The is one business commodity that’s in short supply and it’s time. Over the past few weeks I’ve come accross a number of teams that have been spending hours and days slaving over business proposals for work from potential clients in 2011.

I will admit to not having made too many business proposals for work. For the most part I seem to have been the only person in the frame and the largest discussion has been around my availability and fee so I don’t count myself as an expert in this area. However, from my point of view, the process seems to be one-sided and to the complete benefit of the recipient as opposed to the author.

The proposal details of what needs to be done, how it will be done, who will deliver the work as well as the costs and the benefits to the client and all illustrated with as many charts and graphs as the “Egyptian Book of the Dead” and can often run into many pages. When done they are then emailed out and possibly posted with a flourish, self-congratulation from the authors and often into oblivion.

There follows a period of ignored phone messages and emails to the potential client to see if the work has been received, read and what the “next step”. Often the paper is used as fodder to negotiate price or other aspects of the contract with “preferred suppliers” or as “proof” that the correct “best practice” procedures have been completed when awarding contractual work.

I wonder that as such applications are used as a “negotiation tool” by a potential clients that it is, in fact, a business benefit to them that it would  be fair to invoice for the time taken in producing them. Then they could be honestly used to negotiate prices down with other suppliers, used to justify “best practice” and so on.

In the unlikely event that the contract was awarded then the invoice could then be discounted against the eventual bill. I might try this idea out to see if it works.

I must admit to being fed up of attending a business meeting and to have to listen to a pimply faced executive that is out to impress colleagues whilst saying nothing that he can be blamed for.

For the most part the use of such phrases are pompous and meaningless. Examples that I’ve heard in this last week include: “Targeted cost initiatives”, “Client care identification programme” and “Positioned service excellence programme”.

Coupled with this is the language from the internet such as HMU (Hit me up) meaning text me or email me that Facebook has revealed is the most used terms alongside “World Cup” and the only person in the top ten list “Justin Beiber” (for the benefit of my older readers and those without young kids he’s a Canadian teen pop idol).

Actually I tend not to keep up with the language and just pretend to be stupid. At the end of the talk I raise my hand and ask for an explanation of how the “Service excellence programme” will work and how, exactly, it will be positioned” and what “data” was used to identify the need in the first place.

Generally the individual is so confused by the request that the information is repeated using clear, everyday language that everyone can understand.