It is important to plan ahead and arrange additional support in the event that your resources don’t cover an increase in demand, or fall short in the holiday period.
Contracting authorities can also experience a busy time during the run up to the holidays as they rush to have bidding schedules in place, which again may have a short deadline attached because of public holidays.
Increase in contract opportunities
In line with the procurement cycle, there has been an increase in contract opportunities which are due to start in early 2016. This includes major projects in the UK such as the High Speed Two (HS2) railway and the development of Heathrow Airport’s third runway.
Wherever possible, you should create a pipeline of bids for the coming months, in order to plan and organise your resources accordingly. However, it is common for opportunities to arise which were not anticipated and which therefore create a lack of resources within your bid team; this is extremely common in holiday periods such as Christmas and the summer holidays.
Is it advisable to have a contingency plan for busy periods, either in the form of staff from another team who can support the bidding process, or an external bid writing company who can work alongside your team to write the PQQ or tender.
Ad-hoc support from professional bid writers
We understand better than anyone that last minute submissions, resource issues and your actual day job can cause significant stress when bidding for all-important contracts. Fortunately, we have a team of experienced bid writers on-hand to assist when an organisation requires ad-hoc support, or further assistance on an ongoing basis. We can work alongside your team to create high quality PQQ and tender submissions, in the event you can’t manage the project in-house.
The run up to Christmas is certainly a busy time and staff are likely to take holiday and have a considerable work load towards the end of the year. This is also a busy time for the Executive Compass team, as we assist various companies with tender responses due in around Christmas, or even with early January deadlines, ready for the evaluation period in the New Year.
Range of support
Executive Compass® can be as involved in the bidding process as you require, to ensure a successful PQQ or tender is submitted on behalf of your company. For busy periods where there is a lack of resource, we can manage the full bid process so your team can concentrate on your day job and relieve the stress of a bid submission. Alternatively, if you find you need help with just part of your submission, we can help with that too. Our services can include:
- Review: for teams fully capable of completing their own bids but still requiring a professional opinion and external critique before it is submitted.
- Partial completion: if resource issues mean you are struggling to complete a bid, or if there are more complex sections with which you need help, we can complete part of your bid and also carry out a full review.
- Full completion: we complete the full PQQ or tender document on your behalf, including quality assurance, design, formatting and proofreading.
- Interim bid writer: for multiple projects, an interim bid writer will work with your company to deliver full bid management services (this works well as holiday cover and to bridge the gap when members of staff leave your organisation).
Find out more about our interim support here. To discuss further how our team can assist you during busy periods, such as the run up to Christmas, get in touch for free on 0800 612 5563 or fill in our website contact form with further details of your enquiry.