Assessing Probability, Risk and Cost in Responses to U.S. Federal RFPs

Wednesday, September 211:00 p.m. – 2:00 p.m. EDT

Today’s Presenters

Fergal McGovern Fergal McGovern is CEO of VisibleThread, a provider of Compliance Matrix, Proposal Management & Bid Proposal software. He defines company strategy and is responsible for oversight of VisibleThread Docs and Clarity Grader products. Fergal developed the methodology for the company’s 2016 U.S. Government Procurement Index Report. fergal.mcgovern@visiblethread.com

Phil NesbittPhil Nesbitt is Director of Proposal Development for Artel LLC, a provider of a full portfolio of satellite and terrestrial network communications and infrastructure, cyber security, risk management and IT solutions. Phil is responsible for business strategy, assessment and development of Artel’s RFP response processes. pnesbitt@artelllc.com

• The challenge: written communication

• RFP clarity study findings

• Understanding federal RFP contents

• Tips for developing a better response to an RFP

• RFP content automation

• Q&A

Agenda

• Successful initiatives rely on effective communication – written communication in particular

• The quality of written communication in professional settings varies greatly

• Understanding where poor written communication exists presents the greatest threat - empowers you to take action

• Identify techniques and tools to improve written communication for either side of the RFP process – offer-side and response-side content development

Why Are We Here?

Study Declares U.S. Federal Procurement Documents Incomprehensible

Poorly written RFPs create unnecessary costs for their authors.

Clear writing in procurement documents helps government agencies achieve several objectives:

• Higher accuracy in matching suppliers to program needs: Poorly written RFP content may lead to the best supplier’s elimination based on technicalities. Avoid preventable errors through more clear instruction.

• Greater program performance: Higher quality communication during the bidding process helps suppliers meet government program needs.

• Reduce costs: When bidders know what the government needs and how to respond, the process requires less time and fewer resources.

Should We Care About RFP Clarity?

• In March 2016, VisibleThread conducted an analysis of some of the largest RFPs issued by the U.S. government in 2015.

• Study focused on areas of RFPs that have the greatest influence over the government’s ability to identify the best supplier for the job.

• Section C

• Section L

• Section M

A Study of RFP Clarity

A number of well-established factors influence the clarity of written copy.

In our study, we measured each document set across these four dimensions:

• Readability – How readable is the content?

• Passive Language – Active language communicates clearly. What proportion of sentences is passive?

• Long Sentences – What proportion of all sentences are too long?

• Word Complexity Density – Complex words make copy hard to understand.

What Factors Influence Clarity?

• Wide variability of quality between RFPs

• Agencies can dramatically improve clarity by focusing on certain metrics

• Agencies are increasing their administrative burden by issuing RFPs of poor quality

• Agencies are increasing their operating costs by issuing RFPs of poor quality

What Did We Find?

Fundamentals of Government Procurement Documents

Often the words in an RFP don’t mean what you think they mean, or they mean more than you think they mean.

Parsing solicitation language is often a project of its own.

A Federal RFP is often divided into 13 sections. In some RFPs, one or more sections may be listed but contain no content.

While the proposal manager is concerned with all of the sections, the focus is primarily on sections C, H, L, and M.

RFPs Dissected

Contract Line Item Numbers (CLINs) are another in a list of often confusing aspects of a solicitation. They often seem to have no relationship to the tasks you’ve been asked to perform. They require you to break out your invoices in weird ways that add cost and complexity to your accounting for no apparent reason. So, why are they required?

CLINs are specified in the FAR part 4.10. and serve two purposes:

• They break the contract down by the commodities/services being procured, labor hours of services, funding for travel, quantity of products and equipment, other direct costs (ODCs), etc.

• They provide for traceable accounting classification citations. The confusion comes from this second purpose, which is defined Government accounting requirements, for example, fiscal years and appropriations that are often not visible to the offerors.

Section B

The Performance Work Statement (PWS) or the Statement of Work (SOW) or the Statement of Objective (SOO) is the home of the customer’s requirements for the program or project. This is different from the requirements for the proposal (found in Section L).

• Performance Work Statement is a statement of work for performance-based acquisitions that describes the required results in clear, specific and objective terms with measurable outcomes.

• Statement of Work (SOW) The SOW should specify in clear, understandable terms the work to be done in developing or producing the goods to be delivered or services to be performed by a contractor.

• Statement of Objectives is a Government-prepared document incorporated into the solicitation that states the overall performance objectives.

Section C

Section L (Instructions). This is the most important part of the RFP for the proposal team. This section contains all of the instructions for responding to the customer’s requirements. It will outline how to prepare the proposal documents, define what areas are to be addressed and how they are to be addressed. It will outline what parts of Section C need to addressed in the proposal and will go as far as to mandate the size and font of the typeface, margins, and page count.

Section L is the overriding guidance for the development of content for a proposal. If it states that the sky is green, you proposal will state that the sky is green.

Section L

Section M (Evaluation Criteria). This section gives a detailed description of how the proposal will be evaluated, what rankings the reviewers will use and how these rankings will be determined. Section M lets us know the scoring weight of each proposal section, allowing the proposal team to allocate resources to the areas that have the highest scoring weight.

It is not unusual for the language of Section M to contradict the directions and instructions in Section L. Section L could instruct us to address Information Assurance in the detail provided in the PWS, and Section M will inform us that the key element of the evaluation will be Inside Plant / Outside Plant, and not mention IA.

Section M

Special Clauses. More proposal managers have been burned by the content of this section than any other in an RFP.

This section should NEVER be overlooked. If there is content in this section, it is because the customer wants something specific addressed in the proposal. Read this section carefully.

Section H

Preparing Your Response

One of the most important things to remember is that the document you will submit is a SALES document.

You are selling your ability to meet a customer’s requirements.

This requires a sales job across a number of areas where you sell by telling the reviewer that:

• We can do that

• We know how we’ll do that

• We have a history of doing that

• We have customers willing to tell you how well we do that

• We can do it better, quicker, cheaper than the other guys

Things Your Mother Never Told You About Proposal Writing

The first step is understanding what the customer is really looking for in the requirement. This is often not clear at first glance and requires additional parsing to ensure that we do understand.

Using a paragraph from a recent Federal RFP, we can look at the requirements stated in a single paragraph and come up with nine separate things we need to address:

Write to the Requirements

Actual RFP Section L Language:“Recruitment and Retention. Describe your company’s approach to recruitment and retention of personnel, with emphasis on recruitment and retention in the theater of operations for this contract and on recruitment and retention in hostile areas. Discuss how your overall compensation plan will contribute to recruitment and retention of personnel. Also discuss how full performance of services will be maintained during employee absences.”

1. Describe your company’s approach to recruitment of personnel.

2. Describe your company’s approach to retention of personnel.

3. Emphasize recruitment in the theater of operations for this contract.

4. Emphasize retention in the theater of operations for this contract.

5. Emphasize recruitment in hostile areas for this contract.

6. Emphasize retention in hostile areas for this contract.

7. Discuss how your overall compensation plan will contribute to recruitment.

8. Discuss how your overall compensation plan will contribute to retention

9. Discuss how full performance of services will be maintained during employee absences.

Write to the Requirements

• Review and define ALL the requirements

• Organize the requirements into logical groups

• Intuit the customer’s rationale (e.g., reading between the lines)

• Respond clearly and succinctly

RFP Response: The Hard Part

There has always been a great deal of emphasis on “shall” statements: “The offeror shall provide a quality of service defined in Attachment 3 (Service Level Agreements [SLAs]).” We will then tell them how we “will” provide that quality of service.

Watch Out for the Traps…

“We are the best (highest, first, coolest) purveyor of widgets to the Department of Defense.” If you use this, it must be substantiated .

“We are the recognized expert in Government practices, experienced in all aspects of strategic delivery.” Who recognizes us? Who recognizes us as the expert? No go unless you identify the source of the recognition.

“We have a thorough understanding of the mission and requirements.” As is, this is a throw away line taking up valuable space. If we say, With 10 years of direct experience working closely with (customer), we have developed a thorough understanding…” that will fly.

After identifying the things that the customer really wants, we need to tell the reviewers that:

Writing to the Requirements

We can do that…Emphasize our strengths.Explain the approach at the highest level.

We know how we’ll do that…Give them a road map. Take them from A to Z and cite experience when you write.

We have a history of doing that…Let the customer know that we’ve done this before. This is one area where the moderate use of superlatives works well.

We have customers willing to tell you how well we do that…Especially if they are satisfied customers. We are not talking about past performance citations here. “We provided the Department of Defense with 300,000 widgets with a zero percent failure rate. In seven years of service there has never been a failure. This resulted in an additional order for 200,000 widgets.”

After identifying the things that the customer really wants, we need to tell the reviewers that:

Writing to the Requirements

We can do it better, quicker, cheaper than the other guys“We have developed a management flow program that can provide more skilled technicians (workers, cooks, specialists), putting them on-site within 10 days of notification and at 30 percent less cost than others in the industry.”

The customer is always looking for potential risk. Our job is to mitigate or moderate our weaknesses or perceived risks.“We purchased and tailored new XYZ tracking software to ensure that all construction material for this project is accounted for, every step of the way.”

Highlight competitor’s weaknesses (ghosting) without directly naming or pointing the finger.“We are one of only two companies in the United States (Theatre, Continent, World) that has installed this revolutionary tracking software.”

Neutralize possible competitor’s strengths. This is difficult but not impossible.“Many companies have been using tracking software for more than a decade, some with poor results. Our solution has proven to be 99.98 percent accurate.”

And two key objectives to your writing:

Writing to the Requirements

Provide relevanceIncorporate the relevance of the solution HOW and/or WHY: “The new A/N URC 42X Widget has 247 points of similarity with the existing N/M 100 Crypto Calculator...; “The previous Logistics XQ-17 management program requires the same level of oversight as the new Staff Command Communications project...”

Experience, performance, and a self-assessment Start with an over-arching statement such as:“During the widget program, we will perform every requirement, often exceeding the Customer’s initial specifications. We have identified a number of areas for more efficient use of Widgets, and working with the customer team, we will integrate Widgets into construction systems in new, innovative, ways.”

If applicable, offer two or three specific instances of expected solution performance:“The Widget teleportation segment has suffered continuous ground faults for years. Our technical SWAT team developed a permanent solution to this problem in the first 15 days of support.”

• Build in themes throughout – with the benefit

• Pull out positive metrics and other differentiators with pull quotes

• Avoid the “duh”

• Expose the relevant and meaningful

• Make it easy – consolidate information

• Do NOT give the government more than they request

Winning Response Techniques

RFP Process Automation

• Macro- and micro-level approach – improve an individual response and/or your response capability

• Refine and simplify boilerplate

• Identify and remove/rewrite open-ended statements

• Score your content to gain time and reduce risk – focus on problem areas first

• Reduce time investments in tedious tasks – acronym glossaries, etc.

The Frontier: Language Automation

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