|
 By Sarah Reavley, a partner with Remark Research and Marketing. She has been advising professional services clients on the effectiveness of their marketing and business development for more than 15 years. Contact: +44 20 8444 9529, sarah.reavley@remarkconsulting.co.uk. This article is reprinted from PM Magazine, published by the PM Forum at www.PMForumUSA.com.
Picture the scene: It's 2.00 am and you have been in the office since 7.00am yesterday. You are surrounded by empty pizza boxes, half-full Styrofoam coffee cups and mountains of paper all covered in red ink. Yes, you have descended into the darkest depths of RFP bedlam.
One of the most significant effects of the recession on the marketing department has been the dramatic increase in the number of competitive pitches that professional services firms are taking part in. Partners are under pressure to look busy and be seen to be generating new work for the firm.
Consequently, they jump at every opportunity to secure a new client. This in turn leads to greater pressure on marketing departments and business development teams.
In addition, clients have become more demanding in their requirements of advisers during the pitch process. They know that firms are so keen to win their business that they will be prepared to jump through any number of hoops. Pitch processes have become more complex and onerous, with a multitude of phases requiring numerous documents and presentations. Clients are also using the recession as an excuse for driving down costs and extracting greater value from their external advisers.
If you are not careful, all this adds up to a lot of stress, hard work, late nights and disappointment, never mind the wasted resources. It is often the case that if a proposal is successful, the partner will claim all the credit but if it fails, then marketing is in the firing line.
Law firms are not very good at learning lessons from their unsuccessful experiences in RFPs. Often firms have no clear understanding of how many proposals are being submitted, how successful the organization is in winning work, or how much resource is being devoted compared to the income generated.
Therefore, you need to find a way of ensuring that the firm only participates in an RFP if there is a realistic chance of securing the work
The smart law practice will have in place a process for determining the circumstances under which it will participate in a RFP process. If you are unlucky enough to be working for a firm without such a process, here is a brief guide to help you.
The premise is to develop a set of questions, the answers to which will determine whether or not you compete for a specific role or assignment. Try thinking of it as a version of the Cosmopolitan 'How to tell if you are in the right relationship?' quiz, but without the embarrassment or free beach bag. If your answers to the questions are mostly yes then you roll up your sleeves and refuse to lose. If your answers are mostly no, you draw lots for who is going to break the bad news to the senior partner, then clear off to the pub to celebrate your lucky escape.
You can make your questionnaire as simple or complex as you wish. Some sort of scoring mechanism is needed, but it can be anything from the Cosmo style 'if your answers are mostly no, dump him he's a jerk' through to a more complex, weighted model.
Some firms mark each question on a scale of one to ten and the decision to proceed with a proposal is then determined by the total score. However, if you do opt for this sort of process you need to be very careful that you are not awarding equal weighting to questions that might have a very different impact on the outcome of your proposal. For example, you might include questions like 'will this proposal present a conflict of interest?' and 'are the timescales for preparing the proposal realistic?' Obviously a potential conflict of interest is much more of an issue for the firm than a tight timescale and this should be taken into account in any scoring mechanism.
The decision process
The following questions can be used as the basis of any RFP decision process and should cover most of the factors that might impact on a firm's chances of success. To keep things simple, these questions require a yes or no answer. Mostly positive answers indicate a strong chance of a successful outcome.
Before embarking on a proposal, the first priority is to establish whether or not winning this work is going to have a negative impact on existing client relationships.
1. Conflict
Have we checked that target will not present a conflict of interest for our firm?
Will working with this target have a wholly positive impact on our brand?
If any conflict identified has been resolved, the next step is to understand the reasons why this RFP has arisen.
2. Drivers
Do we know why this work is out for bid?
Do we know why client is unhappy with existing advisers?
Are we sure we don't share incumbent's negative attributes?
Establishing the client's reasons for initiating the proposal process will help determine the sort of service and adviser they might require. It will also prompt the partners to evaluate whether this is a genuine opportunity or just a means of keeping the incumbent on their toes.
Essential components
For each RFP process there will be a number of criteria that will influence a firm's ultimate decision to proceed. However, based on Remark's extensive experience in proposal management, in almost every case a successful outcome will depend on a firm's ability to present the right team, with the right approach, for the right fee.
3. Team
Do we have the right people?
Do they have the time and inclination to pursue this?
4. Approach
Do we understand what client really wants/needs?
Do we have the expertise to meet their requirement?
5. Fee
Can we submit a competitive, credible fee?
Can we afford to bid for/win this client?
The team is the most important component of a successful proposal. Our research shows that clients want to work with people they trust, people who have the required expertise and people who can work together as an effective team, both with each other and with the client's own staff.
This team will then have to demonstrate that they really understand and can deliver what the client needs. They will also need to convince the client that their proposed approach can be delivered on time and within budget.
The fee proposal has to meet the client's budget, deliver equivalent or greater value than anything the competition can offer and allow the firm to achieve an acceptable level of return.
Pitch perfect
If you cannot give positive answers to these first questions, you should probably focus your resources on more attainable or profitable opportunities. If, however, you do meet the above criteria, there are several further issues that you should consider before proceeding.
6. Relationships
Do we know the decision makers?
Do we have positive relationships with decision makers?
Do we have 'friendly' alumni working there?
7. Fit
Is this organization/sector a key marketing target?
Do we have a good track record for this work/sector?
8.Opportunity
Will this be a profitable project/client for our firm?
Can we develop an ongoing relationship?
9. Competition
Have we identified our competitors?
Can we match or exceed competitors' offer?
The silver bullet
Of course, there will be occasions when although a partner cannot give positive answers to these questions, he or she is convinced that the proposal will be successful. In this situation, you should make sure that this individual spells out what it is that makes them think a successful result is so likely.
10. Success factors
Can we identify a single, irrefutable reason why we will win this work?
In conclusion
If you apply this decision process consistently to every opportunity that comes your way and demand entirely positive answers, you may well never submit another proposal. Used judiciously, it should enable you to prioritize limited resources and pursue only those RFPs that play to your firm's strengths and fulfill your marketing strategy.
Most firms will have at least one partner who is brilliant when it comes to winning work, yet defies all the marketing conventions. In these cases, it is best to throw your decision process in the bin and let them work their magic.
However, if you are not working with a maverick rainmaker, spending an hour with the partner in charge of the RFP answering these questions, before the proposal process begins, will prove invaluable. Not only will you have saved yourself and the firm a great deal of wasted time, effort and money if the answer is no, but you will also have a much more focused and motivated team if you do decide to proceed. In answering these questions, you should be able to produce a useful list of headings for your proposal documents and you will also be on your way to articulating your main strengths and key points of differentiation. The criteria that make a particular RFP one you should proceed with are likely to be the same criteria your client will use in deciding who to appoint. |
RSS FEED
