I’ve had a few conversations with small business now where I have asked the business owner to consider whether they were really ready to tender.  

Are you a small business owner considering whether you should bid for a tender? Are you not sure whether you are ready?  

Maybe you are, maybe you aren’t.  

Either way, here are a few things to look out for when considering whether you are ready. 

I’ve also provided a few ideas for you if you aren’t ready but still think you can do the work.   

My first question is - do you understand what the requesting organisation is asking for or needs? 

If you don’t, you really  need to sort this one out before going any further. 

When I have conversations with small business owners that have been sent a tender link, have called me about writing their tender bid, but haven’t read the request, I send them away to read it before I do any work with them. 

To be honest, if you haven’t read the document, you are wasting your time, and mine, until you know what the client needs.  Read the tender documents.  I always recommend you make notes in the margins and get an understanding before you even think about how to prepare a response.  

 2. Can you meet the tender criteria?  

Now that you have read the documents, can you meet the criteria?

The things I see many small businesses struggle with is the past performance requirement you will find in most tenders.  

Have you been in business long enough to provide a solid background on what you do, what you do well and why you do it well?  

If you don’t, have you had management, sales or contract management experience AND experience in the technical or professional aspects of the work you are considering?  

It isn’t completely wrong to tender for work in a new business, in fact it might be completely right if you have an innovative product or service and/or you are located right where you are needed but… 

It would be hard for a tender assessment panel to assess a tender bid as successful without technical/professional experience and some business or management experience.  

3. Have you got two or three referees?  

A part of providing evidence when tendering for work is providing good referees.  

Can you provide 2-3 names, businesses and examples of work that are relevant to the tender?  If not, again, it will be hard to assess you as suitable for the work without referees.  

4. Do you have staff or subcontractors and capacity to do the work?  

What I am asking is, are you so flat out already that you don’t get a lunch break or time to send your invoices?  

If you answer yes, how will you fit in the work?  

 If you don’t have a way to schedule your work when you are looking at a tender and you are not willing  to create a plan - I would suggest that tendering isn’t for you.  

You will need to outline in the tender how you will staff, coordinate and  manage the additional workload.  If you can’t explain this, your bid is already in trouble.  

5. Can you explain what you do?  

Do you have the ability and willingness to describe your approach to how you do the technical or professional tasks or how your product meets requirements?  

Again, this is something required in a tender bid.  

You will need to spell out what you do to show your competency and knowledge and even better, why you are better than the other bidders.  

If you aren’t willing to do this and have the attitude that the assessment panel should just know, you may be wasting your time developing a tender bid.  

6. Do you have, or can gain, the appropriate licences, accreditations and/or insurances for the work?  

 Some of these things take time to arrange. If you cannot get them, you won’t likely get considered as suitable for the contract.  

7. Are you willing to do what it takes to be successful?  

Please, don’t just answer yes to this question.  

Government, and many large not for profits or corporations that are likely to be calling for theirs, have strong corporate and social responsibility (CSR) and or Environmental and Social Governance (ESG) policies and will expect their contractors to at least support these operating guidelines.  

 These can include: 

• Buy Local policy

• Integrity and Anti-Corruption policies  

• Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander or Indigenous development/ employment initiatives or policies 

If you are not already, or willing to, abide by some or all of these rules and values, you might want to reconsider tendering. 

Now what?  

If you have read this and answered no to some or all my questions, but are still are still super keen to do work under the  tender, you might consider some other approaches.  

1. You could approach a larger organisation and offer to subcontract.  

2. You could find a  partner in another organisation or professional/technical expert to compliment your abilities and bid together. 

3. You may be able to bid for part of the tender but not all. This can be risky but in some cases, for example a panel contract, this will be an option.  

Now to writing the tender  

If you have read this, decided for or against any of the above alternatives, and still think you are ready to go for a tender, the next bit is asking yourself whether you can write the responses to the questions in the responses document.  

You, like many other people, may find this a really daunting task.  

You may have really good reasons why you or someone in your team cannot write the response.   

That’s ok. 

If you are ready to tender, are positive about all the questions asked of you above and are now determined to make it happen - we can help.  

At On The Same Page Consulting, we offer multiple approaches to assisting you to develop and polish your tenders and many other documents related to this, such as business plans.  

I would love to talk to you about the options to help you write your tender right.    

Find out more or book here

If I don’t hear from you, happy tendering!   

Conni 

P.S. We offer a no shame editing or proofing and polishing service - this means that we will support you to learn to write tenders if you want to learn that skill and/or you cannot afford the cost of a full tender writing service.

We will support you and guide you so that you can do it yourself.