Architecture and design practices
Use an RFQ or SOQ that depends on comparable projects, principal experience, team composition, and a tightly edited qualifications narrative.
Choose proposal software for the work your team actually does.
The right AEC proposal software depends on where your pursuit process breaks down. A writing tool helps produce text. A content library helps reuse answers. Credentials and asset systems organize people, projects, and images. A proposal pursuit system connects requirements, firm proof, expert input, content, and approval. Evaluate the work that remains with your team after the software produces its first output.
Compare the categories
Start with the bottleneck.
AEC firms often need more than one system. A proposal response, a project résumé, a fee estimate, and a sales pipeline are different outputs. Start by deciding which work you need the software to carry.
| Category | Useful when you need | Check before you buy |
|---|---|---|
| AI writing assistant | Help outlining, rewriting, or producing an initial draft. | Who verifies the claims, reconciles sections, and manages the remaining response work? |
| Response library and RFP software | Reuse approved answers and coordinate repeatable questionnaire responses. | Can it connect a new project’s requirements to experience and expert judgment beyond a stored answer? |
| Credentials and digital asset management | Find and assemble CVs, project sheets, qualifications, and imagery. | Does it manage the pursuit around those assets, or supply material to another process? |
| AEC CRM and project ERP | Maintain client relationships, pipeline, project records, and commercial information. | Where do detailed requirements, response evidence, reviews, and submission decisions live? |
| Proposal pursuit system | Connect qualification, requirements, evidence, experts, content, and approval. | Does the system keep the connected work moving, with a clear place for human decisions? |
RFP, RFQ, SOQ, and SF 330
One pursuit system. All four response types.
Propagent supports RFP, RFQ, SOQ, and SF 330 responses equally. Requirements analysis, project and team evidence, expert coordination, drafting, and review support all four submission types.
| Submission | What the response needs to make clear |
|---|---|
| RFP · Request for proposal | The proposed approach, delivery team, relevant experience, and answers to the stated requirements and evaluation criteria. |
| RFQ · Request for qualifications | Why the firm and proposed team are qualified, supported by relevant projects, roles, and credentials. |
| SOQ · Statement of qualifications | A coherent account of the firm’s experience and team, tailored to the opportunity and submission instructions. |
| SF 330 · Architect-engineer qualifications | Firm, team, résumé, and project qualifications organized for the required SF 330 submission. |
Customer results
From first draft to the shortlist.
In a municipal design-build pursuit, a team received an initial draft in 30 minutes compared with its five-day drafting process. The team fully or partly implemented 29 of 40 Propagent recommendations in later drafts. The team was shortlisted.
| Buying decision | Result from this engagement |
|---|---|
| How quickly can the team reach a first draft? | 30 minutes compared with the team’s five-day drafting process. Research, evidence preparation, and later reviews were separate. |
| Does the review lead to useful revisions? | 29 of 40 assessable recommendations implemented in later drafts — 14 fully and 15 partly. |
| Did the qualifications response advance? | The team was shortlisted. The case covers the qualifications submission and shortlisting. |
What to evaluate
Ask for the work product, not a feature checkmark.
Use the same opportunity and source materials in each evaluation. The useful comparison is what the team receives, what remains unresolved, and how much coordination the proposal owner still supplies.
| Test | Ask to see | What a useful result looks like |
|---|---|---|
| Qualification | An opportunity with a real capacity or experience gap. | The gap, supporting evidence, open decision, and accountable leader are visible. |
| RFP, RFQ, SOQ, and SF 330 fit | Your actual submission structure, forms, page limits, and evaluation criteria. | The response plan follows that procurement instead of forcing it into a generic questionnaire. |
| Compliance and addenda | One changed instruction after the response has started. | The team can trace the change to its source and identify affected response work. |
| Projects and people | A requirement for comparable experience or a named team role. | The candidate evidence explains relevance, source, and anything that needs confirmation. |
| Expert coordination | A question the existing documents cannot answer. | The expert receives a focused request with context; the response owner can see what is still open. |
| Drafting and review | A draft with a weak claim and a conflicting staffing statement. | Review reveals the support and contradiction; the team can revise and approve the response. |
| Operational memory | An approved correction reused in another pursuit. | The team can distinguish approved context from an old, unreviewed passage. |
| Systems and access | The actual source-to-response path using your working environment. | You know which steps are native connections, file transfers, manual work, or custom setup. |
| Security and control | The data flow, access model, retention terms, and export process. | Your IT and procurement team can verify the terms that govern your firm’s information. |
Fit to your firm
Use a pursuit that exposes your real constraints.
Engineering and infrastructure firms
Test technical approach, discipline-specific expertise, project roles, capacity, and the evidence behind past-performance claims.
Construction and design-build teams
Use a formal pursuit with delivery approach, phasing, safety, staffing, partner input, and submission requirements. Test estimating separately when it is part of the purchase.
Small teams and multi-office firms
Small teams need less setup and fewer handoffs. Multi-office firms also need clear ownership, access boundaries, and a way to distinguish current expertise from old records.
A practical evaluation
Run the pursuit past the first draft.
Use a shareable RFQ, approved project sheets, a team résumé, and a prior response. Compare the work produced and the work left with your team.
- 01
Use the same source packet
Ask each vendor to select relevant evidence, identify what is missing, and develop the same response section. Check why each project and person was selected.
- 02
Introduce a change
Make the proposed project manager unavailable. Follow the effect through qualification, the team résumé, response content, and approval.
- 03
Inspect the handoff
Ask who resolves the open questions, what the reviewer can verify, and which approved knowledge carries into the next pursuit. Record the coordination and revision work still left with your team.
Where Propagent fits
The next generation of proposal pursuit management.
Previous-generation tools help find material or produce a draft while the team still selects the proof, chases answers, and reconciles revisions. Propagent is built to carry that connected work from qualification through response review.
In the fictional stormwater worked example below, the difference is the connection between project selection, role confirmation, capacity, and the case presented to the county. Propagent’s five differentiators—Measurable Quality, Meaningful Search, Polished Content, Dynamic Workflow, and Continuous Improvement—describe that operating shift. Your team retains strategy, expertise, and final approval.
Your systems and budget
Keep your records. Connect the pursuit.
Propagent has a built connector for OpenAsset, integration accelerators for Deltek and Unanet, and connections to OneDrive, SharePoint, Google Drive, Gmail, and Outlook. Your implementation defines which records and workflows are connected.
Propagent costs $1,000/month for up to 25 annual responses, $2,000/month for up to 50, and $5,000/month for up to 200, with custom Enterprise pricing. Every tier includes the full workflow. Pricing scales with response volume, not seat counts; larger-volume clients receive more hands-on time from our team.
Propagent publishes this guide from its proposal-pursuit perspective. Use the same buying criteria to evaluate Propagent and other options.
| Workflow | Formats |
|---|---|
| Input | PDF, DOCX, XLSX, TXT, and Markdown (MD) |
| Output | PDF, DOCX, XLSX, TXT, Markdown (MD), LaTeX, and IDML for Adobe InDesign |
A pursuit in practice
Follow the evidence into the response.
Authored fictional example, not a live product capture or customer result.
A county is selecting an engineering team for stormwater improvements along existing roads. Its fictional RFQ requires three comparable projects completed within five years, the proposed manager’s responsibilities and availability, and an approach to drainage design around existing utilities and access constraints.
1. Select the relevant project evidence
Hickory Lane and Westgate match the existing-road constraints. Cedar Run needs its closeout record before it can complete the three-project set. The larger Eastfield project is greenfield work and makes a less direct case for this assignment.
2. Resolve the question the résumé cannot answer
Maya is listed on Hickory Lane, but the project sheet does not explain her responsibilities. The focused question to the project principal is
On Hickory Lane, which drainage-design activities did Maya personally lead, and which responsibilities remained with the project principal? Confirm the wording we can use in her pursuit résumé.
The principal confirms she led drainage design, utility-conflict review, and access-phasing drawings. Overall project management remained with the principal. A separate practice-leader confirmation establishes availability.
3. Draft the case with traceable support
Hickory Lane, Westgate, and Cedar Run each involved drainage improvements within existing road corridors. Across these projects, our team addressed utility conflicts, drainage tie-ins, and property-access constraints relevant to your assignment.
At Hickory Lane, proposed project manager Maya Chen served as drainage design lead, coordinating the utility-conflict review and developing access-phasing drawings. For your assignment, we propose an early review of drainage tie-ins, utility conflicts, and access requirements with county staff before advancing the design.
The proposed early county review is an approved approach, not a claimed past result. The pursuit owner reviews the assembled response before submission.
4. Reopen the affected work when an addendum arrives
Addendum 1 replaces Team Form A with Rev 1 and adds an availability field. The role and capacity answers still hold, but the team must carry availability into the revised form, replace the old attachment, and check the addendum acknowledgment. Those checks remain open until reviewed.
Read the fictional addendum · Inspect the affected matrix rows
Project records and expert confirmations
- R1 · County RFQ · sections 3.2–3.4
- A county is selecting an engineering team for stormwater improvements along existing roads. Its fictional RFQ requires three comparable projects completed within five years, the proposed manager’s responsibilities and availability, and an approach to drainage design around existing utilities and access constraints.
- P1 · Hickory Lane drainage improvements · 2023 project sheet
- Completed drainage design along an existing neighborhood road. The firm designed replacement storm drains and inlets, coordinated utility conflicts, and developed construction phasing to maintain driveway access. Maya Chen is listed on the team, but her responsibilities are not recorded.
- P2 · Westgate culvert replacement · 2024 project sheet
- Completed culvert replacement design beneath an existing county road. The firm coordinated utility crossings, temporary traffic arrangements, and drainage tie-ins. The approved project sheet and client reference are available.
- P3 · Cedar Run drainage retrofit · 2022 closeout record
- Completed drainage retrofit design within an existing road corridor, including utility coordination and property-access constraints. At initial qualification, this record is still with the project lead; the proposal library contains only a short project listing.
- P4 · Eastfield development · 2024 project sheet
- A larger greenfield subdivision drainage project. It demonstrates drainage design experience, but not work around an operating road’s existing utilities and access constraints.
- E1 · Hickory Lane project principal · confirmed role
- Maya was drainage design lead. She coordinated the utility-conflict review and developed the access-phasing drawings. The principal retained overall project management. Maya’s pursuit résumé is updated to describe that role accurately.
- C1 · Practice leader · capacity confirmation
- The practice leader confirms Maya’s availability for the anticipated assignment after reviewing her existing commitments. Any change to the assignment schedule requires a fresh capacity check.
- D1 · Pursuit principal · approved direction
- After P3, E1, and C1 are confirmed, approve the pursuit using Hickory Lane, Westgate, and Cedar Run. Lead with existing-road constraints, not contract size. Propose an early review of drainage tie-ins, utility conflicts, and access requirements with the county. The final statement of qualifications still requires review and approval.
RFQ and addendum excerpts
- RFQ §2.1 · Submission instructions
- Submit the statement of qualifications with Team Form A. Acknowledge each issued addendum.
- RFQ §3.2 · Mandatory experience
- Provide three comparable projects completed within the past five years. State completion year, scope, and the firm’s responsibilities for each project.
- RFQ §3.3 · Mandatory team information
- Name the proposed project manager, describe relevant responsibilities on prior projects, and confirm availability for the anticipated assignment.
- RFQ §3.4 · Required and scored technical approach
- Describe the approach to drainage design along existing roads, including utility conflicts and maintaining property access. Evaluation considers how well the approach addresses these constraints.
- Addendum 1 §1 · Revised team form
- Replace Team Form A with Team Form A (Rev 1), which adds a field for the proposed project manager’s availability. The requirements in §3.3 remain unchanged.
- Addendum 1 §2 · Acknowledgment
- Acknowledge Addendum 1 in the submission checklist. All other instructions remain unchanged.
Common buying questions
What is the best proposal software for an AEC firm?
The best fit depends on the work the firm needs to improve. Evaluate credentials, requirements, evidence, expert coordination, review, and approval using one of your own pursuits. A system that produces a good first draft can still leave substantial work with the team.
How is AEC proposal software different from estimating software?
Proposal software supports the qualifications, approach, evidence, and response process for winning work. Estimating software supports quantities, costs, and pricing. A formal construction pursuit may use both; verify each part of the workflow separately.
Does Propagent support RFP, RFQ, SOQ, and SF 330 responses?
Propagent supports RFP, RFQ, SOQ, and SF 330 responses equally. Requirements analysis, project and team evidence, expert coordination, drafting, and review support all four submission types.
Can Propagent work alongside a firm’s existing systems?
Propagent has a built connector for OpenAsset, integration accelerators for Deltek and Unanet, and connections to OneDrive, SharePoint, Google Drive, Gmail, and Outlook. Your implementation defines which records and workflows are connected.
How much does Propagent’s AEC proposal software cost?
Propagent costs $1,000/month for up to 25 annual responses, $2,000/month for up to 50, and $5,000/month for up to 200, with custom Enterprise pricing. Every tier includes the full workflow. Pricing scales with response volume, not seat counts; larger-volume clients receive more hands-on time from our team.
Can Propagent export to Adobe InDesign?
Yes. Propagent supports IDML for Adobe InDesign. Its full output formats are PDF, DOCX, XLSX, TXT, Markdown (MD), LaTeX, and IDML for Adobe InDesign.
See the difference on your next pursuit
Bring an RFP, RFQ, SOQ, or SF 330 pursuit to a Propagent demonstration.