Term
Debriefing
A meeting you can request after losing an award, where the agency explains how it evaluated your proposal.
After you lose a competed award, you can generally request a debriefing, where the agency walks through how your proposal was scored and, within limits, why the winner scored better. It is the single best source of real feedback in the entire process, and it also starts the clock on how long you have to protest if something looks wrong. Asking for one costs nothing and is not held against you for the next competition.
In a sentence
"Unsuccessful offerors may request a debriefing within three days of notification of award." Miss that window and you likely lose the chance to ask, so calendar it the moment you get the notice you did not win.
Also called
- post-award debriefing
- debrief
- evaluation feedback
Terms like this show up in every federal notice. We translate them in place, on every notice in your trade.