RFP & Proposal Lead — Strategic Ownership

Blue Cross Blue Shield of Michigan; Detroit (MI); Hybrid; USD 90,000 - 130,000; Full time

Job summary

Blue Cross Blue Shield of Michigan is seeking an experienced Proposal Manager to own end-to-end responses for large, high-profile bids. You will lead a team of writers, coordinate with Sales, Legal, Compliance, and SMEs, ensuring compliant, timely submissions and adherence to corporate templates.

Responsibilities include reviewing content, governance of templates, risk mitigation, and pipeline visibility, while managing workload and coaching staff to maintain top-quality deliverables.

Qualifications

• Bachelor’s degree in English, Public Relations, Creative Writing, Journalism, Professional and Technical Writing or related field.
• Master’s degree preferred.
• Minimum five (5) years proposal writing experience required.
• Comprehensive knowledge and experience working in Excel, Word, PowerPoint, Snagit, and Proposal Tech, Adobe Pro, Responsive, and Visio.
• Excellent analytical, decision-making, organizational, planning, verbal and written communications skills.
• Possess tact and resourcefulness in establishing and maintaining effective internal and external working relationships.
• Highly organized with strong attention to detail/consistency.
• Experience with AI and prompting.

Responsibilities

• Provide end-to-end ownership of all project responses, ensuring proposals are accurate, compliant, strategically positioned, and submitted on time.
• Serve as the reviewer and approver of proposal content prior to market submission, with accountability for quality, consistency, and adherence to Blue Cross template standards.
• Oversee proposal template governance across all responses. Establishing and enforcing standardized processes, templates, review checkpoints, and quality controls.
• Identify and mitigate risks related to compliance, accuracy, and submission readiness, escalating high risk or non-standard items as appropriate.
• Manage workload strategy and prioritization across the proposal team, assigning and reassigning work to balance capacity, meet deadlines, and support high value or time sensitive opportunities.
• Maintain visibility to pipeline volume and complexity to ensure sustainable execution.
• Lead and develop a team of Proposal Writers, providing direction, coaching, and performance oversight to ensure accountability for deliverables, quality standards, and deadlines.
• Address performance issues and supports skill development aligned to business needs.
• Serve as subject matter expert on complex, jumbo or high-profile projects where strategic positioning is critical.
• Partner cross functionally with Sales, Legal, Compliance, and subject matter experts to resolve issues, align messaging, and ensure proposal content meets requirements.

Skills

Analytical thinking

Organizational skills

Verbal and written communication

Planning

Team leadership

AI and prompting

Education

Bachelor’s degree in English, Public Relations, Creative Writing, Journalism, Professional and Technical Writing or related field

Master’s degree preferred

Minimum five (5) years proposal writing experience

Knowledge of Excel, Word, PowerPoint, Snagit, Proposal Tech, Adobe Pro, Responsive, Visio

Tools

Excel

Word

PowerPoint

Snagit

Proposal Tech

Adobe Pro

Responsive

Visio

Job description

Blue Cross Blue Shield of Michigan is seeking an experienced Proposal Manager to own end-to-end responses for large, high-profile bids. You will lead a team of writers, coordinate with Sales, Legal, Compliance, and SMEs, ensuring compliant, timely submissions and adherence to corporate templates.

Responsibilities include reviewing content, governance of templates, risk mitigation, and pipeline visibility, while managing workload and coaching staff to maintain top-quality deliverables.