19/06/2021
From 30 September 2021, organisations will need to provide a Carbon Reduction Plan with their bids to achieve Net Zero by 2050. This applies if the contract is with a central Government department, an executive agency, or a non-departmental public body and it is valued at over £5m per annum. Full details can be found…
01/04/2021
Discovering your bid was unsuccessful is an understandably frustrating experience – no one enjoys learning that the cumulative time and effort spent on the submission was in vain and, with some exceptions, there are no prizes for coming second in this game. However, unsuccessful bids can help guide solution development, as well as how this…
20/10/2020
If you have been involved in bidding for, and/or delivering public sector contracts in the last five years, it is likely that you have come across the term ‘social value’. From 1st January 2021, the treatment of social value in government procurement is set to formally change. Evaluators will use a new social value…
02/09/2020
I recently came across a memo on the National Archives website from Winston Churchill dated August 1940 addressed to all members of the War Cabinet and their staff. Entitled ‘Brevity’ it starts: ‘To do our work, we all have to read a mass of papers. Nearly all of them are far too long. This wastes…
10/07/2020
As with any profession, being an excellent bid writer is about more than just having the right job title. After all, winning contracts is binary – there are no prizes for coming second. It is, therefore, imperative you hire the right person first time to increase significantly your chances of winning. Of course, good bid…
12/05/2020
As bid writers, we are often asked to prepare responses that request a ‘methodology’ or ‘approach’. We see such questions covering a wide range of industries, from the way in which a client will deliver a planned or reactive maintenance programme through to working with offenders in the community. These questions are also becoming more…
18/02/2020
When bidding, it is important to ensure your proposal: Answers the bid questions fully States what, who and how you will deliver your service Evidences or substantiates your credentials Articulates benefits to the Authority (the ‘buyer’ of your service or product) Reflects, as far as possible, the higher end of any evaluation criteria. This is…
10/01/2020
‘Please provide details of any social value your firm can provide in relation to this contract’ We are increasingly coming across the topic of social value when reviewing tender documents. It is usually in the form of a general question asking how the supplier will provide social value. Some tenders go further, requesting a certain…
01/11/2019
‘Please confirm below your organisation’s professional qualifications and industry accreditations’ Many bids will ask the above question, or a variant of it, as part of quality scoring your submission, with ISO (International Organisation for Standardisation) accreditation being a common request. ISO accreditation shows potential customers you align to internationally recognised standards they can trust. This…
17/06/2019
The tendering process with clients has to be a two-way partnership that works best when both parties work collaboratively. Neither the client nor the writer can achieve their common objective – a winning bid – without the other. So how does the relationship work to best effect? We always recognise that our clients are the…