In practice, this client was really good at what they do – helping councils and other public sector organisations dramatically improve the services they offer – but they were struggling to get this across in the tenders they applied for.

Over three months, working closely with senior members of their team, I developed a programme of analysis and targeted support, that involved everyone in the company. Initial evaluations of their past bids revealed a number of areas that could be improved but one specific aspect of their tendering style was really holding them back.

My coaching plan took that one key issue as its core and demonstrated how, by tackling it in a logical way, many of the other concerns could be swiftly resolved.

During a workshop held off site, I delivered a short presentation to the full team that addressed best practice, tendering techniques in general and the issues specific to their business. Group discussion and writing exercises then helped the team understand how, why and where to use these techniques to resolve the issues they faced and improve their tender submissions.

Some of the output of those exercises was then used to develop a suite of easy-to-adapt responses to the most common questions they see in the tenders they apply for.

The end result was a company-wide understanding of the importance of tenders to their business and the roles each individual needs to play to achieve success, improved analysis and writing techniques and a library of information, tailored to their business, that they could draw on for future tenders.