I mentioned the other day that I was thankful that I wasn't involved in the production phase of the proposal that I just finished working on. Why? Because I hate production. It all sounds so easy: just copy or print your proposal, bind it up, and send it off. What could be simpler?
In my experience, production rarely goes smoothly. There always seems to be a glitch somewhere along the line. The copier jams, the printer won't print, pages are missing, pages are out of order, you don't have enough binders, etc., etc. Practially anything you can think of related to production can go wrong. And compounding the problem is the fact that production is often rushed because you are down to the wire and the proposal has to get in on time.
Here are some tips for reducing the number of production-related problems:
Pre-Production
- Make sure you have all supplies on-hand and that you know where they are. This includes extra printer cartridges, regular paper, letterhead paper, proposal covers, special appendix materials, tabs, binders and binding supplies, labels, envelopes or boxes, tape for packaging.
- Schedule or make sure there will be people available to assist with the production process -- copying, printing, assembling, reviewing.
- Get advance information on alternate sources of production such as a 24-hour Kinkos that you can turn to in an emergency.
- Try to organze the production process by ensuring that each person involved has a specific task to perfom.
- Make sure you know beforehand where the proposal is going and any special delivery instructions that you need to follow with respect to mailing or hand-delivery.
Post-Production
- Check all pages that will go into each binder. Are they in the right order? Are any pages missing? Are any pages upside down? Are all pages clear and readable?
- You will always find at least one page that has an error. If it's a major thing, try to fix it. If it's minor, let it go; it's likely that no one will notice.
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