I've finally begun my first proposal role at work. Proposals are a really important part of our work, since that's how we get new work, but since the Arab spring and the uncertainty in the Middle East we haven't had a lot of requests for proposals(RFPs) come out of USAID this year. And even now, I am working on a bid for a project in Africa. 

So what happens is the USAID releases an RFP on a public website that our new business teams monitor and once a bid goes live we set up a team to work on it. That team puts together a really awesome roster of employees that we would hire, and a technical proposal of what work we would do. USAID then has two different teams that evaluate all submissions. The one team evaluates what we say we're going to do, and who we are going to have doing it. The other team evaluates our cost proposal to see who is promising to provide the best value for the project. 

The very exciting thing - that I'll try not to hope for because it's incredibly unlikely that I'll be the person to do this - is that some proposals require that the final product be hand delivered. Sure, you could trust FedEx to get your 5 binders to some foreign USAID location, but really... we're not going to let our future business hang on any of the postal services. So we do what's called a hand carry. That entails the company flying you to whatever country with the final proposal binders and your sole purpose is to deliver them to the mission on time, then you fly home. Or you take a couple days of vacation and then fly home. So, in a very small place in the back of my mind I'm saying "pick me!!!!" Will of course let you all know if I do get picked.