Tender Process

Most SMEs start with the Directors working directly with us on each tender. However, as your business grows you may want to create and in house team to handle tenders, or you might just want more structure and methodology to the way you work with external providers as you delegate more of the work to others in your company.

As much as we enjoy working with the founder of a business, we are happy to see a business we have supported grow and fly, confidently absorbing tendering into their routine business operations. We can even help you to do this, with our Tender Process Service.

The Tender Process we help you put in place will be one that fits your organisation, based on your resources and goals. Typically, a systematic approach to tender management will include:

  • Opportunity monitoring – registering on necessary portals, monitoring opportunities as they are published, reviewing trends and changes in requirements, registering interest and filing documentation
  • Bid/No Bid decision making – Bringing all interested parties together – BD, Ops, Finance and IT and Subject Matter experts – to read the documents and then discuss whether to proceed or not with the bid, and if so, at what price.
  • Defining your solution – It is important that all interested parties agree on how they will deliver the contract and how this will add value to the buying organisation. Ensure the essence of your organisation, your unique selling points, win themes, and how you will add value will be encapsulated in the response.
  • Writing the bid – subject matter experts prepare drafts, which are typically brought together by a Bid Manager into a single coherent bid with a single tone of voice. Bid writing and/or bid management might still be outsourced as a better value alternative when considering the opportunity cost of what could in-house team be doing if they were not responding to a tender.
  • Reviewing the bid – Once written, it is imperative that the bid is collated properly and reviewed. This does not mean just for accuracy of the content but also consistency of language, grammar, spelling, and punctuation.
  • Submitting the bid – Submitting a bid on a portal correctly including ensuring that all questions have been answered, adhering to word counts and uploading all supporting documents.
  • Presenting the bid – It is common for a buying organisation to create a shortlist of bidders and ask them to present their offering in more detail. Presenters should be trained in presentation skills o maximise impact.
  • Clarification response – it is essential that when clarifications are raised by the buyer that they are responded to immediately and in detail.
  • Feedback and improvement – whether you are successful or not it is important to request feedback from the buyer. You should then carry out a full debrief of what areas can be improved (even on a winning bid) for future bids and make adjustments to policies, procedures and internal processes accordingly. The contract renewal date should be noted, and a date placed in the diary to contact the client prior to renewal.

If you want to build a systematic and value added approach to tender management, we can help. . Our experienced consultants will work with you and your team to build a process to get the most out of your investment in tendering. Please contact us for a no obligation discussion about your needs and potential solutions. Just call 0161 820 2341 or email info@smetenders.net.