Cover All Bases!

It was a fight for Prestige. The volume of business was decent, not large, and the recurring revenues would be above average rather than fantastic.

Over a decade ago my team was in pitched battle with our only competitor, to strike a major deal with the State Government. At stake was the honor to provide mobile phone connections to the Chief Minister, his team of Ministers and the top Government Secretaries –  it was just 25 connections in total. But with the contract would come crowing rights – the winner could proudly announce that they are the “Official Mobile Service Provider of the State!”

No quarter given, it was a dour struggle.

Mid–way through the campaign we were feeling pretty smug – both parties had submitted the initial proposals, then been called for negotiations, and it was learnt, based on information gathered after the two rounds of discussions and review by the Purchase Committee, that our offer was not just lower on price, but it also matched almost all the parameters listed in the RFP.

It was just a matter of time before the order was signed, sealed and delivered to us … or so we thought!

A few days before the formal letter was to be collected we heard from a source that the Review Committee had done an about turn and was now favoring our rival. Based on some new information received, the Committee decided to have another sitting because the users were high-profile and needed uninterrupted service – they weren’t taking any chances.

The reason for the review: It was “found” that we were suspect on After-Sales Service!

We were shattered – everyone, from the State Business Head down to me, scrambled to get in touch with our contacts in the Procurement Department and the Purchase Committee. We zeroed in on the “trouble-maker”. A member of the Technical committee, who even in the negotiations stage had made a strong bid to favour our competitor (he was using their service already), had been fed information that a major client had cancelled the connections taken from us and had moved over to their side. Our detractor used the news to queer the pitch for us.

We had built our case carefully at every level, but had not done anything to neutralise the threat posed by this person and that lapse had returned to haunt us.  We thought he wouldn’t be able to sway the committee away from us.

While we did have a case of a Service lapse which cost us a valuable customer there were numerous instances of major organisations coming over to us from competition – but we had not used it against them during the bid and negotiations process. Our rival obviously did not believe in such niceties.

After working hard to stall the finalization of the order we submitted proof to substantiate the strength of our after-sales service – this time we did not hold anything back and a detailed presentation was made on how we were superior on every count. Service Quality Assurance was also given.

The Government Purchase committee saw merit in our pitch and finalized the entire order in our favor – to this day I treasure the photograph of me handing over the mobile phone to the Chief Minister and showing him how to use it.

We almost lost the order due to complacence. The message is that at no time during the campaign should you lower your guard and take things for granted.

Only when you have covered the bases you are ready to make the play!

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