The RFP Strain Nobody Talks About
Picture this: your team is burning the midnight oil, chasing multiple subject-matter experts via email, copy-pasting answers across documents, and still racing against a looming RFP deadline. It’s quiet, intense, and rarely discussed. The emotional tax of RFPs isn't measured by lost deals alone; it’s paid in fatigue, frustration, and disengagement.
The truth is that RFPs aren’t just a process problem - they’re a people problem. And unless leaders address the human side, burnout will continue to drag down both morale and win rates. But there’s good news: modern automation - especially AI - doesn’t just speed up proposals. It gives people back their sanity.
The Reality of Proposal Burnout
Burnout isn’t just about long hours. It’s the invisible drain from juggling fragmented tasks, switching contexts dozens of times a day, and constantly firefighting. As one Reddit user put it:
“Everyone was juggling 5–6 things at once... It wasn’t overwork, it was fragmented work... Every switch has a hidden tax.” (Source)
The data echoes the sentiment. A survey of APMP members found:
72% reported emotional exhaustion
82% felt overworked
19% admitted to working nights and weekends just to meet RFP deadlines (Source)
That’s not sustainable. Over time, fatigue doesn’t just hurt individuals; it erodes deal quality and organizational knowledge.
How Burnout Shows Up Day-to-Day
If you’ve ever worked on proposals, these will feel familiar:
Missed family dinners because “just one more edit” turned into hours.
Frustration at bottlenecks, waiting days for SME input.
Copy-paste déjà vu, answering the same questions for the tenth time.
Stress spirals, where looming deadlines turn into last-minute fire drills.
This constant pressure creates what researchers call presenteeism: employees technically “there,” but too drained to perform at their best.
Bottlenecks That Drain Teams
Let’s dig into the common process pitfalls that heighten stress:
Waiting on SMEs: Valuable time is wasted chasing responses from internal experts juggling other priorities. (Source)
Copy‑paste chaos: Disjointed document edits and scattered answer sources lead to inconsistency—and more rework.
Repetition overload: Teams often write the same answers repeatedly without a content repository, deepening mental fatigue.
The result of all the above combined is an endless grind of task-switching, inefficiency, and spiraling frustration.
If this sounds familiar, you’re not alone - our post on knowledge management systems dives deeper into why scattered information is the single biggest bottleneck in proposal work.
The Emotional Rollercoaster of RFP Season
Unlike steady sales cycles, RFPs often arrive in bursts - creating what many teams jokingly call “RFP season.” This flood of deadlines forces teams into survival mode, prioritizing speed over strategy.
Psychologists describe this as chronic acute stress: the body’s fight-or-flight system activated repeatedly without time to recover. The symptoms? Irritability, lack of focus, and eventually full burnout. One study from the American Institute of Stress found that 83% of U.S. workers suffer from work-related stress, and high-pressure roles like proposal management score at the extreme end (stress.org).
The irony is that RFPs are supposed to be opportunities - doors opening to new revenue. But for many teams, the process itself feels like a punishment. That emotional dissonance (excitement about the deal vs. dread about the process) creates disengagement.
Leaders who recognize this can proactively stagger workloads, rotate responsibilities, or use automation to flatten the peaks. Instead of a rollercoaster, the process becomes a smoother ride - one that preserves energy for the actual win strategy.
What we think the "Stress Cycle of RFP Season" looks like
Why the Human Cost Matters (to Business Too)
It’s tempting to see burnout as a “people issue,” but it’s also a business issue. Burned-out employees:
Make more errors, lowering proposal quality.
Are more likely to disengage—or quit—taking critical expertise with them.
Drive longer response cycles, leading to missed deadlines or rushed, subpar submissions.
In short: ignoring the human cost leads to lower win rates and higher turnover - a dangerous combination in competitive markets.
Loopio’s RFP Trends 2024 Report showed the average win rate for RFPs is just 45%, meaning nearly half of efforts don’t pay off (Loopio). Combine that with team burnout, and you’re looking at wasted human energy and lost deals.
Leadership Blind Spots: Why Sales Leaders Should Care
Many sales leaders focus only on response speed and win rate metrics, but overlook the human strain behind them. Ignoring burnout creates hidden costs:
Turnover costs: Replacing a proposal manager can cost 1.5× their salary.
Knowledge loss: When experienced team members leave, tribal knowledge leaves with them.
Reputation risk: Stressed teams make mistakes, sometimes sending incorrect or outdated information to prospects.
Leaders who want to shorten cycles and win more must first protect their people.
The Hidden Opportunity Cost of Burnout
While burnout is easy to spot in late-night emails and tired faces, what’s harder to see is the opportunity cost. Every hour a proposal manager spends copy-pasting answers is an hour they’re not:
Improving the story arc of a proposal.
Personalizing language to resonate with the client.
Collaborating with sales to sharpen the value proposition.
In other words, burnout doesn’t just sap energy—it shifts focus away from the high-impact work that actually wins deals.
This matters because companies that emphasize quality in RFP responses see a measurable lift in results. Loopio’s data shows that teams who personalize their proposals win 1.4× more often (Loopio). Yet personalization is the first thing cut when teams are stretched thin.
By framing burnout as lost opportunity—not just lost energy—leaders can connect the human cost directly to revenue. Protecting proposal teams isn’t just the right thing to do for people; it’s also the smart thing to do for business.
How AI Can Help Without Replacing Humans
AI isn’t here to replace human judgment - it’s here to restore energy. Here’s how:
Time savings: Automating repetitive Q&A retrieves answers in seconds—freeing teams for strategy, messaging, and creativity.
Collaboration boost: A centralized system reduces chasing SMEs across threads, driving faster contributions and clarity.
Consistency & quality: With a trusted content hub, responses stay polished and on-brand.
Multiple platforms report that proposal teams respond 2–3× faster, with far less burnout and friction—letting professionals do their best work again. One study showed proposal teams that adopted automation tools cut manual work by nearly 50% while increasing output (Source).
And critically: AI does the draining work, while humans focus on the meaningful work.
For a deeper dive, see our post on how technology streamlines RFP responses.
Practical Steps Before AI
Even if you’re not ready to fully embrace automation, you can start easing the burden:
Centralize answers in a shared repository (even a Google Doc is better than scattered files).
Set clearer go/no-go criteria so you don’t waste time on low-probability RFPs.
Track burnout signals—missed deadlines, repeated after-hours work, rising error rates.
Cross-train staff to prevent single points of failure.
Schedule recovery time after major bids to protect long-term performance.
These changes lay the foundation for AI tools to plug in seamlessly when you’re ready.
A Healthier Future for Proposal Teams
Imagine proposal work that energizes instead of drains. AI-powered tools can shift RFPs from a grind to a craft: where responders focus on narrative, insight, and client connection—not admin.
That’s Settle’s mission: to make high-stakes proposal work less painful and more rewarding, so teams can win more without losing themselves in the process.
Conclusion
Burnout isn't a necessary evil—it’s a silent obstacle. But with thoughtful automation, RFPs can become opportunities for engagement, not exhaustion.
The real ROI of AI in proposals isn’t just deals won—it’s people saved from burnout.
👉 See how Settle helps your team reclaim time, sanity, and winning momentum.