Send Me a Proposal: A Scored Late-Stage Drill

What do you say when a buyer says send me a proposal?

Agree to the proposal and decline to write it blind. Your agreed first response does three things, in order: it confirms what the proposal must show for the buyer to decide, it confirms how the decision gets made and who takes part, and it books a live review with those people before anything is written.

A proposal is a decision document, so write it only after you know the decision it must support.

Hold the order. Ask about criteria first, because the answer decides what the proposal contains. Ask about process second, because the answer names who must be in the room. Ask for the booking last, so the buyer has already given you the reason for the meeting in their own words.

The failing version is short and polite: "Sure, I'll have it over by Friday." Read the transcript afterwards and it shows a self-imposed deadline, no criteria, no named decision-makers, and no meeting on the calendar. We score that line as a fail regardless of how well the rest of the call went.

How is a late-stage request different from send me information?

It comes after discovery, so the rep can ask about the decision directly. Our Send Me Information drill covers the early brush-off, where the rep has not yet earned a discovery conversation and the first response works to earn one.

Before you run this drill, check that the rep has the buyer's problem, a named contact, and notes from earlier calls on the deal. Then have them use all of it. Do not go back to opening discovery questions; reference what the buyer said and move to the decision. A line that works: "You said the month-end reporting delays are the problem to solve. Before I write anything, what does the proposal need to show to fix that, as far as you're concerned?"

Treat an early information request as a reason to earn discovery and a late proposal request as a reason to confirm the decision.

If your rep cannot reference anything specific from discovery when the request comes, this drill is the wrong next step. The discovery stage did not meet its exit criteria, and that is the gap to coach first.

The agreed first response, line by line

The booking step is a Sandler up-front contract: a mutual agreement, set before the review meeting, covering its purpose, its time, both parties' agendas, and the acceptable outcomes, including no. The call where the buyer asks for the proposal is where you set the contract; the review is the conversation it governs. Our up-front contract guide drills the structure on its own.

These are the four lines we recommend your team agrees on. The wording flexes; the sequence does not.

1. Acknowledge. "Happy to put one together." No send date.

2. Criteria. "So it isn't a guess, what does the proposal need to show for you to make a yes-or-no call?"

3. Process. "And once you have it, what happens next? Who else weighs in, and how do they decide?"

4. Contract. "Rather than email a PDF, let's book time with you and [names]. How long can you all give it? I'll walk through how it meets the points you just gave me, and you all bring your questions. At the end, either it fits and we agree next steps, or it doesn't and you tell me no. Either is a fine outcome. Does that work?"

Check line 4 against the definition. Purpose: a walkthrough against the buyer's stated criteria. Time: agreed with the buyer in the same breath. Agendas: the rep's walkthrough and the attendees' questions. Outcomes: agreed next steps or a clear no.

A booking that leaves out the no is a calendar invite, not an up-front contract.

Why book the review before writing anything?

Because late-stage exit criteria should rest on buyer-verified evidence, and a booked review with named attendees is something the buyer agreed to. A promised PDF is something the rep agreed to.

Gate the late stage on what the buyer agreed to, not on what the rep promised to send.

There is a practical reason too. Write a proposal before the decision criteria are confirmed and you are guessing at what to include. If the buyer will not commit to a review, you learn that before anyone writes a document, and you can mark the deal accordingly in the forecast.

The approach has a trade-off, and we name it plainly. If the buyer tells you their process requires a written submission with no meeting, accept it in the live deal. Write the proposal against the criteria and process they gave you, and ask for a call after they have read it. Lines 2 and 3 still did their job. Keep that case out of the scored drill below: brief every buyer persona so a review can be booked when the rep sets the contract correctly. If you want to rehearse a true no-meeting process, run it as a separate scenario scored on the first three rubric rows, and tell the rep before the attempt. Rehearse all of this in scored practice first; we consider a live late-stage deal the most expensive place to discover a rep cannot hold the line.

Rehearsing the pushback branches

The fair objection to an agreed first response is that strong reps sound canned with one. We take it seriously. A response recited word for word, with no reference to anything the buyer said, fails the criteria row in our rubric. What the team agrees on is the sequence and the intent; strong reps improvise the wording and the branches from understanding.

Agree on the sequence and intent of the first response, and let strong reps flex the wording inside it.

Drill three branches after the first response. Buyer: "Just send it, we'll review it internally." Rep: "Understood. Who's in that internal review? I'd like to join it: you raise the questions, I answer them against the points you gave me. How long can you give it? If the answer is no, I'd rather hear it there than wait on email." Buyer: "I can't get everyone on one call." Rep: "Then let's start with you and [name]. Who would be hardest to convince, and what would they need to see? I'll build the review around that, and either it holds up or you tell me no." Buyer: "We only need pricing to compare." Rep: "I'll include pricing. To compare like for like, what are you comparing it against, and on which criteria?"

When the buyer repeats the same pushback after your first branch, switch to the second-response drill rather than restating line 4 more firmly.

What does a passing transcript show?

All five rubric rows below, in the transcript, in order. Each row is an observable behavior, so a manager who was not on the call can grade it from the text alone.

Pass the rep only when all five rows show in the transcript; four of five is a fail and a re-run.

Read results per rep per scenario. A rep who passes the cooperative buyer and fails the "just send it" branch has a different coaching need from one who fails both, and a blended score hides the difference. Check talk/listen ratio as a diagnostic: if the rep did most of the talking, look at whether they let the buyer answer line 2. It is an input to investigate, not a pass bar. On XL Roleplay, flags in the report link back to the exact moment in the transcript, so you can check each row without replaying the session.

The drill to run this week

We recommend running it in your weekly practice block, kept separate from pipeline review. Spend about 10 minutes beforehand picking a live deal where a proposal request is likely and choosing the rubric row you will coach. The run itself is 30 minutes: 5 setup, 15 drill, 10 debrief.

Setup (5 minutes). Give the rep a three-line discovery summary from the real deal. The buyer, played by a peer, a manager, or an AI persona, opens with: "This looks good. Send me a proposal." Brief the buyer to agree to a review only when the rep states its purpose, settles the time, names the attendees, and says no is an acceptable outcome. Drill (15 minutes). Three attempts of about four minutes each: a cooperative buyer, then the "just send it" branch, then the "can't get everyone" branch. Record and transcribe every attempt.

Pass bar. All five rubric rows in the transcript, in order, on all three attempts. A failing attempt sounds like "Sure, I'll have it over by Friday." The subtler fail: "What format works best for you? I'll send a draft Friday and we can hop on a call if questions come up." It asks a question, but about format, and it leaves the meeting optional.

Debrief (10 minutes). Pick one moment and one behavior. Ask the rep first: "Play back the moment right after the buyer asked. What did you commit to before you asked anything?" Let them name it before you do, then book the re-run on the calendar within the week. Our debrief guide has the full script. A failed attempt earns one debrief on one behavior and a scheduled re-run, not a list of notes.