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More RFPs Won't Help You Win. Better Vetting Will.
Jonathan Gardner • August 26, 2025
Government contracts represent billions in annual spend across federal, state, and local levels. Yet most sales leaders still struggle to turn access into wins.
The problem isn’t always volume. A lot of clients we work with already see plenty of RFPs. The real challenge is deciding which ones are worth the chase.
Welcome to
The Value Chain Advantage. Each week, I share hard-earned strategies to help ambitious companies unlock clarity, protect margin, and scale without chaos. From sourcing to sales, procurement to planning, this newsletter is for founders, revenue leaders, and operators working to strengthen every link in their value chain.
What We're Seeing in the Market
For many sales teams, the bottleneck isn’t necessarily a lack of RFP opportunities — it’s the flood of them.
Here’s what we’re seeing:
- Sales teams burn hours sifting through RFPs that don’t fit their capabilities.
- They chase bids that look promising on the surface but offer little real revenue potential.
- They stretch resources thin and miss the few contracts they could actually win.
The result? Teams get busier, but not more successful.
What We've Learned
Winning firms don’t just respond faster. They qualify better.
They build discipline into their RFP monitoring process so they can filter signal from noise and zero in on opportunities aligned with their strengths.
The lesson is simple: More visibility doesn’t matter if you can’t vet for fit.
From Insight to Action
If you’re chasing government business, here’s one step you can take today:
- Score every RFP against fit. Before you invest hours in a response, ask: Does this match our capabilities? Is the revenue potential material? Do we have a real chance of winning?
A simple go/no-go scoring rubric
can cut wasted effort in half.
The Takeaway
The RFP game isn’t won by the team that sees the most opportunities. It’s won by the team that knows which ones to walk away from.
At J. Gardner, our RFP Monitoring service can give you immediate access to a highly curated list of RFP's, tailored to your company's expertise and focus areas.
We can even run the full RFP process for you so your team can focus on delivery — from discovery, to aggregation, to submission. Led by our expert proposal team who knows how to win.
How does your team decide whether an RFP is worth the time to pursue?
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