Before anything else, it’s imperative to define what tender management is. Without going through all the jargon, the term refers to strategising, choosing, and publishing the bids while documenting everything to identify the best practices for future deals.
Tender management can be both manual and automated. However, even though you can purchase multiple software applications that manage your tender applications, nothing will beat the traditional method where a person will go through all of the information themselves and catch all the small details that a computer might miss.
Why You Need an Exhaustive Tender Preparation
The primary objective of tender management is to boost the chances of outbidding your competitors, gathering data to assess current performance and applying changes to track and manage your tenders effectively. Having a transparent tender management system in place means you can track your current contracts and devise a plan to make the process more streamlined for your company.
In most instances, companies do not have a team to handle full-scale tender preparation. So, it’s better to outsource it to a service provider specialising in tender management so that you can focus on your core services and expertise. In addition, having a system in place is critical if your business relies on securing tenders to earn income.
So, if your team is currently handling their own tender management, you may find yourself facing the following challenges:
● Managing multiple deadlines.
● Having to assign team members to tender preparation instead of their usual position.
● Smaller teams left to work on current projects.
● Time spent on research and gathering information on the project, reviewing the tender, and then submitting the bid that could be spent on more essential work.
● Disruption to BAU
● Managing your team to ensure they are on time with the tender preparation alongside their general tasks
Tender Management and Future Contracts
The main objective of tender management is to allow you to win as many bids as possible. Outsourcing this process to professionals will help establish a system in your organisation enabling you to handle a large volume of contract opportunities.
One of the essential elements of tender management is to examine the feedback on why your bid failed. In addition, you need to review all the aspects of the proposal to determine the weaknesses and improve upon them the next time you submit a tender.
For instance, part of management is to establish a dedicated library that will house all past and existing contracts. As a result, the filing system will become a rich repository of resources you can pull out every time you draw a new tender. Ultimately, the system will significantly reduce the workload and accelerate the timeline, enabling you to meet submission deadlines.
Tender Preparation and Finding the Right Writer
Finally, you must find someone to write the tender to persuade the approving authority to award the contract to your company. Finding a suitable writer is crucial because comprehensive tender preparation does not guarantee that you will secure the contract.
The writer has the tall task of writing the entire tender from scratch or finding a previous contract that resembles the parameters of the new bid. The writer can then use that contact as a template for drafting a new proposal.
So, finding a prolific writer is key to successful tender management. All the efforts and preparation beforehand would be useless if you cannot tie it into an excellent package that will persuade the approving agency to award the contract to your organisation. Your tender must articulate everything you want to say to get to the project’s next phase.
Conclusion: As you can see, applying for a bid is an exhaustive process that would potentially crush small organisations and keep them out of the running from the bidding process. In addition, competing with more prominent companies with dedicated teams to draft contract proposals is tough. So, you must bring in outside help whose primary service is tender preparation to give yourself a fighting chance.
