Bluespark - March 2022

Bluespark - March 2022

the

March 2022

THE MISSING STEP IN CREATING AN RFP Your organization has a major project that needs to be done. You have done your homework and created your list of requirements. You held brainstorming sessions and may have even used consultants to help you get to the bottom of your requirements. You know what you want to get done and now it is time to create the RFP. Where to start? There are lots of great templates out there to help you structure your RFP. The typical template follows a flow like this.

added. It is an excellent idea to involve the stakeholders. Get their input. Create a list of features. Boil the ocean. The problem is that you are left with a list of things, and you have no idea what this will cost. In fact, you have no idea what is cheap and cheerful, and what is crazy expensive and time consuming. And how would you? What is easy today was expensive as little as five years ago. Take shopping carts for example. These use to be expensive, custom and time-consuming. Today, they are easy plugins for most sites. What you need to do is add a step that takes into account the realities of the real world. The ocean has been boiled, and the organization is left with the hope that they can afford all the wishes.

How to write an RFP that will get a response:

1. Define your project and needs. 2. Write an introduction. 3. Explain your company's and project's history. 4. Describe your project's requirements — the scope. 5. Explain how vendors should respond. 6. Outline your selection criteria. 7. Note your timelines. 8. Proofread and revise your RFP.

And this is where the problem starts. You create your RFP, send it out to suppliers. And this is where the problem starts. It comes back far more expensive than anticipated. You fight to get a budget, and it is declined. Back to the drawing board. You realize that you need to reduce the scope of the project. But what to reduce. Back to brainstorming. You cut some features. Trim the scope. But will it make enough of a difference to get into the budget. You create a new RFP and hope for the best. Fingers crossed. Believe it or not this is not an uncommon problem.

The challenge is that the bulk of the people creating the feature list do not know what is easy, reasonable, or challenging.

Adding this additional step can create a smoother more successful RFP process. We call this step The Creating of the 3 Buckets: easy, reasonable, and challenging. Putting the feature into these three categories creates the opportunity for the organization to review the requirements. Once you know what is challenging, and hence more expensive, you can go back to the stakeholders and determine whether this is a “like to have,” “want to have” or “need to have” feature? You have now added a fourth category: Challenging but Need to Have. This will help with the creation of the RFP. Especially given you have a budget constraint and no idea of the project cost. Continued on Page 3 ...

Why does this happen? It results in RFPs being rewritten and lost time.

The problem lies in the creation of the project scope. It is not what you did to create the project scope, it’s that a step needs to be

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HOW TO MAKE SALES FROM THE HEART Sell Happiness Without Draining Yourself

Give customers happiness, and give yourself purpose. When a business sells happiness, it doesn’t always directly convert into happiness for anyone else. Maybe they’re not in need of your service or product and simply aren’t receiving your messaging the same way they will later. However, when you shift your focus from selling to providing people with a sense of happiness and/or peace, you might surprise yourself with how meaningful and fulfilling your company’s content, marketing, and overall mission will feel for you and your team. Happiness can’t be bought, but it can be sold effectively to make the world a better place. We hope these tips will help make you and your team become more fulfilled marketers!

In life, you might feel pressured to smile even when you’re unhappy,

happiness, like a car that you can barely afford? What about spending too much time on certain tasks you dislike or with a group of friends you don’t really care for? Make conscious decisions to trade your money, time, and effort for happiness — and nothing less. That means cutting out unhealthy decisions that might’ve been useful coping mechanisms at one point of your life but are no longer necessary to help you thrive.

and the same is true when trying to please customers in your business. As the best marketers know, happiness can’t be bought, but it can be sold. Selling happiness and fulfillment is something companies do every day — and for genuine, great reasons, too. But how do marketers display those positive feelings all the time? How do you remain an effective leader, fulfilled business owner, and ambitious individual when impostor syndrome strikes?

Selling happiness starts with possibility.

Even when you and your employees don’t feel 100%, remember that happiness starts with a common truth: Anything is possible. When you’re happy, it can feel like the world is full of opportunities. That’s something you want to share with your customers, whether through friendly one-on-one interactions or through your marketing campaigns.

Don’t ‘trade’ your happiness every time.

It’s hard to approach sales or marketing with a generous attitude if you’re already giving away a lot in your personal life. Do you ever exchange your money for temporary

2 STEPS TO BETTER PRODUCTIVITY Organize Your Brain

File Folders for The Mind? Consultant Royale Scuderi postulates that the human brain is a lot like a computer. More specifically, like a computer, our minds slow down or freeze when we have a lot of “programs” (read: thoughts) running at once. Rather than having every tab in our brain’s web browser open, Scuderi encourages people to spend time each day actively organizing their brains. Set aside a few moments at the beginning and end of your day to catalog your thoughts. You could write these into a journal or notepad, or you could create a running digital document with tools like Google Docs or Microsoft’s OneNote. Then, once you have your document of choice, just write! Brain dump all of your thoughts, tasks, and feelings onto that document and simply let it loose from your brain! In doing so, you give your brain permission

When you support outreach for a higher learning institution your focus isn’t just based on one scope. Where a chemistry professor or English student may be singularly focused in their approach to the university or college, you have to be the cook in every kitchen — your hand is in every pot, as they say. Yet, doing so and maintaining some level of internal peace without burning out isn’t easy. As pandemic woes change the way we approach certain tasks and higher education continually evolves and changes, your ability to adapt from one task to the next has to be impeccable . (No pressure!) If you’re struggling to organize your thoughts and streamline your productivity, it may be time to look at your approach. You have the skills and knowledge to help your university succeed; you just need to leverage your brain power to get there.

to filter out all the “malware” it’s storing and allow it to reboot itself.

You can even use this brain-dumping session to catalog your to-do list! Take what you wrote down, organize it, and utilize it throughout your day or the next.

To-Do Lists, Not a To-Do List! With a clear brain, you can finally begin — but where? As productivity expert

and mathematician Mike Byster wrote in Psychology Today, the key to starting is to develop tricks for your brain, which will allow you to take all of the details and tasks you have and boil them down to

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Take a Break

Simple Bok Choy Chicken Soup

Inspired by TheSpruceEats.com

Is the chill of winter lingering? A hot bowl of this Asian-inspired soup will warm you right up! Our recipe makes 4–5 servings.

INGREDIENTS

3 cups chicken broth

2 tsp sesame oil

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1 tsp red pepper flakes

1 garlic clove, chopped

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2 tsp soy sauce

10 leaves bok choy, thinly sliced

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2 cups shredded rotisserie chicken

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DIRECTIONS

1. In a medium saucepan, bring chicken broth to a boil. 2. Stir in red pepper flakes, soy sauce, sesame oil, and garlic. 3. Add bok choy leaves and rotisserie chicken. Simmer for 10 minutes or until the bok choy is dark green and tender. 4. Enjoy with slices of your favorite whole-wheat bread!

CAESAR EQUINOX GOLD GREEN

FLOWERS FORWARD IRISH LUCKY

MARS RAIN

SPROUT WOMEN

... continued from Cover

bite-sized pieces. However, there isn’t one trick that works for everyone; you have to find the method that best suits you.

With this, you now have an opportunity for a more robust and useful RFP process. You can now provide three levels of scope in the bidding. We recommend that you break out the project into phases. The reason for phasing the project is that the early stages are designed in order for the features to be added. This will make more sense in a moment. Here is how we recommend doing the phases.

For instance, Byster references the “chunks” Social Security numbers are broken into, and he explains that using this method helps him. His brain can remember bits of information when it's grouped into fives. We’re willing to bet this is utilized in his daily task list! Rather than creating a running task list of everything he has to do that day, Byster can cheat the system and create multiple sets of to-do lists, each one broken into his magical chunks of five.

Phase 1 Scope – All the features from Easy and Reasonable Phase 2 Scope – Challenging but Need to Have Phase 3 Scope – Challenging

Remember, there’s no right or wrong way to organize your tasks. But one task list may not serve you. Your brain likely sees all that work and scrambles it, causing you to freeze, again. When you can break down your tasks into digestible chunks, you will find the best place to start. Bluespark Can Help Sometimes a chaotic brain is the product of a chaotic plan. Our team at Bluespark

Creating these categories, or “buckets” as we like to describe them, requires time and expertise. It requires knowledge of your industry and technology, and we can help you. We created The Bluespark Bucket List Process to do just that: help you create your project bucket list. For $1,500, Bluespark will spend a day with you and your team to help you break the feature list into the proper categories. At the end of this day, you will be able to create a structured RFP, allowing you to have a more successful RFP process with less surprises. Contact us today at Bluespark.com/Contact to get started.

can help you and your university team tap into your content genius and create a plan that best fits you. Learn more at Bluespark.com/Contact .

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Inside this Issue

The Missing Step in Creating an RFP.............1

Make Sales From the Heart Without Draining Yourself. .......................................... 2

Better Productivity Starts With Your Thoughts. ............................................... 2

Simple Bok Choy Chicken Soup. ................ 3

Take a Break.................................................. 3

Are You Forgetful Lately?.............................. 4

SELF-EMPOWERING MOTIVATION IS A ‘SHORTCUT’ 2 Scientific Methods to Stop Forgetting

Why do we supplement our diets with omega-3s and do puzzle games to strengthen the health of our brains? The most important reason is to prevent memory loss. However, in order to enhance our memory and lessen the instances of forgetting both big and little things, these brain-based strategies can help!

Researchers at Nagoya University in Japan have found that mastery-approach goals (i.e., developing your own competence) enhance memory of newly learned material, whereas performance-approach goals (i.e., comparing yourself to others) can create “tenuous connections” in memory. The authors concluded the study by saying, “Motivation factors can influence inhibition and forgetting.” So, it might be time to ask yourself: What motivates you to learn new things, and how can you change your approach? No. 2: Ask why. A 2016 study from the European Journal of Social Psychology found that thinking more

abstractly can actually reduce memory issues. The study examined how levels of “construal” (examination and interpretation) can affect memory, and their results suggested that “abstract thinking can eliminate retrieval- induced forgetting because of relational processing, demonstrating the roles of the levels of construal on memory inhibition.” In other words, if you know the “how” and “why” behind things you intend to remember, you’ll be more likely to remember them. If you’ve been forgetful lately, maybe it’s time to rethink how you approach new information — according to researchers, a new source of motivation or critical thinking mindset could make all the difference!

No. 1: Aim for mastery, not relative performance.

When losing weight, some people find it helpful to stop checking Facebook or Instagram to prevent self-comparisons. Similarly, your brain forgets what’s important when you compare your performance to others.

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