Reminders for proposal deadlines and milestones
How the Consulting pack reminds staff ahead of proposal deadlines, milestones and check-ins, and reminds the client two days before a check-in.
By Achekam · · 4 min read · For Consulting businesses in South Africa, Nigeria, Kenya
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Consultancies miss dates for ordinary reasons. The proposal due on Friday belongs to a partner who is on a client site all week. A milestone date was agreed in the statement of work and never made it into anyone's calendar. The client forgot the monthly check-in, and the meeting room sat empty while two consultants waited.
Achekam's Consulting pack sends reminders from the dates already held on its records, so the people involved hear about a date before it arrives rather than after.
Proposal deadline reminders
Staff are reminded of a proposal deadline 7 days, 3 days and 1 day before it. Treat each one as a checkpoint with its own purpose:
| Reminder | What should be true by then |
|---|---|
| 7 days before | The bid decision is made; pricing and returnable documents are under way |
| 3 days before | A complete draft exists; missing signatures are being chased |
| 1 day before | Final review is done; the response is ready to submit |
If a checkpoint is missed, the reminder is the moment to say so, not the deadline. A partner told three days out that the draft is not complete can still decide to withdraw or bring in help; told on the last afternoon, they have no choices left.
The reminders work from the deadline recorded on the proposal, so the closing date has to be entered on the day the request for proposals arrives.
Milestone and check-in reminders
Staff are also reminded of milestones and of check-ins. The pack keeps statements of work with their deliverables and milestones, so the dates exist once the statement of work is properly recorded.
Milestone reminders give the delivery team the chance to raise a delay with the client before the date, which is a very different conversation from explaining it afterwards. Check-in reminders prompt the status report and the preparation for sign-off, so the monthly meeting starts with something to discuss.
The client reminder before a check-in
The pack can also remind the client 2 days before a check-in. That cuts down on empty meeting rooms and gives the client time to gather their own comments on the work. The same question has been researched for health care appointments: a systematic review and meta-analysis in BMC Health Services Research brings together peer-reviewed evidence on what cuts missed appointments, including reminders and other nudges, with their measured effects.
Reminders that go to clients come with three controls:
- each stays off until a workspace administrator switches it on;
- once on, a given reminder is sent at most once;
- client reminders are subject to a daily cap.
Decide as a firm whether to switch the check-in reminder on. If your engagement leads prefer to confirm each check-in personally, leave it off and let them do so.
If you do switch it on, think about what the client needs to bring. A reminder that simply says "check-in on Thursday" is better than nothing; one that the engagement lead follows with the draft status report, so the client arrives having read it, turns the meeting from an update into a discussion.
A deadline, followed through
Here is how the reminders fit together on a typical proposal. A request for proposals arrives on a Monday, and the person who reads RFPs records the closing date on the proposal the same day. A week before the deadline, the first reminder goes out. By then the bid review has happened, so the reminder is the cue to check that pricing has started and the returnable documents are being gathered, and to ask the person collecting them whether any signature is going to be a problem.
Three days out, the second reminder arrives. The draft should be complete; this is the point to read it end to end and to chase the last signatures. The day before, the final reminder is the prompt for the last review and for submitting, ideally that day rather than in the final hour.
If the bid is won, the statement of work brings its own milestone dates, and the same pattern starts again around delivery: reminders to staff before each milestone and check-in, and, if switched on, a short reminder to the client two days before each monthly meeting.
Where reminders arrive
Reminders come by e-mail and in the app. There is no SMS and no WhatsApp channel.
Consultants who spend their days on client sites may rarely open the app, so their e-mail is what they will actually see. Check that reminders reach the inbox each person reads, especially for staff who use a client's e-mail system while on assignment. For the client reminder, make sure the client contact on record is the person who actually attends the check-in, not a general mailbox or the procurement officer who signed the contract.
Keeping the dates honest
A reminder is only as good as the date behind it:
- Record every proposal deadline on the day the RFP arrives.
- Record milestone dates when the statement of work is approved.
- Change a date on the record only when it has been changed with the client, and do it the same day.
- Review the coming week's deadlines, milestones and check-ins at a short weekly meeting, in case a reminder was missed or ignored.
- When someone goes on leave, hand their dates to a named colleague.
The dates themselves come from the proposal and the statement of work, covered in tracking proposals to won, lost or not bid and signing a statement of work and kicking off.
Before reminders are switched on, go through your live proposals and statements of work and make sure each has its deadline and milestone dates recorded. Reminders start working from the first date you enter.
General guidance only, not advice on your own circumstances. Tax and payroll rules change: check the current position with the authority or your adviser.
