A proposal with the wrong input and in the wrong hands is a ticking bomb waiting to blast you right out of the prospect. Don’t fall into the trap of thinking that a request for a proposal is a green light and an open door. You may just be smashing into a wall.
Here’s why anyone beneath the true, economic buyer cannot contribute to your proposal:
- They are generally unfamiliar with organizational strategy, do not have a broad view, and take a very narrow position.
- They will default to tasks, inputs, and deliverables. They do not tend to think in terms of outcome and results, where the real value for the project (and your fees) actually resides.
- They think small. They don’t think globally or innovatively.
- They are afraid of being critiqued and tend to be highly conservative instead of prudent risk takers; they are risk averse.
- They will eschew accepting or assigning any kind of internal account- ability because they are scared or they simply can’t.
Here’s why you can’t submit a proposal, no matter if you actually obtained quality input somehow, to anyone less than a true buyer:
- They will not have your passion to represent it and evangelize about it.
- They will tend to see it as a negotiating position once any others raise any type of resistance.
- They have no authority to move ahead in any case, and are simply middle people.
- Their priorities will tend not to include the project and they will sacrifice it if there is resistance from superiors.
- They will not be able to answer even reasonable questions about implementation.
I could go on, but I think you get my drift. You’re better off with no proposal than with a good proposal in the wrong hands. We talk in Chapter 3 specifically about how to identify, avoid, and mitigate the effects of gatekeepers, but for this overview let’s establish that you cannot provide them with proposals.
If you believe and buy into my position that proposals should be summations of conceptual agreement and not explorations of “fit” and acceptability of work, then it shouldn’t be a great leap to understand why non buyers can’t be recipients of proposals.
Occasionally, there is a key recommender who can get you to a buyer, but even that person should be used to create the beginning of a relationship, preproposal, and not be the channel through which the proposal is launched. I’ve had the good fortune to work with a half-dozen (they are that rare) key recommenders over the years, people who are completely trusted by line buyers. They have positioned me in front of the right people at the right time. But I’ve never asked one to provide input for or be the purveyor of the proposal itself.
That is between me and the buyer.
You also have to be careful that your proposal is not used as a competitive calibration. I’ve seen some prospects—especially people at low levels in those prospects who are accustomed to dealing with “vendors”—use the proposals to try to gain lower fees or better features from competing firms. You should place a copyright on your client proposals, and include these lines: “This proposal is in- tended solely for Adam Avery, senior vice president of Acme Rockets, and is for the exclusive purpose of creating a partnership between Acme and Summit for the project described herein. It may not be distributed or shared with others without our express approval.”
That may sound harsh, but a proposal is your intellectual property and not attempting to prevent others from seeing it is like leaving the back door open, the light on, and the combination to the safe taped to the window. You’re asking to be robbed.
Most organizations have an assortment of what I call “feasibility buyers.” They can’t sign a check, can say no but not yes, and may actually advise the buyer. They may constitute expertise in matters financial, cultural, technical, sales, research, politics, and/or simply be a trusted sounding board. That’s why you need your own direct relationship with the buyer, and not merely with those jockeying for position in the buyer’s favor. I know how harsh this may sound, but it’s the difference be- tween placing the right bet on a favored horse and placing a bet on a losing horse whose race was already run.
Proposals aren’t business cards. Don’t hand them out to just anyone who wants one as if you have an unlimited supply.