- You've been contacted by a prime organization and they want your qualifications and/or proposal. What should you do?
- You're certified with multiple agencies and several corporations - but nobody calls... what are you doing wrong, or is there just no business out there??
- Pre-bid and pre-proposal meetings, are they worth going to? Should you go? What should you do or bring or say?
- You're a proposal manager for a company and you are trying to put together a qualification or proposal for a project and you need to find and qualify DMWBE companies, where do you look (and why didn't you look before this crisis happened you wonder) and how do you qualify firms
- you are a DMWBE company, do you need a website, should you discuss your DMWBE status in the website - what can you do that makes you stand out and get noticed (hint, make it easy for the proposal manager above).
- You are in purchasing for a large corporation and the company has initiated a policy of seeking out DMWBE companies to participate as primes and subs - how do you go about setting up a program that meets the company's goals and objectives.
- What agencies, instituions and companies are serious about DMWBE goals, are there entities out there that you just shouldn't bother with?
- DMWBE customers: what are your biggest problems in utilizing DMWBE companies? Responsiveness, current certification, software compatibility, timely response? What needs to be fixed?
- DMWBE companies: what are your biggest problems in responding to customers? Communication, true participation, timely requests for info and data, no feedback?
O.K., we could go on forever ... give us some feedback and we'll strike out with the issues you deem most important first. No feedback and we'll start with some of our favorite issues.
Go find or be found!
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3 comments:
One of the big problems we have as a mwbe consulting engineer is that we get a call or email about whether we are interested, qualified, etc. Then just about the time everything is due to the contracting agency we get a call to provide our SF330 - then we hear nothing until 2 days before a presentation and then they just want us to sit there and not say anything - we have a lot to offer and can help a prime get the job if they will let us!
Exactly! This is a two way street, first of all you must proactively (I hate that word!) communicate and sell yourself as a partner that can help. Make yourself a list of questions and get on the phone: do you want resumes, what format? we have contacts at that agency do you want me to check in with them? are you having an internal pre-proposal meeting - and can we attend? Etc. Be the squeaky wheel but be sure you can respond with valuable information and support. Not necessarily fair but you want to become the go to firm - the one they think of as a partner. It also helps if you are helping a prospective partner ID work that you can help them with - that way you get onboard at the earliest stage.
Squeaky wheel ... exactly. After ten years of being the "non-sqeaky wheel" and basically getting consistently rolled over, I'm DEFINITELY turning over a new leaf in that regard.
Again, I hope you realize that this blog is really, really great. If I can be of any help, I'd love to be of service.
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