Managing Opportunities

Managing opportunities

After you create an opportunity, VM makes it simple and easy to manage existing opportunities from the Opportunities list by allowing you to view additional information about the opportunity and take action on the clause set if you are a contracting user.

Viewing opportunities

To view the full list of opportunities, simply navigate to the OPPORTUNITIES tab. There, you will see a grid with basic information about each opportunity. You can also search and filter the opportunity list to find a specific opportunity that you're looking for including sealed opportunity.

Viewing an opportunity

To view an individual opportunity, locate and click the opportunity you want to view in the Opportunities list. This will take you to the Opportunity Summary view where you can see details about the opportunity, updates, and any documents submitted by vendors.

For sealed bid opportunities, the Messages tab in the Opportunity Summary view is hidden and in the Summary tab, the date and time until the proposals are sealed is shown in the Vendors section. You cannot view the vendors who have submitted the proposals until the bids are unsealed.

Viewing vendor questions

To view questions or question documents, click Questions tab.

This leads you to a list of questions or submitted question documents, where you can see which vendors have posted questions, uploaded the documents and when, as well as download the documents. To respond to the questions, you can create an update or answer each question and submit all the answers.

You can also assign another team member to respond to specific vendor questions by clicking ASSIGN QUESTIONS.

Once you select the assignees for the questions, click ASSIGN to send the questions to the selected assignees.

For sealed bid opportunities, the vendor names are hidden for the questions. You can see the vendor names after the proposals are unsealed.

Viewing proposals

To view the vendors who are working on proposals and see the proposal documents, click a vendor card in the Vendors section. For sealed bid opportunities, in the Vendors section you can only see the date and time until the proposals are sealed. You cannot view the vendors who have submitted the proposals until the bids are unsealed. To unseal bids, see unsealing a sealed bid.

Note: You can only view a vendor's proposal when its status is Submitted, Not Interested, or In Progress.

From here, you can view and download any proposal documents submitted.

Taking action on an opportunity

Contracting users can perform certain actions like creating updates, updating an opportunity, and closing an opportunity. In case of sealed bid opportunities, contracting users can unseal the vendors proposals on the designated proposal opening date and time.

Editing an opportunity

While an opportunity is still in the Draft or Active status, a guided workflow allows you to update the opportunity details, attachments and required proposal documents. You may also notify the respective vendors.

To update an opportunity:

1. From the Opportunities List, locate and click the opportunity to drill down to the Summary View.

2. From the Summary view, click + EDIT OPPORTUNITY if the opportunity is still in draft, or AMEND NOTICE if it is already active and visible to vendors.

   

3. In the General Information step, you can update the following information:

   • Description
   • Instructions
   • Department/Ind. Agency
   • Division/Sub-Tier
   • Office
   • Type
   • Response Due Date
   • Response Due Date Timezone
   • Question Due Date
   • Question Due Date Timezone

   

   • Note: If the opportunity was created from a solicitation in Award Management (AM) solution, Appian recommends amending the solicitation directly in AM solution. A dialog with link to the solicitation displays in this case. Click VIEW SOLICITATION to amend the solicitation in AM.

     

     Then use the Create Amend Notice in the solicitation summary to reflect the updates to the opportunity.

     

   • Note: For sealed bid opportunities:

     • The Sealed Bid and Opportunity Visibility options cannot be changed once the opportunity is posted.

     • If the bid is unsealed, the date, time, and timezone options for the proposal opening, questions due, and response due fields are disabled.

4. Click NEXT. In the Details step, you can update the following information:

   • NAICS Codes

   • NIGP Codes or PSC Codes

     NOTE: The NIGP codes are applicable for State and Local Government only. The PSC codes are applicable for Federal only.

   • Set Aside Codes
   • Place of Performance

   

5. Click NEXT. In the Attachments step, you can review the uploaded attachments for the opportunity. You can add or remove attachments as needed.

   

6. Click NEXT. In the Required Proposal Documents step, you can review the documents that vendors are required to submit for their proposals. You can add or remove attachments as needed, or update the forms that vendors need to complete.

   

7. Click NEXT. In the Notify Vendors step, define an amendment number and title for the update to the opportunity. You can also enter a more detailed explanation of the update and attach any relevant documents. This step will only appear if the opportunity has already been posted.

   

8. If the opportunity has already been posted, click SAVE & CLOSE. If the opportunity is a draft, you can also click POST to make it visible to vendors.

   Note: We recommend that you create an update to update vendors about any amendments to an active opportunity.

Creating updates

While an opportunity is still in the Draft or Active status, contracting users can create updates that will be posted to the Opportunity Summary view.

To create an update:

1. From the Opportunities list, locate and click the opportunity you want to close to drill down into the Opportunity Summary view.
2. From the Summary view, click + CREATE UPDATE to view the form for creating updates.

3. Enter a Title, Update Type, and Update to convey the message.

   

4. Upload documents to the Attachments field.
5. Click CREATE.

Unsealing a sealed bid

Contracting users can unseal a bid on the designated proposal opening date and time. The option to unseal the proposals is visible only on the designated proposal opening date and time.

To unseal a sealed bid:

1. From the Opportunities list, locate and click the sealed bid opportunity you want to unseal to drill down into the Opportunity Summary view.

2. From the Summary view, in the Vendors section, click UNSEAL PROPOSALS to unseal the vendors proposals.

   

3. View the vendors proposals.

Once the proposals are unsealed, the date and time and by whom the proposals were unsealed is displayed at the top of the Vendors section in the Opportunity Summary page.

Requesting clarification

You can request clarification about proposals from the vendors if the opportunity is a sealed bid.

To request clarification from vendors about their sealed bids:

1. From the Opportunities list, locate and click the opportunity you want to close to drill down into the Opportunity Summary view.

2. From the Summary view, click REQUEST CLARIFICATION.

   

   1. From the Request Proposal Clarification dialog, specify the Clarification Due Date and Timezone. The fields show the next day by default, which can be changed.

      

   2. In the Available Vendors section, select the checkbox associated with the vendors from whom you need clarifications.
   3. Make sure the selected vendors appear in the Selected Vendors section.
   4. Click NEXT.

   5. To post an update on the opportunity to all vendors about the clarification and send email notification to vendors, perform the following sub-steps. To just send email notification to vendors about the clarification, continue with step 2f.

      

      1. Select Yes in the Post Update section.
      2. In the Clarification Details section, enter the Title and Description for the update.
      3. Click UPLOAD to upload any required documents.
      4. Continue with step 2h.
   6. Select No in the Post Update section.
   7. In the Clarification Details section, enter the Title and Description for the clarification email.
   8. Click REQUEST.

   9. From the opportunity Summary tab, notice the status of the vendors submission is changed to Clarification Requested in the Vendors section.

      

Closing an opportunity

If you close an opportunity before it automatically closes on its response due date, you will prevent users from updating the opportunity or vendors from continuing to submit proposals.

To close an opportunity:

1. From the Opportunities list, locate and click the opportunity you want to close to drill down into the Opportunity Summary view.
2. From the Summary view, click CLOSE OPPORTUNITY to view a confirmation message.
3. Confirm that you wish to continue and close the opportunity.

Viewing awards

Vendor Management integrates with Award Management to allow you to see which opportunities have been awarded. From VM, you can see the Awards list, filter and search awards, and drill down into the summary view for more details about an award. Click on the Awards tab to view awards.

Summary view

When you click on an award, you will see award information such as status, duration, vendor, and award documents.

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