National Bids Department Manager

## Description **Summary:** The **National Bids Department Manager** leads the strategy and execution of West Music’s National Business Unit bid function, driving profitable growth through proactive opportunity discovery, competitive pricing strategy, and effective team leadership. This role oversees the full bid lifecycle—from opportunity evaluation through proposal development, submission, and post-award analysis—ensuring West Music delivers accurate, compliant, and competitive proposals to school districts and educational institutions across the United States. The National Bids Department Manager supervises the Bid Coordinators and Bid Assistant, prioritizing opportunities, assigning balanced workloads, and coaching the team to produce high-quality proposals that allow schools to help their students, ***Play now, Play for Life.*** Working closely with sales, customer service, and operational partners, this role ensures bids reflect accurate pricing, product availability, and operational readiness while strengthening long-term relationships with school districts and institutional partners. This is a first-level management role ideal for someone with strong knowledge of the elementary general music classroom, district purchasing environments, and the National Business Unit’s core product categories who is ready to grow as a people leader. ***Essential Duties and Responsibilities include but are not limited to the following. Other duties may be assigned as business needs dictate:*** **Opportunity Strategy & Pipeline Management** - Identify, evaluate, and prioritize bid opportunities through procurement platforms such as BidNet Direct, IonWave, Bonfire, GovSpend, and other state and regional portals. - Lead bid/no-bid decisions based on strategic alignment, profitability, product fit, and team capacity. - Maintain a forward-looking bid pipeline and calendar to anticipate contract renewals and rebid opportunities. - Monitor national procurement trends and share insights on opportunity patterns, win rates, and competitive behaviors with National Leadership. **Bid Operations & Project Management** - Oversee the full bid lifecycle from opportunity intake through strategy development, proposal creation, submission, and post-award analysis. - Ensure proposals are accurate, compliant, competitively positioned, and submitted on time. - Maintain standardized processes including compliance matrices, production timelines, and documentation standards. - Implement and refine tools and workflows that improve efficiency, accuracy, and turnaround time. **Team Leadership & Development** - Provide day-to-day leadership, guidance, and accountability for the Bid Coordinators and Bid Assistant. - Prioritize opportunities and assign workloads to maintain balanced capacity across projects. - Coach Bid Coordinators on bid compliance, proposal quality, pricing logic, and effective written communication. - Coach the Bid Assistant on document preparation standards, procurement portal submissions, and process discipline to ensure accurate and timely bid support. - Foster a culture of accountability, attention to detail, urgency, and shared ownership of results. **Cross-Functional Collaboration** - Partner closely with Sales and Operations teams to ensure bids reflect accurate pricing, product availability, and fulfillment capabilities. - Facilitate internal bid reviews to align strategy, pricing, and operational feasibility prior to submission. - Maintain clear communication across stakeholders regarding bid timelines, requirements, and key decisions. **Pricing Strategy & Financial Oversight** - Lead competitive benchmarking against key industry vendors. - Maintain pricing frameworks that account for bid type, geography, and product categories. - Partner with National Leadership to validate pricing strategies that balance competitiveness with sustainable margins. **Performance Analytics & Continuous Improvement** - Conduct post-bid win/loss analysis to e…