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Scheduling Considerations |
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Creating the Schedule requires that you recognize some important considerations. The major items are the delivery date, the delivery method, and the time allowed for fixed versus flexible elements.
- Prepare the Schedule Starting with the Delivery Date
Unless the client is next door to you, the delivery date is not the date the proposal is due. It is the day you mail your proposal. The true delivery date is the only critical date. It's generally inflexible and, therefore, it's THE date that dictates your entire schedule. And because of the possible complications in delivery methods, your delivery date should always be set at least 24 hours prior to the required due date. So set that date and then work backwards through the final production and assembly, the reviews, and the writing until your reach the beginning of the process or the current date.
- Confirm a Delivery Method AND a Back-up Delivery Method
Another reason for scheduling your delivery date a day early is to leave yourself with enough time to recover from a disaster: the FedEx truck breaks down, the buses stop running, the plane can't land, the postal workers go on strike, etc. As preposterous as these things might seem, they are very real possibilities. And what's even more real are those things you can't anticipate. The only exception to this is if the dollar amount of the contract and the proposal production costs are at a level where missing out on the bid will not wound you. (And delivering a day early might just give the impression that you have your act together.)
- Some Elements are Collapsible and Some are Not.
The time allotted for writing and reviewing a proposal can be collapsed, but the time printers, typists, and outside contractors need is fixed. Squeezing their schedules only endangers your delivery. Experience shows that many writers will expand their effort to fill whatever amount of time they're allowed, and reviewers tend to put off their review until the last minute. Printers and typists don't have that sort of flexibility. Their work takes a given amount of time and you don't want them to try and go faster. That only sabotages the quality of your document, or worse, your ability to deliver a document.
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Tom had been involved in proposal preparation and production, but was still "green" and hadn't really caught on to the importance of scheduling backups. And his schedule was set so that the proposal would be shipped out the night before it was due. It was tight, but he felt that they could pull it off. So it was with a great sense of relief that he handed the shipping box to the delivery service at 5 p.m. the day before it was due. "When it positively, absolutely has to get there overnight," they promised him.
The next day he decided to call the shipping agency just to make sure the proposal arrived OK. They confirmed his worst fears. "They had a snow storm up there," they told him. "Couldn't get any flights in or out. We're moving everything to trucks and hope to get them through in the next couple of days."
"But I need it there today," Tom exclaimed.
"I very sorry," they said. "I know it was guaranteed and we'll definitely give you a full refund."
But Tom knew there was no way he could get a refund on the potential contract or on the time and effort put into preparing the proposal.
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