PW Communications

Now Offering Comprehensive Audit of Proposal Support Operations Capabilities

As a full-service proposal support company,  conducting proposal operation audits/assessments is one of our many skills.  Our breadth of proposal capabilities spans the entire spectrum and includes strategy, management, writing, editing, graphics and production.  Since we understand how to manage, write and produce winning proposals, it's a natural line extension for us to evaluate a company's proposal operations and independently assess its strengths and weaknesses. 

Approach. Our approach to conducting a proposal operations audit starts by working with you and your business development team to identify the problems you perceive and articulate the questions you will need to think through.  The PW Communications team will then gather information about your current proposal operations by interviewing current employees and reviewing documents, such as previously submitted proposals.  Drawing on our experience and insights, we will analyze all of this information and provide several options for your company to consider, including cost/benefit analysis. 

Process. Whether your audit requirements are complex or simple, we follow the same logical, proven process for providing you with sound, reasonable data and insights for decision-making. 

Timeline. Once the assessment/audit begins, we expect your company to assist on a timely basis.  Without any true sense of the current environment it's difficult to determine a timeline.  We will strive to complete the review as quickly as possible.

Deliverables. At the end of the audit process, we will provide you with the following two deliverables:

• An Audit Report. We will provide a full report of our analysis and recommendations, plus copies of the source material we used to develop our recommendations. 
• Excel files of scenario spreadsheets. We will provide the Excel spreadsheets that we used in developing our report, so you can work through additional "what-if" scenarios as required.

Required involvement by your company. To be effective, our audit process requires involvement of your business development team, to:

• Participate in identifying and validating the scope of the audit and its output
• Participate in the interviewing process
• Provide specific data as required by the PW Communications Team
• Review and comment on one draft version of the final report

 

Typically, this involvement will represent 20 to 30 hours of total effort by your business development team.  The amount of time may vary depending on the complexity of the audit that you request. Please contact us at 301.231.7233 or info@pwcommunications.com to learn more.

---

The Washington Post: To get ahead took going it alone for founder of proposal-writing firm

By Thomas Heath
Monday, March 22, 2010; A13

Phyllis Bresler first told me about her company a year ago when I met her at a Rockville charity event. And to be honest, when she told me she owned a firm that helps companies win government contracts, it was like hitting the snooze button.

I realized I had the snooze on too long when I saw Phyllis at another fundraiser last week and asked her how the company was doing.

She had me at "$7 million in revenues last year."

That's what PW Communications (the PW stands for "proposal writing") grossed by helping defense industry powerhouses such as Northrop Grumman and Lockheed Martin, and technology biggies such as SAIC, make billions in government contracts.

Bresler, 53, is a born entrepreneur. I know, because like most entrepreneurs, she is driven by a desire to run her own show. It's less about money, although she makes a lot: Her take is in the mid-six figures. She tools around in a snazzy, company-paid Jaguar.

"I encourage entrepreneurship for everybody," she said. "You make your own destiny."

But it's not easy. She frequently works 90-hour weeks, meets a $300,000-to-$400,000-a-month payroll and occasionally must hammer on clients to get paid.

The 1978 graduate of the University of Pennsylvania learned her proposal-writing skills during 3 years at General Electric's information services division in the 1980s. She got the GE job through contacts at the American Bankers Association, where she worked on an invention called the automated teller machine. She also co-authored a book on the effects of technology on the financial services industry.

GE was seeking business by doing the back-office work for banks and other financial services companies. Bresler was assigned to write GE's responses to companies looking to hire someone to process zillions of transactions such as deposits, withdrawals, check-processing and other nitty-gritty.

After three years, "I decided the only way up at GE is out," said Bresler, who at the time was 30 and making about $40,000.

She went to work as a marketer for Centel, a telecommunications firm, but ended up writing all their contract proposals. After Centel disbanded its commercial work in 1990 to pursue federal contracts, Bresler was laid off with six weeks' severance pay.

Then came an opportunity. A friend told her about consultant companies that sold proposal-writing expertise to corporations trying to get government contracts. She called a firm, went for an interview and within days was working as an independent contractor for a consultant. The pay was somewhere between $35 and $50 an hour.

"I absolutely fell in love with it. You were independent," she said.

Soon, the government contractors she was working with approached Bresler. If she started her own firm, they told her, they would probably give her business.

PW Communications was born in 1996 out of the basement of her North Bethesda home. Bresler dove in with only credit cards and contacts to get her going. Her husband, Sid, a lawyer, helped her do the legal paperwork. With the help of word of mouth, Bresler had $1 million in revenue the first year.

And she learned very quickly that cash flow was all-important.

"What one does not realize is that when you start working with big companies, it is very hard to get paid," she said. "If all your T's are not crossed, a 30-day wait [for payment] is a 90-day wait. You have got to stay on it."

Bresler said the lessons she had learned as an independent consultant prepared her for life on her own.

For example, Bresler said she suggested that a security company offer to have its guards arrive at a government building nearly half an hour early, so that a shift change would go smoothly. With that leg up, Bresler's client won the contract and booted the incumbent security firm.

Bresler has several pieces of advice for would-be proposal writers. Most important, she said, is to hand in the proposal on time.

"The document represents your company, and it has to be done professionally," she said. "If it's shoddy, they are going to think your work will be shoddy."

Proposals can run from 25 pages to, for one satellite contract, 35,000. The big ones can consume several Bresler staff members working at a corporate site for months at a time. She hires people with different talents, including managers, graphic artists, technical writers, strategists, even high-level experts such as former generals, admirals and PhDs.

The rates they charge clients vary between $50 to $200 an hour; PW's profit margin is about 20 percent.

"I am able to contain my costs, and we don't gouge for our margins," she said. Bresler and business partner Wendy Grooms, who owns 25 percent of PW, divide the work. Generally, Grooms handles the back-office administrative duties, including billing and payroll. Bresler handles most of the marketing, meeting with new clients, staffing and hiring. Nearly 100 percent of new business comes through referrals.

Hiring is key. If someone isn't working out, Bresler moves swiftly or it could ruin a contract.

There are three full-timers in the office, and between 20 and 40 employees work on contracts at any one time. There is no health care, but an employee can make a nice living. On an annual basis, a PW employee might draw between $60,000 to $200,000.

"I did this while raising three wonderful kids. That's the biggest takeaway," Bresler said. "Working full-time. Starting a company. It's hard for a working mother. But you can do it."

---