In case your nonprofit has ever tried to revamp its web site, purchase a grant, or put together for an audit, you already know there are some roles for which your group merely isn’t ready. It’s unusual for nonprofit organizations to have a complete skillset in-house.
Because of this, nonprofits usually search experience from exterior consultants and distributors. Whether or not you at present have a deal with in your mission-critical duties or must outsource instantly, making a request for proposals (RFP) units the stage for locating the suitable expertise on the proper worth.
An RFP is a proper doc that outlines your group’s wants, expectations, funds, and choice standards when hiring distributors or consultants for a activity. Let’s evaluation one of the best practices your nonprofit ought to implement to jot down an excellent RFP.
1. Outline Your Objectives
A well-defined purpose is a vital basis to your RFP, guiding your nonprofit’s questions and qualification standards. You have to clearly articulate this purpose to draw the suitable distributors and keep away from unreliable responses, particularly for mission-critical duties. For instance, an RFP for nonprofit compliance consultants should recruit certified professionals to make sure your group stays in good standing and avoids extreme penalties, like 501(c)(3) standing revocation.
By defining your objectives from the beginning, your group can guarantee proposals align with not simply your challenge but in addition your broader mission. Your purpose ought to make clear the next:
- Your nonprofit’s downside or want
- The result your group hopes to attain
- The scope of the work
- Your funds vary
- The anticipated timeline for completion of the challenge
To place this into context, let’s say your nonprofit seeks skilled bookkeeping providers. You want skilled steerage on monetary administration to attain correct and compliant monetary data, enhance monetary reporting, and tighten your funds.
To perform this, you need to search for a bookkeeper who will document all monetary transactions in your fund accounting system, put together month-to-month monetary experiences, and information budgetary choices. You could have $10,000 to spend on their providers and wish the bookkeeper to begin instantly, however the engagement will proceed on an ongoing foundation. This degree of specificity will assist your nonprofit appeal to probably the most certified proposals.
2. Define Detailed Proposal Necessities
Together with attracting the eye of certified candidates, your RFP ought to make clear what is required from their bids. Present primary submission instructions, just like the format their response ought to take and the way they need to ship it to you. Additionally, record the mandatory info respondents ought to embrace, similar to:
- Related expertise: Description of previous initiatives, testimonials and references from former shoppers, and samples of earlier work
- Proposed method: Step-by-step plan outlining the instruments and methodologies they’ll use to satisfy your nonprofit’s wants
- Price range breakdown: Detailed pricing construction, together with any further charges the seller may require
This info permits your nonprofit to successfully evaluate proposals and discover one of the best candidate. For instance, a nonprofit in search of a web site designer may obtain proposals from a number of candidates who can deal with the group’s wants throughout the required funds and timeframe. Nonetheless, further info, just like the candidate’s portfolio and references, might help you discover the proper match.
3. Be Clear About Choice Standards
When sorting via proposals, your group have to be on the identical web page about what constitutes a high contender. Establishing clear standards forward of time ensures a good and goal choice course of, decreasing confusion and attainable biases from interfering. Offering these expectations within the RFP might help potential candidates self-assess whether it is value their time to submit a response.
There are two key assets you’ll must successfully and persistently consider proposals:
- An inventory of standards: Create a listing of must-haves, similar to an expertise degree, a particular method, adherence to your funds, or every other requirement that is sensible to your challenge.
- A scoring system: Develop a scoring rubric that assigns weight to the standards in your record. You may charge every criterion on a scale of 1 to 5, with one indicating the seller doesn’t meet your expectations and 5 indicating they absolutely meet your expectations. The seller with the very best rating is your finest candidate.
Additionally, present a transparent timeline to your decision-making course of in order that respondents know when to anticipate a response out of your group. This could embrace a submission deadline, analysis interval, and determination announcement date. With a clear schedule, respondents aren’t left ready to your determination, and your open communication will begin the brand new partnership off on the suitable foot.
4. Maintain It Concise and Accessible
A nonprofit RFP have to be concise and well-organized to draw related responses that meet your standards. Respondents might turn out to be confused or abandon their response altogether when you present them with a prolonged and difficult-to-understand RFP.
Listed here are some common ideas for preserving your RFP accessible:
- Restrict pointless jargon: Keep away from utilizing any purely inside jargon, abbreviations, or terminology, and search for respondents who may also talk with exact language freed from jargon.
- Use direct and easy language: Specificity is essential to attracting viable candidates. Be clear about what you’re in search of, whether or not or not it’s a monetary skilled with a tried-and-true method to bookkeeping for nonprofits or a fundraising advisor with contemporary concepts.
- Break up textual content the place attainable: Use headings, bullet factors, quick paragraphs, and different parts to make your RFP simply digestible. Whereas this doc gained’t be as glamorous as your affect experiences or weekly newsletters, it ought to nonetheless be straightforward for distributors to scan.
In the event you’re not sure how your RFP may come throughout to somebody with much less context about your nonprofit’s wants, ask a employees member or volunteer to evaluation it and supply suggestions. For instance, ask your nonprofit’s bookkeeper to evaluation your RFP for an internet site designer.
5. Evaluation Actual Examples, Keep away from Templates
Whereas there are various free RFP templates on-line created only for nonprofits, your request will finally rely on your group’s distinctive objectives, operations, and wishes.
For instance, an RFP template may advocate together with your group’s background info and challenge objectives. Nonetheless, a nonprofit in search of knowledgeable advertising and marketing company possible wants to incorporate extra particular standards, like examples of deliverables and a proposed method primarily based on the group’s branding.
Whereas nonprofits needs to be cautious of over-relying on RFP templates, reviewing examples may give you an concept of what works and what doesn’t. In case your nonprofit doesn’t have previous RFPs of its personal to evaluation, think about asking board members or companions for examples from their earlier work.
As your nonprofit grows, so will its want for outsourced experience. Over time, you’ll have many alternatives to craft an excellent RFP and optimize your method to yield one of the best outcomes. As responses roll in, analyze your method to establish components that will have influenced the proposals and regulate your RFP subsequent time as wanted.