Comments on: Cerberus…who writes the RFP?

By: dudeguy

dudeguy — Tue, 03 Feb 2009 00:15:30 +0000

It’s ok to have a comment.

By: Business Entrepreneur

Business Entrepreneur — Tue, 09 Dec 2008 13:30:55 +0000

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By: YoBaby

YoBaby — Mon, 08 Dec 2008 05:10:53 +0000

C’mon fellas…if you are assisting with an RFP you are going to write it so that you can win the deal. Anything less and you wouldn’t be doing your job. Get real, and quit trying to be so neutral…you are manufacturer reps and everyone knows it.

By: Tim Reynolds

Tim Reynolds — Mon, 08 Dec 2008 00:23:01 +0000

Nice post. Thank you for the info. Keep it up.

By: Cesar Moves

Cesar Moves — Wed, 19 Nov 2008 21:52:17 +0000

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By: nate

nate — Fri, 07 Nov 2008 04:57:09 +0000

I’m having a million dollar(list price) storage system installed over the next week as an evaluation and the vendors involved agreed to a no strings attached return policy. They expect us to buy it, and we intend to buy it but the language in the agreement was pretty simple, if we don’t give them a PO by a certain date we can get out of the deal without a hitch. Though I didn’t write an RFP. I just went to the vendor and worked out a solution that should work for us. They originally wanted a commitment to purchase based on acceptance criteria but eventually agreed to the no questions asked policy. They don’t do it for everyone of course I do have previous experience with the vendor so they know me well.

By: Cleanur

Cleanur — Mon, 03 Nov 2008 17:27:48 +0000

I see these terms re banded about all the time across RFP’s. I’m sure many of these are canned documents that get shared, especially across public sector. The worst part is that by rehashing these. Requesting features rather than function, the customer actually does themselves a dis service by alienating potential suppliers. Although on the face of it this can cut down the research necessary to produce an accurate RFP, how on earth can you score responses accurately based on semantics and feature lists alone. If the RFP has too much of a bias then the only people who’ll run the risk and cost of taking the time to respond are the owners of the referenced features. Afterall it’s a simple tick box for them, for eveyrone else it’s like wading through mud trying to position equivalent features.

By: Martin G

Martin G — Sat, 01 Nov 2008 13:45:20 +0000

I’ve been involved in a few RFPs and at times I will use a phrase which references a specific vendor’s product as an example of the functionality; often I’ll try to reference a couple of examples to try to avoid steering an RFP. It’s a bit lazy and I’m just using it for short-hand.

I’ll state that I’ve never had a vendor assist in producing an RFP, assistance has been offered mind you but its simply unethical IMO.

By: Stephen Foskett

Stephen Foskett — Fri, 31 Oct 2008 16:34:21 +0000

As someone who writes RFPs for work, I have to agree that people ought to be realistic about what they ask for. When I’m writing one, I always watch out for “steered” statements, like the terms you mention. I also advise to make up an RFP based on functional requirements, not features, so mine would not likely include ANY of those terms.

But I ought to point out that “Business Continuance Volume” was coined at Compaq/DEC StorageWorks, not at EMC, as far as I remember…