Proposal writing, quick and dirty (a ghostwrite)
In marriage as in business as in academia and the arts, it doesn’t really matter to what (or for what reasons) you are proposing. Okay, “for what reasons” matters to you and the recipient of your proposal, perhaps, but it doesn’t matter for getting the funding/backing/other support you seek.
What matters, if success is your goal, is how you are proposing. And in 2016, despite rapidly evolving technological capabilities and cultural understandings, and despite change in all of its other forms, too, the required content of a successful proposal is unwavering. No, really. You need to convince your audience that what you are proposing matters. You need to convince your audience that what you are proposing is feasible. And you need to convince your audience that you are the right person to be doing the proposing. That’s it.
The first is called the “so what?” clause. Let’s say I pitch to you. Am I three minutes in and are you still asking yourself not only “so what is she getting at?” but also, “so why does this matter/what are the broader implications of her proposal?”
If so, I went awry already. My job is to make sure you know what I am proposing and that the proposed material is important―nay, essential―(to you, to your organization, to whoever is going to foot this bill) within the first paragraph of my pitch.
Next comes feasibility, and this is where I show my deep knowledge of all that is relevant to that which I aspire to do. Whether the research is mine or someone else’s, my potential VCs and associates and think tanks and even lovers need to know that I know:
a) this is a nearly-for-sure opportunity in which I’ve already foreseen and thus mitigated the risks, and
b) I am not afraid of investing effort (sometimes called work or research or ganas―en español).
And finally, if I want to propose effectively, I need to make evident that I, and not some other dude, am best suited to launch/pursue this idea or project or whatever it is.
I think, often, of the founders of Uber and Sidecar and Lyft. Three groups of cofounders with more or less the same idea. In this case, they all got funded. But that doesn’t mean that all their funders made the right decisions. As has become evident, the Uber team made especially clever choices related to specializing, growing slowly, building consumer confidence over time and more, one result of which is their current dominance of the P2P rideshare market.
Do backers of Sidecar and Lyft wish they’d met the Uber guys first? I ask myself this, sometimes.
“Find the lack and liquidate the lack,” my advisor used to tell me. She meant when picking a research topic, but she might also have meant when pitching a start-up. The only thing is, in 2016, successful start-up’s no longer require lack. Just ask the Uber guys. Instead, they require your unique ability to do best whatever it is you intend to do.
What I mean to say is: in 2016, my job, as pitcher in the hypothetical proposal I began above, is to prove that I am who deserves (ie is best suited to) investment. Even when my proposal is not entirely unique.
Now let’s go back to where you’re the project pitcher. The recap runs something like this:
1. Can you convince me that your project is best suited to you? 2. That you aren’t afraid to work your ass off?—and no, no, you can’t tell me you work hard; here you need to show me that work ethic. Finally, 3. Is your project a good one? I mean, when I say, “So what?” are you quick and concise and convincing in reply?
Because this is it when it comes to proposal writing.
No mirrors.
No magic.
No, really.
