10/3/2016

Use this Interactive Project Proposal Template (and DitchMicrosoft Word)

process.st/project-proposal-template/

When getting a project approved, you need to submit all pertinent information to stakeholders and then get theirapproval to start. This means listing the project’s background, timeframes and expenses in an easily digestibledocument.

Traditionally, this has been done in Microsoft Word or on paper, but by using Process Street you can generate asmany proposals as you like just by running a checklist of this template and filling in the form fields. When thestakeholders sign off on the document, all they need to do is click the checkbox next to their name and ProcessStreet will log the activity.

Check out the project proposal template below, and when you’re done, scroll down for a breakdown of the steps andhow it all works:

Want to get started straight away?

Hit ‘Give me this checklist’ on the embed above to add it to your account.

This will create a copy of the template inside Process Street, like this:

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… And those are the basics!

Some organizations might require special additions to project proposals, but if you’re happy with the details of theproposal, you can go right ahead and run a checklist of the template.

When you run a checklist, you can imagine it being like printing out the template and filling it in. Checklists aresingle-run instances of templates. No matter what you do to the checklist, the template will stay the same.

Starting a new project proposal

Here’s how you run a checklist to start a new project proposal. First, click the Project Proposal Template from theHome screen, like this:

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Next, you’re going to need to click ‘Run checklist…’ to start a new project proposal .

Filling in the project proposal information

The name of your checklist should be the name of the project you’re proposing, just to make things clear whenyou’re sorting back through proposals. Name it, and hit ‘Run checklist’ to confirm.

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Here I’m proposing and AdWords campaign to the head of marketing, so I’ve named it the marketing channel pluskeyword I’m going to target.

Once inside the checklist, I start filling out the form fields, like this:

When I’ve finished off a task, I tick it off using the task list on the right side of the screen.

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Repeat this step until you’ve worked through the whole checklist and filled in as many form fields as youneed.

Setting dates for the project timeframe

When you get the the project timeframe section of the proposal, you’ll notice you can use the date fields to set thestart and end date of each section:

Our date form field makes it easy to select the right dates quickly with a visual calendar for reference.

Fill in the rest of the timeframe.

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Estimating the project budget

Project budgets are broken down into two parts:

One-time costs

Monthly recurring costs

Our project proposal template has fields for both of these parts. Fill in the $ amount in the first, then adescription of the costs, bullet pointed if it’s more than one item.

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Next up, we’re going to fill in the project stakeholders

Fill in project stakeholders

Whether you’re just writing a project proposal to your manager, or if there are more parties involved, in this step youneed to type the names of these stakeholders in the form fields, like this:

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State how the project will be evaluated and monitored

Every project needs should be proposed with a way that assures stakeholders it will be able to be deemed asuccess or failure. For this, you need to state how you’re going to evaluate and monitor it.

Use the paragraph field in task 5 to bullet point the different parts of the project that will be evaluated, and how:

Getting approval on the project proposal

For the next step, you’re going to need to loop your stakeholders into the process and get them to tick off whetherthey approve the project.

Let’s break this up.

Adding stakeholders as members to the checklist

First of all, you need to add your stakeholders to the checklist. They’ll get a notification that they need to come in andapprove the proposal.

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If the stakeholders are part of your company, you should add them as members of the organization by clicking theorganization name near your display picture (mine’s Nero Inc. here). Then just type their names to add them in.

Commenting to notify the stakeholders

To send an email notification to the stakeholders, it’s a good idea to @mention them in a comment, like this:

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After that, it’s just a matter of waiting to get the project approved!

The benefits of using an interactive project proposal template vs paper or MicrosoftWord

When you use a template in Word to make your project proposal, there are inherent frustrations with writing text inwithout breaking the formatting, but that’s not all. There’s the fact that it’s a rudimentary format which either has tobe saved locally and shared (without tracked changes) version by version, and that it’s a waste of paper if you needto print it.

By using our template, you get a document added to your Process Street account that you can access from anycomputer or mobile, and just run a new checklist and add collaborators for each new proposal.

What could be simpler than that?

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