A good friend from law school who is now in-house just called to say that she may have an opportunity to send you some work. You’re excited. This is exactly what you’ve been working toward. You’re up for partner in a few years, so the timing could not be better. All those articles that you’ve written, the networking events and the endless marketing seminars are finally going to pay off. So you wait for her email, but when the email arrives, it’s not from your classmate, but from the procurement department of her company. When you open the attachment, you see the following words in large caps: “REQUEST FOR PROPOSAL.”
Wait a second. What happened to all that work that you were going to get? What are you supposed to do with this thing? It’s 100 pages of questions and statistics, and asks you questions like, “Who will be the relationship partner?” and “Describe your firm’s disaster recovery procedures.” You have no idea what any of this even means. Then you notice the due date … three weeks. Panic sets in.
