8. "In an honest service there is thin commons, low wages, and hard labour. In this, plenty and satiety, pleasure and ease, liberty and power; and who would not balance creditor on this side, when all the hazard that is run for it, at worst is only a sour look or two at choking? No, a merry life and a short one shall be my motto."
Hello everyone. Firstly an apology – a couple of weeks ago I had a bad case of laryngitis, so if my voice fails as I speak it may take a couple of seconds to get back. I’m here today to talk about people. Personally, regardless of how well I understand your client, and how well I can express my sales messages and win strategies, without people ready and willing to support the bid, I’m not going to be successful. Before I begin, I thought I’d put some parameters around what’s different about leading a group of people on a bid, as opposed to other types of teams or projects. Firstly, a bidding environment is an extremely competitive environment - Usually there are a number of bidders all seeking the same work, and only one of you can win. On top of this, the people who generally get involved in bids also tend to be somewhat competitive – adrenaline junkies. High levels of pressure on the team – “must win” A team with high levels of dependence upon each other – The Air Warfare Destroyer bid had over sixty people working on it, most of whom were relying on winning the project in order to have a job to come back to, and we were all relying on each other to win. A deadline that cannot (cannot!) be missed – Significant reward on success – we may invest several million dollars to win a project, and may reap tens of millions in profit as a result It occurred to me that there was one other group of people who worked in the same conditions – a highly competitive nature in a do-or-die environment with a significant reward at the end.
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