The two of us, Sara Jane (SJ) Baublitz and Whitney Kippes, met when we were the two youngest and most recent hires at an international relief and development agency. Bonding over a shared desire to find a balance between doing quality program design and business development work and supporting our own mental health, both of us worked in business development and relationship management before taking on new business development roles at different organizations.

 

In 2019, we reunited to form Bid Boss Consulting. At that point, we'd come to value our 20 collective years of experience as what it was—a valuable asset. We had also both faced very real burnout and the intense toll that years spent in business development and proposal management can take.

 

In spite of that, we’ve continued to love doing the work.

 

In a profession where the expectation is that folx burn out within two years in business development and move on, our long-time love affair with bids is rare. And it made us wonder: What are we losing every time we have to recruit and train a new person? And why do we accept high turnover as a given? 

As we navigate an increasingly competitive fundraising environment, the needs of your organization and your team are also changing.

This is a problem that requires a two-pronged approach: the capture and proposal support to get today's bid out the door and the training and coaching solutions to strengthen your internal capacity for the long term. At Bid Boss, we can provide:

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• An expert proposal team member ready to provide surge support

• A fully integrated team member when you need mid- and longer-term support

• A seasoned advisor on business development strategy and processes

• A certified trainer providing custom in-house training and coaching

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Bid Boss is a women-run consulting firm based in Arlington, Virginia, with the mission of helping international development organizations win more while avoiding staff burnout. With decades of business development experience in the humanitarian and international development sectors, we've aggregated knowledge and expertise about the best avenues that can help our clients mobilize resources and position themselves to win awards from a wide variety of donors, including USAID, USDA, FCDO, CDC, the United Nations, major foundations, and the private sector.