Evaluation criteria define how proposals will be assessed. In federal RFPs, Section M lists the factors, subfactors, and their
relative importance—commonly technical, past performance, and price/cost. Methods include best value tradeoff or lowest-price
technically acceptable (LPTA). Proposals must address each factor explicitly and provide evidence that aligns with scoring
considerations. Evaluators typically use adjectival, color, or numerical ratings to judge merit and risk. Understanding Section M
early enables proposal teams to shape outlines, allocate page real estate, and emphasize discriminators. During debriefs, agencies
tie results back to Section M, providing insight for continuous improvement. Ignoring or downplaying Section M is a frequent cause
of poor scores even when the technical solution is sound.
Evaluation Criteria (Section M)
Standards and factors used by the buyer to assess proposals and make award decisions.
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Thirty to forty questions. Sometimes a hundred. Capabilities, features, integrations, data handling, FAR and DFARS compliance, export controls, FedRAMP, CMMC, NIST. Almost every answer already exists somewhere in your organisation, written well, reviewed, and approved. The work is not thinking. The work is finding the good version of an answer you have written eleven times before, and rewriting it to fit the way this buyer asked the question.
An independent 3PAO auditor and VisibleThread founders explain CMMC, FedRAMP, and compliance deployment options for federal contractors.
Layer on Davis-Bacon wage provisions, DBE and MBE participation goals, Buy America requirements on federally funded infrastructure, and CUI handling on defense installations, and the document burden bears no resemblance to a commercial RFP. Most proposal software was built to answer questionnaires. AEC teams must dissect solicitations, demonstrate compliance, and carry commitments into delivery.
Related Glossary Terms
The official compilation of permanent U.S. federal laws, providing the statutory basis for many contracting requirements.
A global classification system used to categorize products and services for procurement and spend analysis.
A unique 12-character identifier assigned via SAM.gov to organizations doing business with the federal government, replacing the DUNS number.
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