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Indefinite Delivery/Indefinite Quantity (IDIQ) Vehicles
Getting on IDIQ Vehicles
The U.S. Government has at least 2,600 Indefinite Delivery/Indefinite Quantity (IDIQ) vehicles, many of which are not well-known and/or have few awardees, yet they are actively used by some of your target Federal customers. To help you succeed in this current Government contracting environment and tame the IDIQ monster so it serves you, we offer three services that could be your key to riding the Government contracting vehicle of your dreams: Building the right IDIQ portfolio for your business, managing capture activities so you have the intel you need to land seats on vehicles and task order (TO) contracts, and preparing winning IDIQ and TO proposals. 

Assembling the Right IDIQ Portfolio – We can ensure that you have the right portfolio of IDIQ vehicles in your pipeline and at your disposal to connect with your Government customer(s) and earn yourself a seat on those you’re most interested in pursuing. Learn More 
Managing Capture – If you want to win a seat on an IDIQ and continuously win new TOs to grow your business consistently, you have to perform careful capture. We can help you manage the capture process to make sure you always have the information and customer connections you need to succeed. Learn More

Preparing Winning Proposals – Our team of Government contracting experts includes proposal managers, writers, editors, desktop publishers, compliance reviewers, and other key people who know how to develop high-scoring proposals that win consistently. Together, our core team alone has more than 50 years of Federal market experience that can help you win seats on the IDIQs that will help you grow your business and repeatedly win TOs through those vehicles. Learn More
IDIQ Portfolio Building Assistance
Ensure You Have the Right Portfolio of IDIQ Portfolio Vehicles in Your Pipeline for Your Customers to Access You
Are you certain you have all the right contract vehicles to make it easy for your Government customers to do business with you? Do you have a sufficient variety of IDIQ contracts in your portfolio to get your customers to move the right Task Orders (TOs) to the one(s) where you have the least competition, making you the most likely winner?
You can protect the work you’ve been doing and/or be pursuing with enough choices to drive Task Order work to the least competitive vehicle in your portfolio. Keeping your portfolio filled with the right mix of vehicles that perfectly fit your capabilities and offer a higher win probability will also keep you stocked with bid opportunities to pursue with greater success throughout the year. Our gap analysis will prevent you from missing opportunities that are perfect for your company and that can keep business flowing all year long.
Our six-step process identifies IDIQ portfolio gaps that a typical business developer (who is not a professional data analyst) would not find using basic sources.
Six-Step Process for OST’s Portfolio Gap Analysis
Let Us Navigate the 2600+ IDIQs Available to Identify the Right Ones for You
We use the knowledge and skills of leading IDIQ experts, combined with 26 decision-making parameters, 12 subscription databases, and our proprietary databases filled with useful information, like available IDIQ vehicles, parents/subsidiaries, and taxonomies. We identify both large and small vehicles with “pockets of work” that are not widely known.
Maximizing Your IDIQ Proposal Score
An example of past performance scoring template for a new generation GWAC.
Many Indefinite Delivery/Indefinite Quantity (IDIQ) Requests for Proposal (RFP) these days require responses that are not heavy in narrative and graphics. Instead, they are past performance and credentials-heavy, and require compliant responses that would achieve a higher score. General Services Administration (GSA) is especially fond of scored proposals, such as the giant Alliant 2, VETS 2, OASIS, multiple award contracts and Governmentwide Acquisition Contracts (GWAC).

Although at a first glance the scoring system for such proposals seems deceptively simple, more strategy goes into preparing for these vehicles. Some points are a straightforward yes or no. You either have the required certifications and facility clearances or you don’t. Most points, however, depend on your selection of your relevant experience projects and which “buckets” you place them in to get the credit for those projects the way the Government views your past performances (the way the projects are classified in Government systems may not be the way you perceive the project’s relevancy). You also need to know how to get the bonus points for contracts based on size, task orders won on multiple award contracts, breadth of Government agencies served, number of performance areas/NAICS performed, and a record of positive past performance.
To add another wrinkle of complexity, some RFPs allow teaming, and others don’t. It is likely that teaming will be allowed for small businesses on most new IDIQ competitions since the 2016 Defense Authorization Act required the Government to allow small businesses the ability to team when pursuing contracts. Sometimes newly formed teams are penalized in points so any subcontractors must add more the penalty points for the partnership to make sense. Selecting a partner that increases the number of Government agencies served and adds more performance areas/NAICS/PSCs can easily add more points than GSA will subtract from your score. Selecting the right partner as a prime or sub, along with relevant experience projects, will be critical to securing your company’s position on a scored IDIQ contract.
 
Scored IDIQ RFPs have an anticipated number of awards and an associated cutoff score. Normally no one is privy to this score but our analysts calculate this score by doing laborious work of scoring every single likely bidder under the RFP or a draft RFP, using the systems that Government uses, and then rank the likely bidders according to their score. No other company claiming their knowledge of the scored vehicles goes through the trouble it takes to get an accurate prediction.

Other than a few tweaks required from your company based on some information that’s not publicly available, we know where you would rank in competitiveness. Through a comprehensive report, our business development experts will show you where your company ranks versus other companies (are you a shoe-in, vulnerable, near the competitive range, or have no chance?). You will also find out how to improve you score, how to prepare and plan your response, and what are the potential teammates that will complement and improve your score.
How You Will Benefit from Our GWAC Scoring Report
Our analysis will help you with three important aspects of scored IDIQ success:
1.Bid-no-Bid decision (and you will either know that your money is well-spent or save your valuable B&P dollars in not pursuing something you couldn’t win)

2.Pre-proposal planning:
  • Deciding what contracting officers/references you need to talk to ensure your past performances are categorized correctly in Government systems
  • Signing Teaming agreements, Contractor Teaming Arrangements (CTA), or joint ventures (JV) with the right companies to help maximize your score
  • Knowing what you need to prepare in advance in your credentialing

3.Proposal preparation:
  • Presenting information in the right places to maximize your score
  • Ensuring your response is compliant and compelling
Get Your Report to Avoid Losing Billion-Dollar Opportunities on a Technicality
Our report will provide the information your company must have to execute the win strategy. We’ll show you where your weaknesses are compared to the other companies and how you can close those gaps. Rely on our expert analysis and verifiable data to make your teaming decisions versus relying on potential subcontractors’ claims. 

As an additional service, we will review your proposal for compliance. Get an independent set of eyes on your proposal to ensure a winning spot on some of the largest IDIQ vehicles.

To get started, purchase the report. Our business development expert will contact you within 24 hours of purchase, and will set up a time to obtain the necessary information to develop a custom deliverable.
Developing Task Order Pipelines
Getting on a large Indefinite Delivery Indefinite Quantity (IDIQ) vehicle is a huge feat for many businesses, but winning a seat on the bus isn’t the ticket to success. Winning Task Orders is, and it’s not as easy as you may think. The real work begins after you get on an IDIQ, because the real money is in winning Task Orders, not just a spot on the greater vehicle. Those companies that don’t win Task Orders suffer little growth, while those that do win awards grow aggressively in the Federal market. For example:
•On the Navy’s Seaport-e, 70% of awardees got just the minimum Task Order award.
•The Army’s STOC II vehicle is even worse; 83% of participating companies received only the minimum award.
•Those businesses that do succeed in winning Task Orders on IDIQs grow aggressively. For instance, 30% of small businesses on National Institutes of Health’s CIO-SP3 SB Governmentwide Acquisition Contract (GWAC) have grown large within the first few years of the contract.
What’s the difference between those companies that win Task Orders and grow and those that limp along with minimum awards? It all boils down to how well you develop your opportunity pipeline.
Why Many Businesses Fail to Win Task Orders Through IDIQs
Many companies succeed at getting on IDIQs and fail at winning Task Orders because they react too late to Task Order Request for Proposal (TORFP) issuance. Responses barely make the deadlines, because business developers learn about the majority of TORFPs only when they’re released. A lack of planning and preparation can cause a business to throw something poorly-written “over the wall” to meet a TORFP deadline, hoping they’ll win on price… and “hope to win” isn’t a strategy.
How to Win More Task Orders & Grow Your Business
One of the key components to winning multiple Task Orders and growing fast on IDIQ multiple award vehicles is having foresight into Task Orders that will be issued down the road. This requires a Task Order Pipeline for each IDIQ. Knowing well in advance that a Task Order will be re-competed, or how certain work could migrate from one IDIQ vehicle to another, will help you prepare and conduct capture.
 
Capture raises your win probability and, subsequently, increases your Task Order Proposals’ win rate. Instead of scrambling to put together a proposal response in a typical short deadline scenario of a week or two and throwing something together in a hurry, you’ll have time to research, plan, brainstorm on the solution, estimate your pricing, find partners, assess how to outdo your competition, and develop a sound win strategy.

We use a 10-step process to identify Task Orders for our clients’ pipelines, as illustrated below.
To elaborate further, when we help a new client identify the best Task Orders for their pipelines, we:
1. Familiarize ourselves with our client’s company.
2. Analyze core data to pull and isolate all Task Orders that flow through the vehicle.
3. Apply taxonomies to narrow down the list to eliminate false positives by matching those Task Orders that best match the specific company’s capabilities.
4. Narrow down the list of opportunities further based on the company’s characteristics and bidding preferences.
5. Apply keyword scripts to combine automation with BD expert analysis.
6. Prioritize opportunities using analytical judgement.
7. Sort and group the remaining Task Orders to develop a focused list using 31 decision-impacting values.
8. Perform a detailed review, examining each opportunity carefully.
9. Qualify and validate opportunities through paid databases and customer calls.
10. Review the list with our client to fully qualify the remaining opportunities.
Our methodology will give you advance warning of upcoming Task Orders that have been fully vetted for your company, giving you more time to prepare to submit Task Order proposals. You’ll learn about opportunities well before they come out, avoid the distraction of unqualified opportunities, and have more time to prepare, which will lead to an increased number of Task Order bids and wins.
Account Planning
As you are looking to not only win one or two task orders on your Indefinite Delivery Indefinite Quantity (IDIQ) vehicle, but grow aggressively as a holder of that IDIQ contract, you need a “map” to understand help penetrate the customer’s organization. Government has many people participating in source selection process, deciding on the winner. You need to know those people. You have four goals with the customer: build the relationships, understand the customer’s hot buttons (hopes, fears, and biases), shape the requirements, and vet your solution. Government organization usually comprises:

• The contracting officer, program manager, and other key contacts
• Oversight authority
• End user organizations
• Policy and funding organizations
• Congressional oversight and committees
• Other offices and agencies involved in related or similar activities

Customer organization gets even more complicated for an IDIQ that serves more than one Government office and agency, with Governmentwide Acquisition Contracts (GWAC), for example. Narrow down the list of clients you will pursue, and perform the same analysis for each customer.
A “map” is a visual representation that accompanies an account plan, so you could see the “landscape” of how opportunities emerge, and who is involved. It is a mix between various org charts and your notes who has relationships in your organization, with the Government. It is a living document that evolves with your level of understanding of customer organization.
Winning Task Orders
Get competent help with the full life cycle of Capture Management
Task Order Capture
When Government contact is non-existent, we use a streamlined capture approach, placing heavy emphasis on research, brainstorming, teaming decisions based on competitive analysis, and price strategy.
Capture is pre-proposal prep work that’s necessary before Task Order RFPs are issued if you want to succeed and maximize the benefits from your seat on an IDIQ contract vehicle. Task Order Capture can sometimes resemble capture of a “regular” pursuit of a “requirements” contract, but most often you can expect to deal with:
• Reduced or non-existent ability to contact the Government customer
• Less time to perform capture
• Mostly well-known competition

To help you run a meaningful task order capture effort, we use a streamlined strategy:
• Absent customer contact, we research customer “hot buttons” (i.e. hopes, fears, and biases).
• We conduct short, focused win strategy, win theme, and solution development brainstorming sessions.
• We also help perform an analysis to compose the right team to beat your competition.
• We perform a mini competitive pricing analysis to avoid losing based on the cost volume.
Account Planning
As you are looking to not only win one or two task orders on your Indefinite Delivery Indefinite Quantity (IDIQ) vehicle but grow aggressively as a holder of that IDIQ contract, you need a “map” to understand help penetrate the customer’s organization. The government has many people participating in source selection process, deciding on the winner. You need to know those people. You have four goals with the customer: build the relationships, understand the customer’s hot buttons (hopes, fears, and biases), shape the requirements, and vet your solution. Government organization usually comprises:

• The contracting officer, program manager, and other key contacts
• Oversight authority
• End-user organizations
• Policy and funding organizations
• Congressional oversight and committees
• Other offices and agencies involved in related or similar activities

Customer organization gets even more complicated for an IDIQ that serves more than one Government office and agency, with Governmentwide Acquisition Contracts (GWAC), for example. Narrow down the list of clients you will pursue, and perform the same analysis for each customer.
A “map” is a visual representation that accompanies an account plan, so you could see the “landscape” of how opportunities emerge, and who is involved. It is a mix of various org charts and your notes who have relationships in your organization, with the Government. It is a living document that evolves with your level of understanding of customer organization.
Task Order Manual Preparation
We help you put together an IDIQ-specific Task Order Manual that encapsulates operational rules for a well-functioning IDIQ team to establish a sound team management foundation, help the continuity of operations, and create the IDIQ winning “machine.”
It contains information on IDIQ patterns and processes the entire team can follow, stay organized and moving in the same direction. It introduces organizational leadership after an IDIQ award—so your entire IDIQ team knows how to react quickly to bid, and how to win.
Your IDIQ Task Order Manual may even have an internal (detailed) version and external (streamlined) version for your teaming partners. It is a living document that contains the most important information and strategies for your IDIQ:

• Overview of the program/vehicle from the capture and proposal viewpoint, including unique IDIQ’s “personality”
• What is the IDIQ “pattern” – how often are the task orders issued, how are they
evaluated, what’s valued on the vehicle, and what does it take to win?
• What are the marketing rules of engagement your teammates will abide by when talking to the customer, and how do you create a unified customer message? How will your teammates be allowed to interact with the Government customer? Can they talk to the customer directly or do they have to go through you? What if they send a message to your team that is contrary to your strategy? Can they bring work to the vehicle by talking directly to the customer? How will you deal with “frenemy” companies, i.e. your non-exclusive subs?
• What workflow will your team follow for business development, capture, and TO Workflowproposal development?
• How will everyone stay organized and know what to do when the time is of the essence?
• Unified customer message
• The organization, including PMO and teammates, with points of contact and their roles and responsibilities
• Methods and frequency of communications
• Security rules, invoicing, portal login, and other administrative
IDIQ Task Orders
Indefinite Delivery/Indefinite Quantity (IDIQ) Task Order proposals are usually different from Government proposals addressing “regular” requirements. They have a rapid turnaround (typically from 1-2 weeks) and limited page count (typically 5-20 pages).
Writing Task Orders is not simple. Just because they seem like a smaller effort than 50-to-100-page proposals that you have 30 days or more to complete doesn’t mean you can expend less effort. Quite the opposite is true; in fact, Task Order proposals require:

• The same capture planning and solution development, masterfully summarized, with examples of drill-down into the level of detail to take credit for your preparation process.
• More simultaneous proposal activities to ensure everything gets done on time while your schedule is compressed.
• More succinct narrative and graphics as you have less “real estate” (in terms of page count) to distinguish yourself from your competitors.
• Same precision in pricing, even when the Government may request a “Rough Order of Magnitude (ROM)” cost estimate, as the Government won’t allow you to deviate much in your final price

Our internal team of talented consultants will lend a helping hand to your team with these Task Order proposal-specific roles:

• Proposal Manager: Familiar with the demands of a short-duration proposal
• Proposal Integrator: A senior proposal writer capable of understanding and even refining your solution while integrating inputs from multiple Subject Matter Experts (SME), polishing the narrative and helping conceptualize graphics. Not every writer can be a proposal integrator, and with many activities accomplished simultaneously, one person is imperative to have in this role on a fast turnaround proposal.
• Cost/Price Strategy, Estimating, and Basis of Estimate (BOE) Development Experts
• Color Team Reviewers (Pink Team, Red Team, Gold Team)
• Proposal Editors/Desktop Publishers
• Proposal Graphic Artists
• Personnel Recruiters
• Schedulers for Resource-Loaded Schedules
• Many Other Specialists
We can either run your entire Task Order or provide support for separate tasks, such as outlining or reviewing.
 
If you don’t have proposal space and need one in the DC area, you can run your Task Order out of our proposal center in Rockville, Maryland.
We can also help you with Task Order staffing, which involves our recruiters helping locate program personnel when you must submit resumes with your bid.

Speed is the name of the game in writing winning Task Order proposals. Therefore, we offer training in speed writing as part of our course on Writing Persuasive Federal Proposals. You may also find our Proposal Editing Workshop useful for focusing on succinct and impactful narrative, and our Graphics Conceptualization and Win Themes Development Workshops helpful for making your proposals more persuasive. Another handy tool we recommend is our Proposal Manager’s Essential Checklists, which take the guesswork out of proposal management and coordination.

We can also set up a Task Order proposal template for you to speed up the desktop publishing process. It will have automated menus for one-click formatting of your document. On a short-duration proposal, every hour saved could be the hour spent on developing winning content.

This Task Order Manual will help you dominate your IDIQ competition. Have a Task Order Manual for each of your IDIQ vehicles.

If you would rather put one together yourself, we offer a 52-page, detailed Task Order Manual template that not only provides the format and the words to put in your own Task Order Manual but also gives directions on how to tailor it further to your needs.
IDIQ Proposal Training
IDIQ Proposal Training for Winning IDIQ Proposals
Indefinite Delivery Indefinite Quantity (IDIQ) multiple award contracts are the ideal way to grow in the Federal market, especially for services companies.
Although IDIQs comprise 25% of Federal contracts valued at roughly $500B, over half of all non-tech service contracts are now solicited through task orders (TOs) issued under IDIQ contracts. When it comes to technology, more than 70% of contracts are issued through IDIQ TOs.
The Government has more than 1,800 active and upcoming IDIQ vehicles and more than 800 obscure ones. Getting on just one will offer your business countless growth opportunities in the form of task order requests for proposals (TORPs) issued to a limited set of bidders.
Just getting on the “bus” (IDIQ) isn’t enough, though; you sometimes have to fight for a “seat” to increase your odds of winning TOs consistently.
Despite the competition for getting on IDIQs and obtaining a task order seat once you’re on, pursuing IDIQs offers a unique opportunity to corner a market with relatively little competition—and we can help.
Turn Your Business into an IDIQ Machine with Our Winning Proposal Resources
IDIQs can be tricky, but with the help of OST Global Solutions’ consulting expertise in every critical area, you can successfully secure a spot on the IDIQ vehicles best suited for your business and start winning task orders to bolster your bottom line and succeed in the Federal market.
As you can see, we’re here to help you do more than win a task order or two; we want to make you a top winner on IDIQ contracts.
In addition to our core services, we’ve created a one-of-a-kind IDIQ Trends Report containing 150 pages of comprehensive information that will help you get on the right IDIQs and win more task orders. Our team of proposal development, capture management, business development, technical writers, cost/pricing strategists, program recruiters, and other proposal professionals is also at your full disposal and ready to help you grow your business through Federal contracting.
IDIQ Process Optimization
In every company’s life, there is a point at which it will seek rigor. Rigor means doing things efficiently, effectively to predictably generate success. Rigor is a focus on process for the long haul, the work of a professional business developer.
Average proposal personnel may produce great work and win occasionally. They are akin to an amateur cook: they leave a messy kitchen, they stress, they take a while, and most of the time produce an average home-cooked meal – while occasionally surprising with something delicious (a win). Professional chefs, however, don’t come across as stressed, hassled, or even busy. But their meals are worth truly enjoying every day (their win rates are consistently high). Same with task order proposals. Sure, many companies may win an occasional task order or two, but embracing rigor in an IDIQ environment means creating a machine for winning multiple task orders and dominating your indefinite delivery vehicle.

Infusing professionalism into creating your own IDIQ Center of Excellence is key to success.

Following a diagnostic Business Development Maturity Assessment, we will help you establish the pillars of maturity, that include Training, Process, Resource Library, Strategy, and Technology:
• Training: Speed is the name of the game in Task Order responses. Your staff must be proficient in efficient brainstorming, speed writing, graphics conceptualization, professional proposal editing, desktop publishing, and other core skills to produce well-written proposals. Key to preventing burnout from doing rapid-fire Task Order responses is rotation: proposal managers can serve in capture management capacity with slower pace of work to recover, or contribute as a writer instead of running the team. Cross-trained proposal professionals who understand more disciplines in the lifecycle of business development will also help improve your proposal quality. Capture-trained proposal managers improve their ability to win proposals, and proposal-trained capture managers run better capture efforts. Therefore, cross-training in foundations and advanced capture and win themes development may be useful for higher retention and win rates. Business Development for Project Personnel is a key course to turn your entire project’s workforce into a salesforce – serving as valuable sources for new Task Order information, capture, recruitment, teaming, and proposal development.

• Process: We will enable you with a workflow that spells out every step of business development process, a Process Book (encapsulating your standard operating procedures for business development, capture, and proposals), and a toolset for rapid proposal preparation. We will also train and/or mentor your team in process implementation.

• Resource Library: We will guide you and help you set up the library of resources you can reuse in proposal preparation. Reusable materials such as proposal graphics, model sections and solution brainstorming checklists, past performance library, and other information, easily accessible to the proposal team, helps speed up the process and create a baseline of proposal development excellence.

• Strategy: Strategy to winning each vehicle is individual to that IDIQ’s “personality” – each is different. We will work with you on developing and capturing your win strategy for a particular vehicle in a customized Task Order Manual, and equip you with the tools in improving your win rate.

• Technology: We will help you set up the right toolset for your proposal center, to ensure you benefit from collaboration, communication, and enabling software that helps develop rapid turnaround proposals.
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