For years, proposal teams were treated as a downstream function. Important, yes, but rarely strategic. That era is over.
The
10th Annual State of the Industry Benchmark Report marks a turning point. Over a decade of data now tells a consistent story: proposal work has moved from the periphery of the organization to the center of the revenue engine. What once looked like operational execution now directly shapes how much revenue organizations can realistically pursue and win.
Based on insights from nearly 300 proposal, sales, and revenue leaders, this year’s benchmark shows a profession under sustained pressure, but also at a clear inflection point.
Volume Isn’t Spiking. It’s Compounding.
One of the strongest signals in this year’s data is how proposal demand is growing.
Teams are no longer dealing with one-off surges or temporary spikes. Instead, they are navigating steady, compounding volume. More proposals. More RFPs. More coordination. Month after month.
In fact, 68% of respondents report year-over-year increases in proposal volume, and 63% report higher RFP response volume.
On paper, incremental growth can look manageable. In practice, those increments accumulate quickly when each response requires days of work and input from multiple contributors.
Proposal work now stretches across the organization, touching sales, SMEs, finance, legal, leadership, and delivery teams. Responding well is no longer about writing faster. It’s all about orchestrating complexity, comprehensively and widely.
Revenue Is Flowing Through Proposals
As volume grows, so does financial exposure. The report shows that a meaningful share of both new and existing business revenue now depends on formal proposals and RFPs. For many organizations, proposals do not just influence wins; they determine which revenue opportunities even reach the decision stage.
That dependency raises the stakes. When proposal teams cannot respond in time, or cannot respond at all, organizations do not just lose efficiency. They remove themselves from revenue decisions entirely.
With typical RFP volumes of five to nine requests per month and the largest percentage of opportunity sizes ranging from $1 to $5 million, missing even a small percentage of opportunities can translate into millions in exposed annual revenue. Capacity gaps are no longer abstract operational issues. They are measurable business risks.
Time, Not Intent, Is the Limiting Factor
Proposal teams are, quite frankly, overloaded. Our research tells us that more than half of respondents say completing an average request takes six to ten days, and 56% involve between six and fifteen contributors per response. At that scale, coordination becomes very difficult indeed. Dependencies multiply and any small delays ripple across the entire response.
As volume rises, teams hit a hard ceiling. Not because they lack skill or motivation, but because coordination, not writing, becomes the bottleneck.
This helps explain why so many organizations report being unable to respond to every opportunity they receive. The work is there. The revenue is there. The capacity is not.
Tools Are Working…Just Not Together
Most organizations haven’t stood still. They’ve invested in tools. But the data shows a mismatch between today’s proposal demands and yesterday’s toolsets. General-purpose productivity software still carries most of the load, even as response teams grow larger and more distributed.
The result is a familiar pattern:
- Content exists, but it’s scattered.
- Files move, but ownership is unclear.
- Collaboration happens, but it’s manual and fragile.
Instead of eliminating friction, tools often just shift it elsewhere, from writing to chasing inputs, from creating content to locating, organizing and updating it.
This fragmentation helps explain why long-standing challenges persist, even in organizations with experienced teams and modern tech stacks.
AI Is Already Here and It’s Changing the Work
If there is one area where the report shows real momentum, it is artificial intelligence.
AI is no longer experimental in proposal environments. Nearly three-quarters of respondents use AI for researching and summarizing information, while 63% rely on it to help answer RFP questions. Drafting, quality checks, and content reuse are now routine AI-supported tasks.
The benefits are tangible. Teams report faster drafting, better use of staff time, higher throughput, and more room for personalization.
At the same time, most organizations are still early in their maturity. Forty-three percent say only 25–49% of their proposal process is automated today. AI accelerates execution, but it has not yet fully reshaped how teams decide what to pursue, how they coordinate contributors, or how they measure effectiveness.
That gap defines the current moment.
Proving Value Is Now Mandatory. Measuring It Is Not.
Another striking signal from the data is the near-universal expectation to demonstrate value.
Almost 90% of respondents say including ROI or business cases is now an important part of their proposal process. Buyers want justification. They want outcomes. They want proof.
Yet many teams lack clear visibility into what actually drives success. Which messages resonate? Which content influences decisions? Which approaches improve win rates?
This creates a growing disconnect. Proposal teams are expected to quantify value externally while struggling to measure effectiveness internally. As proposal work becomes more central to growth strategies, that gap becomes harder to sustain.
The Inflection Point Is Clear
Taken together, the findings point to a profession in transition. Proposal teams are handling more volume, coordinating more people, managing higher-value opportunities, and operating under tighter timelines than ever before.
Technology adoption is widespread. AI is delivering meaningful gains. But most organizations are still early in turning these tools into fully integrated systems.
The next phase won’t be defined by speed alone. It will be defined by visibility, coordination, and the ability to link effort to outcomes. Companies need to know not just that teams are working harder or faster, but that they’re working on the right opportunities, in the right way, with measurable impact.
Want the Full Picture?
- Proposal and RFP volume trends by industry
- Opportunity size and revenue exposure
- Win rates for new and existing business
- Where proposal processes break down
- How AI value shows up differently across sectors
- What proposal leaders expect technology to change next
If proposals play any role in how your organization wins business, this data isn’t optional reading, it’s strategic context!
Download the full benchmark report to see how your organization compares and where the real leverage lies as we head into 2026.