effect of using short and long sentences
Repetition for effect
We will look at text-white balance
Widows and orphans

Personal Take Out

Each delegate will be asked to write a fun summary of what they are taking from the Writing Winning Tenders Course in for example, Limerick, strap-line or cartoon form.

Writing Winning Tenders and Proposals Course

   

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