Automated Request for Proposal (RFP) Review for Bid/No-Bid Decision-Making using Multi-Criteria Decision-Making

10 pages•Published: June 2, 2026

Manish Pradhan, Kofi A. B. Asare, Somik Ghosh and Ben Bigelow

Abstract

This study explores how to automate the process of RFP reviews for specialty contractors in making their bid/no-bid decisions efficiently. Specialty contractors typically rely on their intuition and experience to make bidding decisions. Making such decisions when faced with choosing multiple project opportunities can be particularly taxing for small-sized specialty contractors who usually have few people assigned to do this task. They often have to rely on consultants for bid document preparation, which comes at a premium. This study addresses this challenge by prototyping and testing a web application that uses a Multi-Criteria Decision-Making method’s (MCDM) Weighted Sum Model (WSM), to make reviews faster and more objective. This enables users to assign weight values to each bidding factor, extracted from existing literature. The system then automatically calculates a WSM score for each RFP, then normalizes the score to the range of 0 to 100. The solution, deployed as a web app, provides specialty contractors with a low-cost, instantly deployable tool that reduces the time and effort needed to screen RFPs. This enables them to focus on core operations and respond quickly to opportunities, while advancing knowledge on automated RFP review using MCDM and natural language processing by computers.

Keyphrases: digital construction, multi criteria decision making, rfp, weighted sum model

In: Wesley Collins, Anthony Perrenoud and John Posillico (editors). Proceedings of Associated Schools of Construction 62nd Annual International Conference, vol 7, pages 743-752.

Links:	https://easychair.org/publications/paper/VXxC
	https://doi.org/10.29007/3mbj

BibTeX entry

@inproceedings{ASC2026:Automated_Request_Proposal_(RFP),
  author    = {Manish Pradhan and Kofi A. B. Asare and Somik Ghosh and Ben Bigelow},
  title     = {Automated Request for Proposal (RFP) Review for Bid/No-Bid Decision-Making using Multi-Criteria Decision-Making},
  booktitle = {Proceedings of Associated Schools of Construction 62nd Annual International Conference},
  editor    = {Wesley Collins and Anthony Perrenoud and John Posillico},
  series    = {EPiC Series in Built Environment},
  volume    = {7},
  publisher = {EasyChair},
  bibsource = {EasyChair, https://easychair.org},
  issn      = {2632-881X},
  url       = {/publications/paper/VXxC},
  doi       = {10.29007/3mbj},
  pages     = {743-752},
  year      = {2026}}

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