Let me share with you a memorable communique I received several years ago from a prospective website developer (i.e. not one I went forward to use) for the project in question (which was certainly not Pursuits Academy).
The degree of its un-interpretability was mindblowing although, unfortunately, not at all rare when communicating with our more technologically-minded and adept brothers and sisters.
The email was the culmination of an urgent and frustrating weekend search for a website developer whom could step in and facilitate a conversation with the support desk of a software supplier.
Here it is. Read it and weep:
“I understand and that being the case I offer you work through your problem via the Knowledgebase that you’re already familiar with and Live Chat on Monday.
“(Software) itself is a premier platform, if anything I think the problem is that allows the website owner to ‘drink from the firehose’ i.e. it is a very sophisticated, complex solution that offers so many features and is more like an enterprise-level CMS.”
Now, you could be forgiven for assuming this developer was based in Romania, India or some part of the non-English-speaking world.
Actually, he’s based in regional New South Wales, Australia.
I’m going to ask you to consider three things. But first, I’ll set the scene by letting you know that I made abundantly clear to this developer that I had minimal technological know-how – which is why I needed assistance.
1) How desperately out of options would I have needed to be to embark on a relationship with a service provider whose emails I couldn’t understand a word of?
2) How likely is it that, when you let your technical people loose on your client and prospective client organisations, that not all representatives of those organisations may be receiving communiques of this ilk, and may also be insufficiently conversant with the technology in question to decipher them?
3) Closely connected to point (2), is it possible that you have over-estimated the technological know-how of any of the possible recipients of communications emanating from your “tech” people?
This point has been worth making in its own right.
However, it takes on a heightened dimension in the bidding arena.
One critical mistake many ICT bidders make is not taking into account the fact that the evaluation teams of procuring companies frequently include members with non-ICT backgrounds. If you fail to communicate in what is at least moderately understandable language to these evaluators you will, all else being equal, win their favour less readily than will the bidder who demonstrates the consideration of communicating in plain English – or who takes the time to explain the necessary technicalese. And that’s at best. At worst, you will seed confusion, and confused minds don’t buy – or at least turn to simpler and more readily understandable options.
As I point out in my e-book, ‘Bid-Writing Tips for Geeks & IT Salespeople: 15 Principles for Making Sense to Both the Technologically-Proficient and the Technologically-Challenged’ (find it in the eBooks section of Pursuits Academy), the first step in ensuring the content of your EOI / RFP / RFT responses is couched to hit a home run with the evaluators is to understand the distinction between a technology need and a business need.
Your technology is nothing more than the thing your customer needs to solve a problem or meet a business need. You, as bidder, must demonstrate a clear appreciation of the business requirement for which your technology is being evaluated as the possible enabler.
Come rushing in with gushing self-praise for your wonderful technological “solution” without first conveying a detailed understanding that underlying need, or dive into high-tech diatribes before ticking that first-base box then – again, all else being equal – you greatly increase the chances of your bid being a losing one.
