Category: Management Tips

The language we use – including profanity – plays a role in whether our gaggle of colleagues will come together as an effective team.

One lesson from design teams is to design the process to fit the project. On RFP responses, this means tailoring the process to the scale of the response, providing communication and control tools tailored to that process, and setting appropriate standards.

Walls – whether actual or virtual – are places where the big points about an RFP response are posted, in a format big enough and simple enough to be seen and taken in at a glance: the response schedule, the selling themes, and the control sheet that identifies the status of each of 37 sections in the final multi-stage process of preparing the document for submission.

Under extreme time pressure, hard-charging proposal teams can go negative, become paralysed by fear of failing, and forget to laugh. Flipping all of these is key to fostering effective teamwork.

Greeting others on the proposal team at the start of the workday reminds everyone that they’re not working on their own. It reminds them that they can both give and receive help on numerous challenges. Saying goodnight also reinforces teamwork and gives others the courtesy of a chance to ask you that one burning question before you leave.