Dr. J.P. (Jack) London
CACI Chairman and CEO

"Breakthrough: Innovations in Winning"

Thank you, Eric, for that generous introduction. And thank you to the Association of Proposal Management Professionals for this invitation. I get a lot of invitations to speak. And I can't make them all. But yours was an invitation I was eager to accept. Why? Well, in part because it gives me a chance to visit with, and honor, the excellent efforts of CACI's J. D. Olson and his team, who work here in our CACI New Orleans offices.

But I'm also glad to be here because it gives me a chance to talk about a favorite subject. Winning. And really, in your business - in our business - what other subject is there? In fact, I'm very much in sync with one of America's foremost experts on winning. The late, great, Vince Lombardi. You're probably thinking of the same quote I am... the one that's often attributed to him: "Winning isn't everything. It's the only thing!"

But there's something else Lombardi said about winning that I think will serve as a better basis for my talk today. "Winning isn't everything," he said in a 1962 interview, "but wanting to win is."

Which brings me to the other reason I was eager to be here today. Because of who you are, because of what you do and because you came to this conference, you personify what Lombardi was talking about. You want to win. That's vital. And it's at the core of why I believe the role of the proposal management professional is incredibly important. Sad to say, though, I don't think that's the case at all businesses. In large part, I think that's due to their not appreciating what a truly professional proposal management staff can do, especially when it is encouraged and supported throughout the company.

I believe that mindset should change, and that's another reason why I thought it important to come talk with you today. I'd like to talk about "professional proposal management" using the best example I know - CACI - and examine how we've defined and developed this function over the years. Because I believe the organization and culture that we have built truly epitomizes the kind of "breakthrough" this conference has adopted as its theme.

Before I introduce you to our approach, however, I should introduce you to our company. Simply put, we develop, deploy and support technology that supports America's defense - a job that, today, is more important than ever. While many Americans have only recently begun to pay increased attention to the nation's defense, it's an area we've focused on for decades. It's not all we do, of course. We have a 41-year track record of serving corporate and government clients around the world.

Our company began, appropriately enough, with a winning proposal, which delivered thousands of dollars of revenue in our first year of business. Thirty-four thousand dollars, to be exact. We've grown a bit since then. As the new millennium began, we were running at more than half a billion in revenue, and we've set a goal - a goal I know we can achieve - to become a $1B company by 2005.Where's that kind of growth going to come from? Many sources, of course, but a very significant one is from people - people just like you. Let me introduce you to them - or really, let me introduce you to how CACI manages... proposal management.

A lot of people, when they look at our organization and track record, usually want to know, "what's our secret?" If there is one, it's a pretty basic one, and it's this: we recognized early on the need to invest in proposal professionals - in the tools they needed, the infrastructure they required and most important, in the people themselves. It's an investment that's earned solid returns for us. We now win virtually all of our recompetes. And when we go after new business, we come out on top more than 50% of the time. The truth is, there really is no answer to "what's our secret?" because there really is no "secret" behind those numbers. Just a lot of hard work and commitment.

"Hard-work" is self-explanatory, especially to an audience like this one. "Commitment" may seem selfexplanatory, too, but organizations define it different ways. So let me explain how we define commitment at CACI - that is, commitment to top flight proposal management, commitment to top flight proposal managers and most of all, commitment to winning.

First of all, we maintain a highly trained, highly motivated cadre of proposal professionals. Sounds simple enough. But how many organizations ignore this? They build a function, they hire staff and then... they let it fend for itself. Not at CACI. We maintain our proposal management culture the same way you maintain any other precision instrument you prize. We give it attention, we examine it regularly for flaws or opportunities for improvement, and if any part breaks, we fix it - promptly.

Now, I also called our proposal professionals highly trained and highly motivated. Again, terms you hear so often they're easy to overlook - or worse yet, ignore. We pay attention at CACI. "Highly trained" and "highly motivated" aren't buzzwords for us, they're action items. To stay ahead of the latest trends, and make sure we can deliver what we promise, we train and retrain. As for keeping our people highly motivated, we have a variety of ways of doing that, including incentives and opportunities for advancement. But what may motivate them more is the kind of culture we strive to create at CACI. It's one that values the work they do - and does everything it can to make that work easier.

For example, a key guiding phrase for us is, "Collaborate to Win." In practice, that means we promote a corporate culture where proposal development and support is everyone's job. In other words, when one of our proposal professionals calls you for help, to give the answer, "that's not my job," is never acceptable at CACI. Because winning and keeping business is everyone's job.

We back this up with extensive, steady support from fully involved senior management. In their book, Positioning to Win, Jim Beveridge and Ed Velton said it loud and clear: "If you want to win, you have to sacrifice your best qualified leader to the proposal." Now a word like "sacrifice" may make a corporate executive anxious, but at CACI, losing a deal makes us a lot more anxious. That's why people like me get involved early and stay involved. If that sounds like a sure way to keep people on their toes... well, you're right. But it's not just about keeping our staff on their toes - it keeps me and the rest of my leadership team from resting easy or falling behind.

In sum, we deliver the process, tools, training and environment that people need to do their jobs successfully. And then we get the work done. Because no matter how great your people or your culture, you're not going to win the business unless you have a great proposal. Here's how we craft a great proposal at CACI:

First, we prove we understand the client. That is, that we know them, we know their business, we know their industry and we know the challenges they face.

Next, we prove we understand the problem. Understanding the problem is at the core of any great proposal, of course, but it's surprising how easy it is to stumble over this. Understanding the client's problem starts with recognizing that your client is unique. So are their problems. They require a unique solution.

So that's what we do. We develop effective solutions that meet the client's mission. We're able to do this because of the work we've already done - that is, working to understand the client, and their problem. That prep work has left us with a clear idea of their mission and what we need to do for them.

We also have to prove to the client's satisfaction that we have the track record and resources to deliver the solution, or solutions, that we propose.

There's also one additional element to the proposals we develop at CACI, and it's something that I believe sets a winning proposal apart. As it happens, it's very much in sync with the theme of your conference. Here it is: In every proposal we do at CACI, we push ourselves to offer the customer something new. New to them, new to us. Doing so delivers twin benefits. One, it pushes our customer ahead. Past competitors. Past barriers. Past the solutions they've always tried before.

What's more, it gives them a reason, a new reason to choose CACI. Because by offering something new, we're offering a unique solution to their unique problem. In addition, developing new solutions for our customers pushes us ahead. It forces us to do just what you've been discussing here, and that's breakthrough. In our industry, we'd be out of business in a year if we weren't always pressing ourselves to seek new advancements and breakthroughs in all that we do. Beveridge and Velton agree with me on this, by the way. They write: "The most effective strengths are technical innovations, and innovations are often the key to a win."

Of course, you can't win in the real world unless you compete in the real world. So let me offer a real-world example of how CACI went after business, and put our proposal principles into practice. The example concerns our work with U.S. Army's Communications and Electronics Command (or CECOM) Intelligence and Information Warfare Directorate on the TEFOS contract, or Technical, Engineering, Fabrication and Operations Support. When the contract came up for our recompete, we knew it would be a unique - and uniquely difficult challenge for several internal and external reasons.

First, we knew competition would be tough because the customer had moved to a multiple award environment, which meant competition would ensue on individual delivery orders. It wasn't business we could pass up, though. The contract ceiling had risen to $500M - and that's after we'd realized $180M in revenue during the predecessor contract. But it wasn't just the money that was changing this time around. The landscape was changing, too - literally. Our customer had moved from Virginia to New Jersey. Many government employees - our customers, the people who knew us best - did not go. So unlike most recompetes, this was like bidding to an entirely new customer.

We had undergone changes of our own, as well. We'd just acquired a company called QuesTech, that originally held this legacy contract, and we were working hard to integrate them into our business. And there were other challenges. Starting with the fact that one of the key team members on the previous contract decided to strike out on their own and compete for the work directly. Add to that, the fact that we were also confronted by a team led by another long-term, well respected CECOM contractor, and the fact that the government had stated one award would go to a small business if one qualified.

It was, to say the least, not a scenario for an outright win. So we dove right into the CACI proposal playbook. We made this effort our top corporate new business priority. We assigned a senior capture manager and the head of our proposal group to the effort, along with senior, proposal-experienced technical people from other CACI Business Groups, to lead critical parts of our efforts. That's right; we assigned key parts of the proposal to people outside the immediate operational group. In one case, a sample task presentation was led by a brand-new employee.

That may sound risky, but in fact, just the opposite logic was at work: we were simply assigning these tasks to absolutely the best qualified people that we had. That included making the best use of the folks at our newly acquired company, QuesTech, who had been doing an outstanding job supporting this customer for 17 years.

Once we'd assembled our dream team, we invested to make that dream a reality by fully funding the up-front work necessary to position the company and the team in the new environment. If this all sounds like it was difficult to manage - well, you're right. But, again, as Beveridge and Velton said, "If you have a proposal team that is easy to manage, you had better take a hard look at its members. They probably aren't your best people."

Well, these were our best. And that was reflected in the result. We won, and we won big! But the project teammate who'd defected back at the start now lost out. Since then, we have won more than 80% of the competitive delivery orders we bid, and we have won the lion's share of the dollars. No question, I'm proud of this and all our successes. But I don't kid myself. The world in which we live and work and compete for business is changing rapidly.

Speed, in fact, is what will define our future. A full quarter of our business, for example, is now GSA Schedule, which dramatically increases the speed at which we conduct business. Proposal cycle times are only going to get faster in the months and years ahead, for everyone. Speed like this will require a lot from us all, but what it will require most is renewed attention to the fundamentals of our business. Much may have changed, and may continue to change. But hard work and, yes, sleepless nights, are still what's needed to put in winning proposals.

But what provides the edge? I think it's clear. It's no one person or gimmick or tool. It's creating a winning culture where breakthroughs and innovations are like air and water - a part of your life. In fact, I believe your conference theme says it directly: "Breakthrough: Innovations in Winning." As I've said today, I believe pushing to deliver something new really can deliver success to you and your customer.

But don't push too far. As General Patton once wrote to his son, then a West Point cadet, "Take calculated risks. That is quite different from being rash." And that's very true. Your search for innovations need not send you to the ends of the earth, nor should it. The best innovations are the ones that well up from within, and represent the vast collective knowledge and skill of an organization.

If this process sounds familiar, it should. It is an extremely American trait: innovation that springs from cooperating, listening, and most of all, never quitting is a hallmark of our nation. And not just of our businesses, but indeed, for all those who serve our country, as we have seen over the last few months. As a nation, we are driven to succeed, and not stop until we do so. Call it patriotism, or call it pride, but it is a call that the best among us will always answer. And that should include you. Because, what many companies may not realize is that they already have some of those innovations, and innovators, right there in-house.

You, as proposal professionals, need to find them. You need to be one of them. You need to - do your own "breakthrough." And once you do, winning will, indeed, be well within your grasp.

Ladies and gentlemen, I thank you.