Go / no-go

The checks that come before anyone writes a word, in order of how fast they kill a bid.

Why this comes first

Writing a response the organization is disqualified from is the most common and most expensive failure in this work. It costs an evening — often several — from a person who has very few of them, and the rejection arrives without ever being scored.

A fast, well-reasoned no is the product. It is what makes 50 bids a week possible. The filter is the skill; the writing is the easy part.

Check 1 — Eligibility

Hard stops. Any single miss ends it.

• Entity type — nonprofit, for-profit, government, educational, tribal. Read exactly which are named
• Registration status — SAM.gov active and unexpired, UEI issued, state charity registration current
• Certification requirements — is this set aside for 8(a), HUBZone, WOSB, SDVOSB, or small business
• Size standard — under the threshold for the stated NAICS, by the stated measure
• Geography — place of performance, service area, or state of incorporation limits
• Prior award status — some programs exclude current or recent grantees

Read the eligibility section literally. "Eligible applicants are units of local government" excludes the nonprofit that partners with one. Partnering is sometimes the answer, but it is a different bid with a different lead.

Check 2 — Mandatory qualifications

The requirements written with "shall," "must," or "will be required to." These are disqualifiers, not preferences.

Common ones that end bids:

• Past performance thresholds — "three contracts of similar scope within five years." No amount of good writing substitutes for the third contract
• Licensing — state contractor license, professional licensure, program-specific certification
• Bonding — bid, performance, and payment bond capacity at the stated amount
• Insurance — coverage types and limits, sometimes with named-insured requirements
• Facility or personnel clearances — long lead times, frequently fatal to a first-time bidder
• Staffing — named key personnel with stated credentials, committed at stated percentages
• Accounting system — a DCAA-adequate system for some cost-reimbursement work
• Match or cost share — a hard cash requirement the organization has to actually have

Distinguish "must" from "should." Evaluators are usually required to reject on a missed "must" and merely allowed to score down a missed "should." Getting this backwards either kills a winnable bid or wastes an evening on a dead one.

Check 3 — Compliance mechanics

Not disqualifying in themselves, but they decide whether the deadline is reachable.

• Submission deadline, with the time zone, and how many working days remain
• Portal registration — SAM.gov and several agency systems take days to weeks. This kills more finished proposals than anything else on the list
• Format constraints — page limits, font and margin requirements, file format, file size
• Required forms and attachments, and which need wet or electronic signatures
• Question deadline — usually well before the submission deadline, and the only chance to resolve an ambiguity
• Pre-bid conference or site visit — sometimes mandatory, and missing it disqualifies

Count backwards from the deadline. Include signature routing, a partner's letter of support, and an audit copy someone has to find. A three-week window is not three weeks of writing time.

Check 4 — Capacity to deliver

The uncomfortable question: if this is won, can it actually be delivered.

Staff availability, cash flow through a reimbursement-based award, the reporting burden against admin capacity, and geographic reach.

Winning something the organization cannot deliver is worse than losing it. It damages past performance, which is the asset that wins everything after it, and for a small organization one bad performance record closes a lot of doors.

Check 5 — Fit and odds

Only reached if everything above passed.

• Incumbent — is there one, and is the customer happy. A recompete against a satisfied incumbent is usually a no
• Scope alignment — how much is core work versus a stretch
• Competition — set-aside pools are smaller; open competitions can draw hundreds
• Cost to bid — hours to prepare, honestly counted
• Award size against effort — a USD 40k grant with a 60-page application and quarterly reporting may not be worth it

Weigh cost to bid against realistic probability. Small organizations lose more to over-bidding than to under-bidding, because every evening spent on a 5% chance is an evening not spent on a 40% one.

Writing the decision

Both answers are short and both name the reason.

No-bid:

NO-BID — Solicitation W912-26-R-0043, HVAC maintenance, Fort Whitfield

Reason: mandatory past performance requires 3 federal contracts over USD 500k
in 5 years. Okonkwo Mechanical has 1 (USD 310k, 2024). Hard disqualifier in
Section L.

Worth noting: this recompetes in 2029. Two more qualifying contracts by
then makes it a real target.

Go:

GO — Riverbend adult literacy expansion, State DOE, due Sep 15

Eligible: 501(c)(3), in-state, current registrations.
Mandatories: all met. Match is 10% in-kind, coverable with volunteer hours.
Mechanics: 20 pages, portal registration active, questions due Aug 8.
Capacity: 24 working days. Reimbursement basis — cash flow is the real risk.
Odds: no incumbent, new program. Award USD 180k over 2 years.

Recommend go. Flag: get the DOE portal password confirmed this week.

Recording it

Every no-bid goes in the pipeline with its reason. Solicitations recur, and next year the decision takes ninety seconds instead of an evening.

Revisit a no-bid when the reason changes. Past performance grows, certifications get issued, bonding capacity rises. A no-bid list reviewed once a year turns into a target list, which is the most useful thing this skill produces over time.