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Government contracting is not a numbers game. It is a positioning game.
One of the most expensive mistakes I see small businesses make is treating every solicitation they find on SAM.gov as an opportunity they should pursue.
It isn't.
A solicitation can match your NAICS code, fall within your service area, and still be the wrong opportunity for your company.
Before a business decides to invest time and resources into a proposal, there are more important questions to answer:
Can we actually compete?
Does the requirement align with our capabilities? Do we meet the solicitation's eligibility and compliance requirements? Do we have the personnel, experience, capacity, and infrastructure to perform?
Can we understand why the government would choose us?
Who is the incumbent? What does the agency appear to value? Where might the current solution be falling short? And what can we credibly offer that strengthens the government's position?
Does the opportunity make business sense?
A contract is not automatically a good contract simply because it has a large dollar value. The cost of bidding, delivery requirements, competition, contract terms, margins, and performance risk all matter.
This is why I believe the most important step in government contracting often happens before the proposal is written.
It's the decision to determine whether the opportunity deserves your resources in the first place.
Good contractors don't just ask:
“How do we win this contract?”
They first ask:
“Is this the right contract for us to pursue-and why should the government choose us?”
That shift-from chasing solicitations to making disciplined capture decisions-is where a more strategic approach to federal contracting begins.
Tags:
#GovernmentContracting #GovCon #FederalContracting #GovernmentContracts #ProposalWriting #SAMgov #CaptureStrategy
One thing I’ve learned from working around government contracting is that opportunity volume can be misleading.
Finding 100 solicitations isn't necessarily better than finding 5.
The real advantage comes from knowing which 5 deserve your attention, understanding the competitive...
For those working in GovCon: what do you consider the first thing worth checking before deciding whether to pursue a federal opportunity?
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