Bid Manager - Proposal & Pursuit

At Symbos, we help organisations build smarter, more connected customer operations through a blend of people, process, technology and AI-enabled capability.

We support clients across Australia, New Zealand and international markets, bringing together customer experience, contact centres, business process outsourcing, digital consulting, managed services, workforce management, learning and development, and collections and recoveries expertise.

We are looking for a Bid Manager who can bring structure, rigour and strong commercial storytelling to complex opportunities. This role is ideal for someone who understands that a winning proposal is not just well written. It is well led, well governed and aligned to what the evaluator needs to see.

As Bid Manager, you will own the pursuit lifecycle from qualification through to submission, shortlist presentation and post-bid review.

You will lead the response process end to end, including Go or No-Go assessment, pursuit planning, compliance matrix development, response strategy, writing, editing, review gates, executive checkpoints and final lodgement.

This is a senior, hands-on role for someone who can turn complex operational and commercial input into a persuasive, client-focused case. You will be expected to challenge weak assumptions, keep contributors aligned to firm deadlines and ensure every submission meets the required standard before it reaches the client.

What Sets This Role Apart

• End-to-end ownership of complex bids, from qualification through to final submission and shortlist presentation

• Genuine authority over the pursuit process, response quality and release standard

• Exposure to executive decision making on live opportunities

• The opportunity to shape how Symbos builds, governs and improves its proposal capability

• A visible role working across operations, commercial, legal, technology, marketing and executive teams

• The chance to build reusable proposal assets, case studies, templates and content libraries that improve speed, quality and consistency over time

Key Responsibilities

• Own the pursuit lifecycle for assigned opportunities, including Go or No-Go assessment, pursuit schedule, kick-off, governance cadence, review gates and executive checkpoints

• Define win themes against evaluation criteria and develop the compliance matrix, response outline and proposal structure

• Write and edit persuasive, evaluator-focused content, including executive summaries, solution narratives and client-facing responses

• Convert input from subject matter experts into clear, customer-focused language that answers the question, evidences the claim and states the benefit

• Coordinate operations, workforce management, quality, technology and transformation input into a coherent solution narrative

• Work with Commercial, Finance and Legal to ensure pricing, delivery assumptions and the written response are aligned

• Direct senior contributors across multiple functions and time zones without formal authority

• Brief executive sponsors with clear asks, honest risk assessments and practical actions to improve win probability

• Manage design input so proposal documents and presentations communicate strongly, visually and textually

• Produce shortlist presentations, site visit materials, negotiation packs and rehearsal materials

• Own quality control, tender portal management, clarifications, addenda and compliant lodgement with a time buffer

• Build and govern the proposal knowledge library, including templates, case studies, credentials, reusable answer sets and version control

• Run post-bid reviews, secure client debriefs where possible and report win and loss patterns to the executive

What We're Looking For

• Five or more years experience in proposal, bid or pursuit management

• At least two years experience leading complex bids end to end as the accountable lead

• Experience in contact centre, business process outsourcing, customer experience, managed services or professional services environments

• Strong understanding of operating models, workforce management, quality, transition and customer operations language

• Experience with multi-million dollar, multi-year outsourcing, managed services or professional services bids

• Experience responding to Australian or New Zealand tenders, ideally across government, utilities, financial services or regulated sectors

• Strong persuasive writing skills, with the ability to produce evaluator-focused executive summaries and winning responses

• Proven ability to manage senior stakeholders, executives and specialists across functions and time zones

• Experience maintaining proposal content libraries, templates and reusable answer sets

• Advanced Microsoft Word and PowerPoint skills, with strong Excel and SharePoint capability

• Confidence managing tender portals, clarifications and compliant lodgement processes

Nice to Have

• APMP certification at Practitioner or Professional level

• Formal Shipley training

• Experience working from the Philippines while supporting Australia, New Zealand or other offshore markets

• Design literacy, including the ability to produce or amend graphics and brief designers with precision

• Experience supporting bids across customer experience, digital consulting, collections, recoveries or transformation services

Who This Role Suits

This role suits someone who brings commercial judgement, calm execution and an evaluator's eye to every pursuit.

You are likely to enjoy this role if you can bring order to ambiguity, hold senior contributors to deadlines, challenge weak content constructively and stay composed during the final 48 hours of a submission.

You care about quality, but you are also practical. You know when to push, when to simplify and when to escalate. You are comfortable being the person who protects the standard, even when timelines are tight.

Application Process

If this sounds like the right next step for you, we would love to hear from you.

Please apply with your updated CV and, where available, examples of proposal, bid or executive summary work that demonstrate your ability to translate complex information into clear, persuasive and client-focused content.

Shortlisted candidates will be contacted for an initial conversation with our Talent Acquisition team, followed by further discussions with the hiring team.