This document discusses how to improve government proposals through effective proposal reviews. It outlines common types of proposal reviews, such as pink, blue, red, green and gold team reviews. It provides tips for mastering these usual color-coded reviews, including using checklists to ensure all steps are followed and facilitating reviews effectively. The document also discusses mistakes made by pink and red team reviewers and recommends practices for more helpful reviews, such as training reviewers and experimenting with asynchronous reviews. Finally, it promotes additional indispensable reviews like in-process and peer reviews to catch errors and provide better feedback.

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How to Improve
Your Government
Proposals’ Pwin:
Master the Formal
and Informal
Proposal Reviews
www.ostglobalsolutions.com

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Master the Usual Color
Reviews
 Pink, Blue, Red, Green, Gold
Teams, White Glove Review, and
other colors of the rainbow
 Key skills: review logistics and
facilitation
• Logistics: use a checklist to ensure you
don’t miss any steps
• Facilitation: get the most from
reviewers

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Pink and Red Team Reviewers’
Mistakes
 Ignore checking proposal against the RFP evaluation
criteria and other requirements – simply read the
proposal
 Correct grammar and typos, or criticize the aesthetics
of the graphics that have not been professionally
rendered yet
 Stay on the surface
 Offer only a handful of comments instead of a
thorough scrub
 Criticize without offering a specific solution: “this just
doesn’t read well”
 Issue a blanket positive statement –“it reads well”

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Helpful Review Practices
 Train the reviewers how to be effective
 Tailor review expectations and
questions for each review
 Conduct at least one review for quick-
turn proposals
 Experiment with asynchronous and
rolling reviews if time is tight

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Add Indispensable
Reviews
 In-Process Reviews to sustain
progress
 Peer Review for authors to
understand what is being
discussed elsewhere in the
proposal and provide more
substantive critique
 Read-Aloud Review to catch the
last errors and inconsistencies

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To Wrap Up Our Series on
Pwin…
 You may do everything right and lose:
• Someone else may buy their way in
• Competitors may run better capture
• Politics or bad luck may get in the way
 Nothing is guaranteed, but your Pwin is
higher if you do a great job on every front
 Just because your past proposals have won
doesn’t mean they are good
 To keep winning in a increasingly competitive
market, always put your best foot forward

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Resources to Improve Results with Proposal
Reviews
 Foundations and Advanced Proposal Management
Courses (B&P Academy)
 Proposal Manager’s Essential Checklists (OST Website)
 GovCon Incubator’s KNOW™ Portal
www.ostglobalsolutions.com
Olessia Smotrova: 240-246-5305
David Huff: 513-316-0993