← The Sales Station ~ dish 05 of 10 · the sales station

Proposal First Draft

You have scope notes. You have past proposals. You need a first draft by tomorrow. The station generates the 70%-there proposal in an hour.

The job

A discovery call closes. The rep has scope. Three similar past deals that landed. The rep writes the proposal from scratch because every deal is different. This takes two days.

Proposal first draft reads the scope notes, pulls the three similar proposals, and generates a first draft. It’s not perfect. It’s 70% there. The scope might need adjustment. The pricing might need context. The value statement might feel generic. Those are the rep’s two-hour refinement window. The two-day blank-page task is gone.

Plated well: the rep has discovery notes and three past proposals. The station generates a first draft that has the right structure, the right tone, and enough detail that the rep can edit instead of write.

The recipe

All seven ingredients still apply. The leverage on this dish is Output Over Process (Ingredient #5). The proposal quality depends on describing the destination, not the steps.

Training sets what a proposal in your voice looks like (formal? consultative? value-forward?). Examples are critical: three proposals you won with, in your house format. Output Over Process is the load-bearing ingredient: instead of telling the station “create a header, then a problem statement, then solutions,” tell the station what done looks like: “a proposal that feels specific to their business and shows them how we solve their exact problem.” That instruction is sharper than a 15-step outline. Guardrails prevent common missteps (never quote pricing higher than their budget signal, never oversell on scope). Measurement is simple: does the rep edit the proposal or rewrite it? Edits mean it’s 70% there. Rewrites mean it needs sharpening.

How to build it

  1. Collect three recent winning proposals. The scope, the structure, the tone, the way you positioned the value.

  2. Mark what changed between proposals. Scope? Pricing? Problem statement? Note what stays constant (your company story, your methodology, your pricing model structure).

  3. Define the destination. Write one sentence: what does a first draft proposal look like when it’s done? “The prospect can read it and see themselves in the solution without feeling generic.”

  4. Set the structure rule. How many sections? Do you always have a timeline? Do you break scope into phases? Create that structure from your examples.

  5. Feed the discovery notes. The prospect said they need X done by Y date. The budget signal is Z. Three similar past deals where you solved similar problems.

  6. Set the guardrails. The station never quotes higher than the budget signal. The station never commits to a timeline without a confidence caveat. The station never oversells on scope.

  7. Generate a first draft. Have the rep review it. Mark what’s wrong. How much editing did it take to get to “good”? If under 30 minutes, it’s working. If over 60, sharpen the examples.

What breaks it

  • Output destination is vague. You tell the station “write a good proposal” instead of describing what good looks like for your business. Generic instruction, generic output.

  • Examples are too similar. Three proposals with the same scope, the same problem, the same timeline. The station learns one pattern. The next deal is different: different scope, different decision-maker, different timeline. The station forces it into the old pattern.

  • Scope notes are incomplete. The discovery notes say “need to improve workflow” but don’t say which workflow, how many people, what the failure looks like now. The station fills the gaps with guesses. Guardrails become useless because the foundation was incomplete.

  • Discovery to proposal gap is too big. The rep took notes. The rep never reviewed them with the prospect. The proposal is missing context that exists only in the rep’s head. Close the loop: send the discovery summary to the prospect before the proposal gets drafted. Confirm the rep understood.

When it’s working

By week two, the first draft is in the rep’s hands the day after discovery. The rep spends two hours editing, not two days writing. The proposal goes out faster and lands because it’s specific.

By week four, the rep is barely changing the structure anymore. That’s when you know the examples are working.

Monday Move

Take your next discovery call. Write the scope notes. Pull three similar past proposals. Have the station generate the first draft. Spend two hours editing it. Send it. Compare the turnaround to your old process. If you cut it in half, it’s working.

Dish 5 of 10 on the Sales Station. Build-note leverage: Output Over Process (Ingredient #5).