If you’re like most of us, you walked into the new year with a list of resolutions. Maybe it’s hitting the gym, reading more, or finally organizing your chaotic Desktop files.

But what about your business resolutions? Specifically, the ones about growing revenue and working smarter?

Every January, sales and proposal teams promise themselves: "This is the year we stop scrambling. This is the year we stop answering RFPs at 11 PM on a Friday."

And yet, by February, the old habits creep back in. The chaotic spreadsheets, the endless email threads, the manual copy-pasting from three-year-old documents.

It doesn’t have to be that way. It’s a new year. It’s time for new RFP automations.

The "Old You" vs. The Automated You

We wrote recently about why you should stop chasing RFPs and let them come to you. That’s step one of the transformation.

The "Old Way" of handling RFPs is reactive. You find an opportunity late, you scramble to assemble a team, and you spend 80% of your time formatting answers and only 20% refining your strategy.

The "New Way" (the automated way) flips that ratio.

With the advancements we’ve seen in AI over the last year, manual proposal writing is becoming a relic.

3 Automations to Adopt in Q1

If you want to actually keep your efficiency resolution this year, here are the three shifts you need to make right now:

1. Automate the Hunt

Stop refreshing government portals and scrolling through endless lists. If you are still manually searching for RFPs, you are already behind. Tools like RFP Hunter (which we launched to help you find matches instantly) ensure you only see the opportunities you can actually win. We have a free version of the tool you can try out here. Reach out if you're interested in us pulling personalized matches for you!

2. Automate the First Draft

The "blank page syndrome" is the biggest killer of momentum. New AI tools don't just "help" you write; they draft the response for you based on your knowledge base. Your job isn't to write from scratch anymore; it's to edit, refine, and add that human strategic layer.

3. Automate the "No-Bid" Decision

We’ve talked about the 5 red flags in an RFP. Automation helps here too. innovative scoring tools can instantly analyze an RFP against your capabilities and tell you statistically if it’s worth your time.

Make This the Year of the 48-Hour Turnaround

Imagine submitting a high-quality, compliant, winning proposal within 48 hours of finding the RFP.

It sounds impossible if you’re stuck in 2024 workflows. But for teams using Proposal Automation Tools, it’s the new baseline.

Don't let Q1 slip away into the same old grind. Upgrade your toolkit, automate the busy work, and focus on what you’re actually good at: winning the business.

Ready to automate your RFP process? Get a free demo of Settle today.