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How To Succeed With Tenders
HOW TO SUCCEED WITH TENDERS – PREPARATION IS THE KEY
Tendering skills are a critical component of the professional buyer’s job description, however, responding to a tender or RFQ is vital to the success of any business. If you fail to succeed on getting the award on your tender responses it is likely you will not be in business very long. What is the key to increasing your chances at winning more tenders?
Preparation is the key element if corporations and individuals are to expect success from the tendering process.
While some of this preparation we are referring to may demand a capital investment if your representative is to perform a site visit or take part in additional training however, not all preparation is costly.So frequently, when dealing with some smaller sized corporations the tendering process can be quite nerve-racking, time-challenged and often without system. Responding to RFQ’s or RFP’s can become the most unpleasant task.
This can be managed by planning in advance.
Tender responses almost always require details on your team, approach and methodology, management, price and past experience. With the often restricted timelines to complete the tender response, it is crucial that time is allocated to ensuring the best possible solution to the project’s requirements at the best possible price. Most efforts needs to be dedicated to fresh thinking, not administrative compilation of past information.
There is no doubt that a successful track record of implementing or past experience in similar activities will be evaluated and contribute to your success or failure for any tender. But this doesn’t imply spending two weeks to locate and compile a summary of past experiences is time wisely spent – this can be done now and on an ongoing basis.
All tenders are likely to call for an array of details which exhibits your experience in past, similar activities. Information required almost always consists of the activity name, location and duration, client, project value, key personnel by name and title, and a synopsis of the activity.
Aggregating this activity is clearly destined to be a challenge if it requires searching for staff and past associates for details, relying on memory etc. The answer is to encourage the habit of compiling relevant information as soon as a project begins, and keeping the information current.
This can be made even easier by capturing information from the start of a project consistent with how a future tender might require the information presented.
Major organizations request a Project Data Sheet (PDS) for each project example that you are including with your tender. This is often a single page per project, and captures all the information required in the evaluation of your tender.
Can I use each PDS just as it is for any tender I submit?
Keep in mind that although this template is consistent with what is currently requested, it is important to check exact tender requirements before submission to ensure compliance.
Secondly, each tender has different considerations because each project is different, so a generic response is rarely successful. Likewise, each project you have undertaken would have contained a range of activities approaches etc. So, before just adding a PDS example to a tender submission, consider what the tender’s (project’s) focus is, and ensure your PDS examples demonstrate this. Occasionally a slight re-write to place greater emphasis on a key aspect of relevance is important. So customize your response to reflect the client’s needs and wants.
What if I do not tender for activities?
The information that the PDS template captures is ideal for submissions direct to client, or as a data capture tool for drawing information from for developing capability documents, case-study information and the like.
Preparation is the key.
Whether preparing a tender for a complex project, or a proposal direct to a client, it is important that time is spent coming up with the best possible approach or solution to ensure implementation produces the very best results. Taking time away from this critical aspect of tender and proposal development to prepare Project Data Sheets is not time well spent.
See VR220-Product Data Sheet.doc in the Vendor Pack if you are interested in looking at a sample template. Our pack has a variety of tender response templates which will help you produce a professional tender response and help you improve your chances of winning more tenders.
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