The Business Development (BD) process in
Government Contracting relates to the identification of suitable contracts and
preparation of proposals in response to Government solicitations for these
contracts. It typically consists of five separate and distinct phases:
- The PositioningPhase (tied to the company's Business and Strategic Plans), where the company decides on the direction they want to take to increase market share. The PursuitPhase, where the overall Marketing Plan is developed and then separated into the accounts that will identify individual targets to pursue
- The ProposalPhase, where the response to the RFP is prepared
- The Post SubmissionPhase, where clarifications, proposal modifications and negotiations (if any) are prepared
- The OperationsPhase, where the contract is mobilized for Phase-in, if won - or lessons learned from the Government's debrief is collected, if lost
One important aspect of the BD process is that it
is most effective as a closed-loop system, in which the Operations Phase
information feeds into the Positioning Phase for an ever-changing system that
quickly reacts to changing conditions in the marketplace. This is often
referred to as the BD Lifecycle.
Many separate workgroups or business units
support the BD process, from corporate management to the operations staff to
production personnel and administrative staff inside the company, to third
party Subject Matter Experts (SME) or professional proposal preparation
personnel like those provided by third party consulting firms.
Positioning PhaseSome of the tasks performed
during the major phases of the BD process include:
- Defining the company's direction
- Using data from the Marketing Plan, establish target selection criteria and prioritize targets
- Forming strategic alliances with other companies that can make good teaming partners that will lead to expanding the company's resume in new markets
- Analyze the gaps between where the company is today, and where the company needs to be, what it needs to have, etc to meet the projected goals
- Establish the various Lines of Business (LOB) and develop the account plans (by customer, region, etc) to support the LOBs
- Establish the necessary overall Bid and Proposal (B&P) budgets to support the accounts
Pursuit Phase
- Establish and develop the Capture Plans for targets identified within the Account Plans
- Develop an understanding of each individual customers' needs and articulate these in each Capture Plan
- Establish a customer Call Plan and meet with them to discover gaps and present solutions
- Locate Key Personnel suitable for the job
- Locate required subcontractors to fill niche task requirements or small business subcontracting goals
- Locate and commit one or more "guy on the ground" that understands details that may not be disclosed during the procurement cycle (make sure he does not have a conflict of interest!) Redact all of the information into a Bid/No Bid document for analysis
Proposal Phase
- Hold strategy sessions and discuss all known information, and discover any final gaps
- Develop the Concept of Operation (CONOPS)
- Refine and finalize the B&P budget
- Mobilize the Proposal and Cost Teams
- Attend the Site Visit/Pre-proposal conference
- Conduct Final Bid/No Bid for Management
- Prepare, refine, produce, and deliver proposal
Post Submission Phase
- Follow up to client
- Orals Presentation if required
- Archive working proposal documents into library
- Respond to Questions/clarifications from customer
- Revise proposal as needed
Operations Phase
- Mobilize for Contract Phase-in
- Negotiate contract modification as needed
- Develop lessons learned (entire team)
- Collect and archive contract performance data for future proposals
This is just a simple list of some of the major
tasks performed during the process, there are many other sub-tasks that must be
performed to accomplish these, and there are many opportunities to do them
incorrectly. This is often frustrating for companies, as they are unable to
understand why they're not experiencing the success they believe they should
have, or that their competition has, because they are dutifully performing each
step of the process.
What's important here is that merely performing
the step is not the same as performing it correctly. Another dynamic of this is
that it can be difficult to admit that sometimes we need help, or it could be
that upper management would take a dim view of our abilities if we asked for
outside help with our internal processes.
Additionally, many large (and some small)
companies need help, but don't know they need it (or in extreme cases, are too
arrogant to admit it). This is normally characterized by a high turnover of
business development personnel as they struggle in vain to be successful using
a broken process.
Business Process Management Outsourcing
The growth and survival of business in the
dynamic environment depends upon the development of new products. Organizations
must always be on the lookout for new opportunities and exploit the
opportunities by creating new products and services. That's where the role of
business process management outsourcing comes in.
Needless to say, new product development holds
the key for the survival of an organization. New products do not come about by
themselves. They are the result of the ingenuity of creative people in the
organization. As such, it is obvious that new product development is the
function of organizational creativity. In other words, it depends upon how
creative an organization is with new ideas because any organization can only be
as creative as its people.
Creativity, in general, may be defined as an
"escape from mental struckness". In the organizational context, it
may be viewed as new insights that point to better ways of dealing with
reality. It involves a departure from conventional thinking to non-conventional
thinking. It entails establishment of a relationship between the hitherto unrelated
things, ideas or concepts.
Just as individuals differ in their ability to
translate their creative talents into results, organizations also differ in
their ability to translate the talents of their members into new products,
processes or services. When talking about business process management
outsourcing, organization members must believe that change will benefit them
and the organization. Some resistance to change is found in many organizations
for fear of losing position, learning new skills, etc. Such a resistance to
change has to be overcome by clarifying the need and urgency for change. The
adage that routine drives out the non-routine has to be revised and must be
made the other way. Managers in the organization, from top to the down must
make it clear in word and deed that they welcome new products and services.
