Session summary
Eliza Carbines explains capture as the work of positioning a buyer to prefer your organisation and solution before a tender is released. Capture sits in the middle of a seven-phase business development lifecycle. It opens with a pursuit decision and closes with a preliminary decision to bid. Every business moves through the same phases, and a small team simply does less work in each one. The session separates capture from sales, networking and response writing. A buyer's staff may like you personally, but that is not the same as their organisation preferring yours.
The practical starting point is a capture objective: one private sentence that names the contract, its likely value, the expected award date and what will change for the customer. Eliza contrasts a vague revenue target with a specific, timed objective, and suggests that an objective which is hard to write may signal the wrong opportunity. Bidders then rate their position with the buyer as unknown, known, improved or favoured, name the evidence for that rating and set a goal to move one step. Incumbents are warned not to assume that a smooth contract means the buyer prefers them.
Timing matters because influence ends when the request is released. After that, contact moves to the tender portal and answers are usually shared with every bidder. Australian state governments often publish early tender advice, and Commonwealth agencies list upcoming purchases in annual procurement plans on AusTender, which can also allow them to shorten the open tender period. Eliza treats three to six months before release as the ideal preparation window. In private markets, where nothing has to be published, she recommends calling prospective buyers directly.
The session closes on hot buttons: the concerns and goals that motivate a buyer to buy, whether or not the tender asks about them. Eliza recommends recording each one in the buyer's own words, with an owner and a planned solution. The pursuit decision and the bid decision stay separate, and each later stage is a fresh decision. In the Q&A, she advises a small business to compete on value rather than price, to name its risks openly, and to call a buyer with open, curious questions before the tender opens.
Key takeaways
- Write a one-sentence capture objective that names the contract, its value, the award date and what will change for the customer.
- Rate your position with the buyer honestly, name the evidence and plan the next step that moves you forward.
- Watch early tender advice and annual procurement plans so that preparation starts well before a tender opens.
- Record each hot button in the buyer's words, with an owner and a planned solution.
- Treat the pursuit decision and the bid decision as separate gates.
