Proposal production across the business development life cycle – phase 5 (Part 6 of 6)

In her previous post (Part 5 of 6), Briana Coleman, PPM.APMP discussed the key activities involved in Phase 4 of the typical business development (BD) life cycle:

• Phase 1 Opportunity identification and assessment
• Phase 2 Pursuit
• Phase 3 Pre-proposal preparation
• Phase 4 Proposal development
• Phase 5 Post-submittal

In this post, Briana discusses the key production activities that you should perform in the final phase—Phase 5 Post-submittal.

1. Archive and shred!

The production life cycle creates a lot of artifacts—both electronic and hard copy. Don’t forget to shred all versions of your proposal that you don’t need, and archive the ones you do. Create a central place in your office or on a network to store final proposals for in-house use or reference.

Archive or delete versions of graphics in a place that is easily accessed by your graphic artists later. This may include putting a slug number on each graphic for easy reference.

Clean up your SharePoint/Privia/Windows directory proposal repository, and delete any old versions of files.

Finally, clean up the war room so it’s ready for the next proposal.

2. Lessons learned

Just as you conduct a lessons-learned analysis for the proposal preparation, you should review the production process. This can be a component of the overall lessons-learned analysis or a separate exercise. Make sure you ask your desktop publisher, editor, graphic artists, and printer how things went. Update your company production plan with the results.

What key production activities do you perform in the final phase—Phase 5 Post-submittal? Send your thoughts to me at BWingate@LohfeldConsulting.com, and I’ll share your advice in upcoming posts!