MICHELLE BOGLE CF APMP
I wrote my first proposal in 2006. It was for a tender to deliver mud logging services to an oil and gas company in Egypt. I hated it.
The 50-odd questions, the forms, the CVs, the technical specifications, the HSE and Quality. Appendices. Compliance, compliance, compliance.
Just write anything they said. No, I replied. This is like essays in university. You have to answer the questions! Tap, Tap, tap. Delete. Tap, tap. Delete.
Then came the printing, the photocopying, the stamping and binding. One original and three copies please. Three? Isn’t it five? How many envelopes?
11pm the night before submission. Fuelled by coffee. And biscuits. And Fast Food. And adrenaline.
Where is the bid bond? Did anyone check to make sure the financial section is separate from the technical?
I remember my feeling of pride at the stacks of lever arch folders. Beautifully designed covers and spines. All waiting to be loaded into the boxes for delivery.
Didn’t we do well? Three full boxes!
Will anyone read it…?
Yawn… Wake me up in two days please.
I wrote proposals for 4 years and in 2010 I moved on. I worked in other roles. I thought I had escaped.
Proposals? No thank you.
Fast track to 2012. I was managing teams and projects, especially around process development. I felt like something was missing in my career.
What career could I pursue, that I would enjoy and that would make the most of my skills and experience?
A life coach suggested I consider a career using one of my unique skills. Something that not many people are good at.
Hmm. I kept coming back to writing. I was process-oriented. I was also creative and enjoyed design. I had strong empathy and listening skills - often 'hearing' way beyond spoken words to understand what others couldn't express effectively. What could I do with all of these?
Aha! Proposals!
And that’s where my career as a Proposal Specialist began.
I attended a training course with a bid consultancy, and I left buzzing (Thank you Marcus and Neal).
I learned the techniques. I learned the best practice. I learned that there was a right way and a wrong way. A good way and a bad way to write proposals. Hint: Three boxes of lever arch files do not necessarily make a good proposal!
That’s when I discovered there was a whole community of people like me. People who had turned their skills into an art. People who liked managing bids and creating proposals.
I thought I had died and gone to (proposal) heaven.
I found that my unique skills gave me an edge in the proposals world. My mental knowledge library of lots of things about things is useful too. I seem to have an answer for everything!
I wrote my first proposal in 2006. 14 years on and I couldn't imagine doing anything else.
Want to learn more? Contact me today.
PROFESSIONAL SKILLS
Continuous learning and development is another passion of mine. I'm committed to constantly staying up to date with trends in the bids and proposal world, as well as developing new skills which complement my work as a bid professional.
I'm a member of the Association of Proposal Management Professionals (APMP), through which I'm certified APMP Foundation. I regularly attend the APMP webinars delivered by experts from across the World, as well as the UK annual conferences which involve multiple days of bid and proposal utopia.