The Bid Burner Tracker for Proposal Teams

The short answer is yes, proposal management is inherently stressful due to the demanding and high-pressure nature of the job. In fact, 1 in 5 RFP teams report unmanageable stress levels––a trend Loopio sees year after year.

So, what makes a career in proposal management stressful?

1. Tight deadlines: Requests for proposals (RFPs) typically have strict submission deadlines, leaving little wiggle room for unexpected delays. The pressure to meet these deadlines can lead to long work hours as teams burn the candle at both ends, feeling a constant sense of urgency.

2. High-stakes deals: Since proposal teams have a significant impact on their company’s revenue and growth, there is an immense amount of pressure to deliver winning submissions. This pressure compounds with the expectation to submit a high volume of RFP responses per year.

3. Complex coordination: Proposal managers must coordinate with various departments, including sales, marketing, finance, legal, and technical teams. Managing input from multiple stakeholders (plus soliciting answers from busy SMEs) can be challenging.

4. Client demands: Clients expect polished, professional, and highly-customized proposals. But crafting a tailored response that stands out from the competition can take precious time, which teams don’t always have to spare when starting proposals from scratch.

The good news? RFP response software like Loopio can help alleviate the stress in proposal management by answering questions automatically from a trusted library, making it easy to collaborate with SMEs, and saving you time to personalize (and ultimately win) RFPs.

It’s no secret that responding to RFPs is a tense, fast-paced process. But there are ways to make it less stressful for your team. The key is to look for opportunities where you can eliminate bottlenecks, streamline collaboration, and write winning proposals more efficiently.

Here are some strategies to implement today:

🚦Be stringent in your Go/No-Go: Chasing after every RFP is a recipe for burnout. Instead, protect your team’s time by staying firm on which RFPs to go after. If there isn’t a good chance of winning, consider passing so your team can focus their energy on RFPs that matter.

👪 Define a consistent team workflow: A consistent workflow can bring order, direction, and so much sanity to your team. Create a workback schedule that breaks down tasks into small, achievable chunks. Then assign responsibilities, so no one is confused about who does what.

👂 Seek feedback early and often: Host regular check-ins with your team to learn what’s working (and what isn’t working) in the proposal process. And with the above template, you can track their feedback in real time so you can make improvements as they work.)

🤖 Use technology to your advantage: Rely on RFP automation software to do the heavy lifting. Leverage AI to quickly edit answers from a trusted library, easily collaborate with SMEs in one place, and automatically format responses to exact RFP requirements.

🥳 Celebrate the RFP victories: Your team works hard to win new business for your company. Make sure their efforts don’t go unnoticed by sharing the good news internally. A little praise and recognition goes a long way in keeping motivation high (and stress low).

The best way to prevent burnout is to avoid it in the first place. While that’s easier said than done when you’re already drowning in RFPs, the good news is that burnout doesn’t happen overnight. It builds slowly over time as stressors pile up in the proposal process.

In other words, if you take a proactive approach to identifying (and addressing) these stressors with your team, you can fight burnout head on. How can you do that?

Use the template above to track your team’s workload and challenges they’re facing. You can also encourage them to measure their stress levels using this scale:

1. I’m calm and focused 😊
2. I feel slight pressure 🙂
3. It’s busy, but I’m keeping up 😅
4. I’m overwhelmed at the moment 😰
5. I’m burnt out and struggling to cope 🔥

Here are other signs of burnout you should actively watch out for:

 
✓ Changes in behaviour (and participation) at work

✓ Trouble focusing on tasks at hand (foggy-brain syndrome)

✓ Difficulty meeting submission deadlines

✓ Producing lower quality proposals

✓ Apathy toward their work and proposal team