By Douglas Fiebig, Senior Partner at Trilogy Writing & Consulting and Evija Kuemmel, Head of Corporate Communications at Trilogy Writing & Consulting

When outsourcing services, designing and issuing a Request for Proposal (RFP) is an important step for establishing successful partnerships with vendors. The RFP process helps pharmaceutical companies, Contract Research Organizations, and other healthcare organizations assess potential vendors, compare their capabilities, and shortlist the most suitable partners. When done well, RFPs streamline selection and set the stage for productive collaborations.

As medical writing consultants, we have responded to dozens of RFPs for over 20 years. Many have been thoughtful, strategic documents that helped both sides manage expectations. Unfortunately, others have been lengthy and filled with irrelevant questions, making the process inefficient for both issuer and vendor.

The consequences of inappropriate and lengthy RFPs are not only a challenge for vendors in terms of the time needed for their completion. We suspect that poorly designed RFPs also disadvantage the issuers. They are likely to generate superficial or inappropriate responses, delay decision-making, and lead to vendor selection based on incomplete or irrelevant criteria. After years of receiving frequently ineffective RFPs, we are using this article to share a few ideas for designing effective RFPs. We explore why so many RFPs miss the mark and how they can be smarter, more efficient documents that serve the issuer’s needs. We provide examples from our service line – medical writing – but believe these principles are equally applicable across all services.

What We Encounter: The Reality of Poor RFPs

Before exploring ideas about what can make the RFP process more effective, it’s worth highlighting some characteristics of ineffective RFPs that we have received.

The kitchen sink approach. These RFPs involve 50-80 questions, asking everything from founding year to office square footage to the history of the company. Buried within are the few questions that matter to the service needed.

The copy-and-paste problem. Many RFPs are generic templates applied across service areas and project scopes. As a medical writing vendor, we’ve been asked about experience running Phase 2 studies – irrelevant to writing services. This generic approach shows little thought about the specific services needed and makes it harder for vendors to demonstrate their fit.

Questions that lack differentiation or create confusion. Asking “What are your staff’s hours and days of operation?” adds little value to assessing medical writing credentials. More importantly, the responses are unlikely to vary substantially among vendors. It would be more pertinent to ask whether the vendor has resources in different time zones and to ask for evidence of how these resources can be leveraged to optimize timelines of the envisaged project.

Similarly, another real-life question like “Provide a price for writing a CTD submission” is meaningless without details about the product, indication, development program, and CTD modules within the scope. This is about as effective as asking a builder “Provide a price for building a building”. Without context, issuers receive a wide range of prices based on assumptions made by vendors.

Questions that mislead. A question like “What is the average length of service for your employees?” can elicit a skewed response if a company is growing and has many recent new hires. If you compare a company that is growing with a company that is not, then a meaningful comparison cannot be made. A better approach is to categorize employees by predefined ranges for the length of service.

Likewise, “How many reports have you authored in neurology?” may appear relevant due to its specificity but ignores experience in other therapeutic areas. In medical writing, broad experience is often more valuable than narrow specialization. The best medical writers will have honed their skills over time through having worked on a broad range of document types and therapeutic areas.

The narrative trap. RFPs relying too heavily on open-ended questions invite lengthy responses that are hard to analyze and compare. Instead of structured data points, issuers sift through pages of subjective storytelling, slowing decision-making and increasing bias. Ultimately, no one gains from this approach – vendors invest time crafting narratives, while issuers struggle to extract meaningful information and compare vendors.

“As a vendor responding to RFPs, we aim to provide clear, accurate information to help issuers make the best decisions but all too often, project scopes are vague and the questions asked are not directly relevant to our service offering, making it hard to see how comparisons between vendors can be made.”

What Makes a Good RFP: A Vendor’s Perspective

Having experienced both excellent and deficient RFPs over time, we have gained insight into what works well and the characteristics of effective RFPs that benefit issuers and vendors alike. The list below is not exhaustive, but when RFPs feature these traits, they are easier to respond to and yield productive interactions. Here are our recommendations from a vendor’s perspective.

Good RFPs are focused on decision criteria. Every question in a well-designed RFP should answer one fundamental question:
“Can the vendor successfully deliver on our specific project?” Issuers should identify 5 to 7 key decision criteria before drafting
questions. Examples include therapeutic area expertise, experience with specific regulatory authorities, resources for tight timelines, quality management systems, and pricing structure. If price matters, acknowledge it; if regulatory experience is critical, prioritize it. Validate questions internally and ask: “Will this help us make a decision?” If not, revise or delete. This ensures vendors provide focused responses to questions that influence decision-making.

Good RFPs are specific to your project. Generic questions yield generic answers; specific questions yield useful information. Instead of asking “Do you have experience with Marketing Authorisation Application (MAA) dossiers?”, ask “How many MAA dossiers have you written in the past 2 years, and which modules did you author?” Instead of “Provide details on your staff,” ask “How many medical writers with MAA expertise are available for a project starting in Q2 20xx?” Specificity tells vendors exactly what you need and prevents vague responses.

Good RFPs enable meaningful comparisons. To compare vendors objectively, RFPs should favor structured formats over open-ended questions. Use checkboxes for yes/no questions, tables for capacity, timelines, and pricing, and implement word limits for open-ended questions. Structured formats guide vendors and facilitate assessments. If every vendor responds with lengthy narratives, issuers end up comparing writing styles rather than capabilities. A balance between structured and open-ended questions ensures comparability and context.

Good RFPs speak the vendor’s language. Using terminology and frameworks familiar to the service area being procured clarifies scope and fosters trust. By aligning the language and concepts with the service being requested, the likelihood of receiving relevant, actionable insights rather than generic responses is increased, ultimately leading to better decision-making and stronger partnerships.

Good RFPs are concise and crisp. Concise RFPs respect the time of issuers and vendors, focusing only on essential information. Direct, well-structured questions allow quick, accurate responses, reducing ambiguity and expediting assessment. Brevity done well signals professionalism and purpose. If you cannot shortlist vendors based on 15 focused questions, adding more will only create unnecessary complexity. The challenge for an issuer when drafting an RFP should be to set a limit of 10 to 15 relevant questions.

A Partnership Mindset

As a vendor responding to RFPs, we aim to provide clear, accurate information to help issuers make the best decisions but all too often, project scopes are vague and the questions asked are not directly relevant to our service offering, making it hard to see how comparisons between vendors can be made. Poor RFPs make it harder for an issuer to make sound procurement decisions. They waste the vendor’s time crafting responses to irrelevant questions and waste the issuer’s time assessing information that is likely not pertinent to the service being sought.

Good RFPs form the foundation of successful partnerships. They identify vendors with the right expertise, capacity, and approach. They signal that the issuer values efficiency and clarity and set the tone for collaboration based on mutual respect and meaningful communication. Good RFPs may take more time to prepare than ill-considered RFPs – recall Blaise Pascal’s quote: “I have made this longer than usual because I have not had time to make it shorter” – but they provide meaningful insights and save time during assessment. When issuers select the right vendor, everyone benefits: issuers receive quality deliverables on time, and vendors gain successful projects and happy clients.