Back to Basics: Capture Planning Do’s and Don’ts By Tom Luciano Seneca Creek Consulting The requirement to develop a capture plan should be limited to certain significant-sized acquisitions that warrant such in-depth understanding and market knowledge prior to making a bid decision. However, there are key components of this process that can be streamlined and tailored to your business model. The purpose of the capture plan is two-fold. First, it permits management to make an unbiased and informed bid/no bid decision on prime contract bids. Secondly, once a bid decision is made, the capture plan becomes one of the key documents for the proposal manager and proposal team. From the proposal manager’s perspective, the capture plan contains several key elements necessary to ensure that a winning proposal is developed. These include: Win Discriminators: What does our solution have that nobody else’s has and why it is better than our competitor’s solution? Evaluation Criteria: How will the selection be made and to what extent does our company address each criterion? Evaluation Board: Who will make or influence the selection and what do they know about our company? Purpose of the Solicitation: Why is the customer interested in a new solution and why have they chosen to do it in the manner reflected in the RFP? Price: What is the “right” price range for this work? Is this “priced to win” or “priced to value”? The capture plan must be straightforward yet contain all the necessary ingredients to present management with a clear understanding of the opportunity and confidence that business development personnel have performed the required due diligence on the targeted acquisition. From the business developers’ point of view, presenting a complete capture plan makes them a key stakeholder in the opportunity and contributing participant throughout the proposal process. The capture plan is, in fact, the pyramid on which other step-by-step decisions are made regarding the opportunity that your enterprise is pursuing. Viewed in this light, it is apparent that a proper, not overly complex plan is in place at the earliest point possible. For more information visit www.SenecaCreekConsulting.com.