College of Pension Actuaries

If you need to write procedures for your organization, you may be tempted to start writing immediately, especially if the project is complex. Wait! Take time up front to select a methodology for your procedures writing. The right methodology can simplify a policies and procedures project and ensure a more useful and maintainable end product. As consultants with over 10 years of experience in writing procedures and creating procedures manuals, we have learned what makes a procedures writing methodology efficient and effective. Here are our top five tips for selecting a methodology for writing procedures.

Tip 1: The Right Methodology Helps You See the Big Picture

The right methodology helps you identify and understand at a high level the processes you need to document. Once you have a high-level understanding of processes, you can build a framework for your project and identify the steps needed to fill in the framework. Then, you will have an easier time planning your schedule and estimating time and resource requirements.

Tip 2: Changes Happen – A Good Methodology Simplifies Updates

Changes are inevitable in any organization, especially complex organizations. If you are going through the effort to write procedures, you will want to make sure that those procedures can be updated easily as changes occur in your organization. A methodology that simplifies change management is critical. We have found that organizing procedures by process is a very effective way to simplify change management. In general, high-level processes do not change as quickly as their implementation does (i.e., the procedures). For this reason, if you organize your manual by process, most updates should not require major reorganization of the manual. When reviewing methodologies, be sure to consider how a particular methodology would simplify or complicate updates.

You’ve all seen the textbooks which claim that they can walk you through the complexities of a challenging topic with ease. Now I would agree that there are right ways and wrong ways of learning but one of the things that I am certain of is that learning takes time. This is because learning requires rest whilst the brain absorbs the knowledge that has been acquired. This is why some of histories most famous thinkers are known for having great ideas whilst out in the wilderness. This is partly due to the fact that we learn new things in new environments but also due to the assimilation that takes place when we are no longer directly thinking about a given topic or when we are “taking time out from learning”. So this is learning pretty much in a nutshell but what about learning Tender Writing? Well, I am certain that no topic of any real depth can be learned in just a day and Tender Writing is no exception. I do know that the textbooks which claim 24 hour learning and pretty good on the whole but most, if not all, of these books rely on an intensive one hour session followed by a period of rest whilst the newly acquired knowledge “sinks in”. There may also be practical sessions which don’t tend to fall into these one hour sessions or, indeed, the whole of the “day’s” learning.

If your company or organisation is producing lots of Tender Documents on a regular basis but doesn’t have a set process in place then the overall efforts might be costing much more than they need to cost. So it is advisable to have a Tender Writing Consultant appraise your current systems and recommend a plan of action to get the most out of your current Tendering activities. If you do decide to hire a Tender Writing Consultant, which is highly recommended, then you should choose one by reputation and make sure that you hire one of the best ones who can really change your company or organisation’s Tender Writing Process.

So what are the most common aspects of Tendering Processes that usually need changing? Well, there are a few common issues with the typical Tender Writing Process and the effects of these deficiencies are usually higher costs than needed and lower results than anticipated. In essence, the first Tender that a company or organisation ever writes themselves or has produced for them should be the most expensive and each subsequent Tender that is written should be less expensive each time. This is because the first Tender requires lots of information to be collated, interpreted and used for the purpose of the Tender. The second Tender does not necessarily need to follow the same process, at least not the aspect of the process which entails information gathering and interpretation. This means that the second Tender must cost less right? It still depends on the type of project that is being Tendered for but if all things were considered equal then gathering information once and reusing it multiple times does definitely helps to cut costs.

A good tender writer is very important for any company. Tender writing is a difficult task and anyone who has great writing skills cannot do it. It requires a professional, an expert on tender writing to write that winning bid which makes your company stand out amongst the competing firms even when they have more experience than your company. When you compete for a contract, every company that bids wants to have an edge and that edge generally is a well written bid letter. Hence, a good tender writer is a huge asset to any company.

The first step to bidding for any contract these days is the PQQ. PQQ stands for Pre-Qualification Questionnaire. This helps the clients to identify the contractors suitable for a contract. PQQ is a way to shortlist contractors on basis of the questions asked in it. It inspects an array of elements in the contractor’s profile like finances, safety, credibility, history, insurance, accreditation, experience, capability etc. It tells whether the contractor can justify the contract or not. Hence it works like a filter.

There’s another term called ITT. ITT stands for Invitation to Tender. It is a document that invites potential suppliers to tender for a contract.

Having written the PQQ, everything comes down to writing a good Tender. Tender writing is not everybody’s job. Almost every contract is different and needs to be addressed differently while writing a tender. There’s no fixed layout for a tender. Companies that use a fixed layout may get a few contracts initially but they fail eventually. That’s why a tender writer is so important. He understands the contract’s requirement and shapes the tender accordingly. Hence, it provides a better chance to succeed with the contract.

In today’s world of cut throat competition, expanding a business has become a difficult task. Bidding for a Tender helps achieving this as when you bid for a contract or tender, you actually showcase the client your expertise in a particular field and offer them your organisation’s products and the services.

A bid for a contract is actually the understanding of the contractual requirements and convincing the client that you can offer all the services and can live up to the expectations of the client as mentioned in the Contract. A winning tender does that. People normally don’t get contracts since they keep on boasting about their companies in the tender letter and forget to convince the client about their understanding of the contract which a winning tender does.

A winning bid is professional and is written thoughtfully. Proper research is done before writing a winning bid since the client knows which tenders have been written after understanding the contract fully and which not.

While writing a winning Tender letter, lay emphasis on how you in particular qualify for the posted contract. Write about your history if you have handled a similar contract before, include references and talk about your understanding of the contract.

In the tender letter, write about the infrastructure of your company and how you want to go ahead with the contract. When you show the client your understanding of the project and your capability of handling the project, the only thing the client would require out of you is your thinking of the project’s future. How you would take ownership and go ahead with the contract is the main point in writing a winning tender letter.