Synergy — Product Design Case Study

Brief

How can we make the proposal-to-contract process as efficient as possible for telecom B2Bs?

The question we were asked was to reimagine the end-to-end proposal journey as one AI-assisted workspace, making manual coordination faster and enabling teams to handle more proposals.

Context

How does the Proposal generation process work?

Since I had never worked at a B2B Sales process, here's a map of how this works, in the simplest terms

THE FLOW OF PROPOSAL-TO-CONTRACT PROCESS

01.

Opportunity Identification

Step 1 Business Need Step 2 RFP Creation Step 3 RFP Publishing

02.

Discovery & Qualification

Step 4 Bid / No Bid Step 5 CRM Opportunity

03.

Solution & Proposal Development

Step 6 Proposal Planning Step 7 Proposal Drafting Step 8 Compliance Review

04.

Review & Approval

Step 9 Executive Approval Step 10 Proposal Submission

05.

Customer Engagement

Step 11 Customer Evaluation Step 12 Negotiation

06.

Contract Execution & Delivery

Step 13 Contract Signing

Dictionary:

RFP: An RFP (Request for Proposal) is a formal document a company or government agency creates to announce a new project and invite outside vendors to bid on doing the work

CRM (Customer Relationship Management): CRM stands for Customer Relationship Management. In simple words, it is a digital address book and organizer that helps a business keep track of all its customers and potential buyers in one place

Here's what we needed to do...

When I first read this problem statement I had chills, because this problem seemed so massive to solve

How might we reduce the 6–12 week proposal-to-contract cycle that proactively support teams through drafting, collaboration, approvals, and contract signing while keeping users in control of critical decisions?

It wasn't going to be easy, but we were ready for the challenge.

To make sense of the problem, we decided to focus on the person at the centre of it all: the Proposal Manager.

Research

So, let's meet Sam, our Proposal Manager.

Imagine you're Sam. Here's how your day is...

Sam Merchant

Bengaluru, India / Senior Bid / Proposal Manager / 10+ Years Experience

Proposal Manager

Daily Actions

Analyse incoming RFPs and qualification criteria.

Create proposal timelines and governance plans.

Coordinate SMEs and cross-functional contributors.

Review technical, commercial, and legal responses.

Consolidate and edit proposal content.

Ensure compliance before final submission.

“I'm constantly juggling actions and tasks only to end up with end minute changes that cancel or delay deals”

User Scenario

Sam owns the complete proposal lifecycle that is from opportunity intake to final submission ensuring every proposal is compliant, persuasive, and delivered on time. Acting as the central coordinator across sales, pre-sales, commercial, legal, finance, marketing, and delivery teams, Sam transforms fragmented inputs into a cohesive proposal that maximises the organisation's chances of winning.

Working in a highly deadline-driven environment, Sam constantly balances speed, quality, compliance, and stakeholder expectations while managing multiple proposals simultaneously. Success is measured by win rate, proposal quality, submission accuracy, revenue impact, and margin protection.

Goal

Deliver compliant, high-quality proposals before every deadline. Coordinate all contributors efficiently and keep the process moving. Improve proposal quality while increasing overall win rate. Protect commercial margins without sacrificing competitiveness. Maintain consistency across proposal structure, messaging, and branding. Reduce manual effort through better collaboration and automation.

Painpoints

Managing too many stakeholders with competing priorities. Constantly chasing contributors for delayed inputs. Manual editing, formatting, and version control consume significant time. Proposal pressure increases dramatically near submission deadlines. Information gets lost between sales, technical, commercial, and legal teams. Balancing speed, compliance, quality, and persuasion creates continuous trade-offs.

Time Saved Currently

Here’s Sam’s journey to making successful deals

Before we started building our solution, we wanted to understand how much time existing AI tools in the market were actually saving.

Sam's Journey Time Saved Analysis Composition

Insight

Based on this we realised even if AI tools existed they made the process fragmented and did not increase efficiency significantly

Interview Insights

After this, we spoke to stakeholders who had used these tools to gain a deeper understanding of their experiences.

We wanted to understand the pain points people faced, both online and offline.

Insight

Proposal managers spend considerable time navigating between disconnected tools instead of focusing on proposal quality.

We checked websites like g2.com to see feedback

Pain Points

Based on all this research we tried to map out all the pain points collectively

We tried to understand what things we needed to do to make this an effective solution

Bid / No-Bid

Pain Point 1

Difficult to judge deal potential vs effort required

Pain Point 2

Misaligned sales and finance decisions create wasted effort or missed opportunities

CRM Opportunity

Pain Point 1

Manual updates create inaccurate, incomplete CRM data

Pain Point 2

Poor visibility affects ownership and forecasting

Proposal Planning

Pain Point 1

Finding the right SMEs and assigning ownership is difficult

Pain Point 2

Delayed inputs slow down the entire proposal timeline

Proposal Drafting

Pain Point 1

Teams waste time finding relevant content and versions

Pain Point 2

Multiple contributors reduce consistency and accuracy

Executive Approval

Pain Point 1

Senior stakeholders enter too late in the process

Pain Point 2

Multiple approval cycles delay final submission

Proposal Submission

Pain Point 1

Last-minute checks create deadline pressure

Pain Point 2

Missing files or incorrect formats risk submission failure

Negotiation

Pain Point 1

Changes trigger repeated internal approvals

Pain Point 2

Sales, finance, and legal priorities often conflict

Contract Signing

Pain Point 1

Final terms and responsibilities may not transfer clearly

Pain Point 2

Missed clauses create future delivery and payment risks

Solution Statement

“An end-to-end AI co-pilot for bid managers, unifying opportunity intake, drafting, compliance, negotiation and signature into one governed workflow.”

Solution

Introducing Synergy

An adaptive AI workspace built around the way Sam actually works.
Synergy connects the proposal journey from opportunity identification to contract signing, bringing the right information, people and AI agents into the workflow when they're needed.

Solution

Information Architecture

We mapped Sam's journey from opportunity to contract and grouped his scattered tasks into a few focused workspaces. Instead of replicating the tools he already uses, the IA follows how he actually works, with the Dashboard acting as the central entry point and the workflow branching naturally after proposal submission.

Solution

How Synergy adapts to Sam's workflow

Now, let's walk through the proposal process with Sam and see how Synergy supports him at each step.

Solution

Let's start with the Dashboard

Sam identifies and qualifies a new opportunity, reviews its potential, requirements and risks, and decides whether to pursue it. The opportunity is then structured in the CRM with key deal information and ownership. Sam builds the proposal team by assigning relevant SMEs, sends them the RFP, and brings their inputs together with relevant existing content to build the proposal.

ACTION PAIN POINTS RESOLVED

AI Identifies Opportunity for Sam

Sam Reviews Opportunity and compatibility

AI updates CRM which Sam approves

AI Finds SMEs from Past project and selects team

Sam Approves and Sends RFP

Need to manually look for opportunities via email

No need to route the RFP through various tools to analyse

Manual CRM updates + poor visibility

Finding the right SMEs and assigning ownership

Delayed inputs slow down the proposal timeline

Solution

RFP Preparation

Teams contribute their inputs while relevant content and previous proposals are brought together to build the response.

ACTION PAIN POINTS RESOLVED

AI identifies questions that need input from different teams

Sam reviews and selects the questions to raise

AI sends questions to the relevant teams and collects responses

Sam reviews and approves SME inputs

AI consolidates inputs for proposal drafting

Manually identifying required teams

Tracking questions and responses

Delayed SME inputs

Manually consolidating inputs

Missing or incomplete responses

RFP Preparation Video Slot

Solution

Proposal Planning

Teams contribute their inputs while relevant content and previous proposals are brought together to build the response.

ACTION PAIN POINTS RESOLVED

AI recommends relevant past proposals and templates

Sam generates custom visual for proposal

AI generates the proposal draft across key sections

AI checks content, brand, and technical alignment

AI identifies missing requirements and suggests fixes

Searching past proposals for content

Structuring proposals from scratch

Manual drafting and formatting

Checking quality and RFP alignment

Missing technical requirements

Solution

Executive Approval

Teams contribute their inputs while relevant content and previous proposals are brought together to build the response.

ACTION PAIN POINTS RESOLVED

Sam opens the completed proposal

AI sends the proposal for executive review

Executive receives a review request with an auto-reminder

Executive reviews and approves the proposal

Sam shares the approved proposal for submission

Senior stakeholders enter too late in the process

Multiple approval cycles delay submission

Solution

Negotiation

Teams contribute their inputs while relevant content and previous proposals are brought together to build the response.

ACTION PAIN POINTS RESOLVED

Sam starts a live negotiation session

AI captures the client's position and compares it

AI identifies negotiation risks and recommends a counter

Sam approves the suggested counter

AI updates the pricing and commercial terms

Changes trigger repeated internal approvals

Sales, finance, and legal priorities often conflict

Final terms and responsibilities may not transfer clearly

Solution

Contract Generation

Teams contribute their inputs while relevant content and previous proposals are brought together to build the response.

ACTION PAIN POINTS RESOLVED

Sam opens the negotiated proposal

AI drafts the contract from agreed terms

Sam requests a commercial change

AI updates and highlights the change

Sam approves and reviews the final version

Repeated contract approvals

Missed clauses & risks

Solution

Contract Signing

Teams contribute their inputs while relevant content and previous proposals are brought together to build the response.

ACTION PAIN POINTS RESOLVED

Sam reviews the final contract

Sam checks the required signatories

AI tracks signing status

AI drafts and sends the signing email

Sam monitors pending signatures

Repeated follow-ups with signatories

Missed clauses & signing risks

Learnings

AI needs context to be useful.

I learned that good AI experiences depend on giving AI the right information, not just adding AI to an existing workflow.

Research changed the direction of the product.

Talking to stakeholders helped me move beyond assumptions and design around real workflow pain points.

Good IA can make complex systems feel simple.

Mapping the journey first helped me turn a fragmented, multi-tool process into one connected experience.

The goal isn't to automate everything.

The most valuable opportunities were often about reducing coordination, searching and follow-ups while keeping Sam in control.