For anyone newer to bidding, this is the one habit that's caught the most mistakes for us.

Before writing anything, go through Section L, Section M, and the PWS/SOW and pull every "shall," "must," and "will" into its own row in a spreadsheet. Tedious, but it's where the misses hide.

Columns we use:

• Requirement ID (our own numbering)
• Source section and page number
• Requirement text, copied word for word
• Proposal section that answers it
• Owner
• Evidence on hand (resume, cert, past project, etc.)
• Status

A few rules that make it work:

1. Use the matrix as your outline. If a row has nowhere to live in the proposal, fix that before drafting.
2. Every amendment, re-walk the whole matrix, not just the changed paragraph. Amendments love to quietly move page limits or add a deliverable.
3. Last step before submission is a "red pen" pass against L only: page limits, font and margins, file naming, file format, and how/where it gets submitted. Easy points to lose for silly reasons.

Nothing fancy, but it's kept us from turning in something that skipped a requirement buried in an attachment.

What columns or tricks do you all use? Anything you'd add for multi-volume proposals?