In Vienna for Eurovision recently, I was lucky enough to stay in one of my favourite hotels.
The Imperial was opened by the Emperor Franz Joseph. Guests have included JFK, Emperor Hirohito and the Queen (the real one, not Camilla!). If it is good enough for them, it is good enough for me!
Why has it been so successful for 150+ years? Partly, the building is spectacular: it is a former palace. But mainly it is because of the service. They anticipate your needs. The experience feels personalised. And they make you smile.
In other words – they are wonderful at stakeholder management.
Bid and proposal functions need to be more like The Imperial. It is too easy for us to moan that “the C-suite do not take us seriously”, “Sales did not engage us early enough” or “Our SMEs never deliver what we need when we need it”.
What would The Imperial do? They would work out what would delight each of the guests around the bid table.
Alison in the C-suite does not want to hear that you are working weekends. She wants to know how you can contribute to the organisation’s growth – and be confident that you are winning and retaining good business.
Alex in the sales team just wants to win. They have seen you work late into the night, so assume that is what you do. That they might forewarn you of an upcoming bid, or that you could add value if they did, would not cross their mind. And a salesperson tied to a desk is not a salesperson in their natural habitat, out with customers.
And Amina, your main technical expert, does get that today’s bid is tomorrow’s project. But she is your SME precisely because she is the “expert” – she is under pressure delivering services for your existing clients. Her time is tight. She is not a confident writer: proposals slightly scare her.
And yet we blaze in with the entitled expectation that they will all jump when we say jump. Is it any wonder that we see friction and stress?
That we will be able to steer them using true best practices should go without saying. But the success of any bid and proposal function at the macro level surely comes down to understanding your stakeholders’ aspirations and designing a service that will delight them.
And success on any individual bid depends on truly understanding the people you are working with – their motivators, their comfort levels, their constraints. And then seeking to lead, not merely manage.
So let us stop complaining – and let us bring some of The Imperial’s empathy, polish, and joie de vivre to the art of bidding and the task of winning.
Jon Williams
Jon and his team work with clients worldwide to help them establish winning proposal capabilities and to capture major deals. He has built and led numerous bid and proposal centres; managed, reviewed and benchmarked countless proposals; worked in over 35 countries; and trained many thousands of course participants.
