Auto-Generation

Proposal generation starts from an opportunity workspace. Open the opportunity, go to its proposals area, and start a new generation. The flow has three parts: configure, optionally close gaps, then generate.

Step 1 — Configure

The configuration step lets you shape the draft before any writing happens:

Choose sections

All 18 sections from the section catalog are selected by default, grouped into five categories — Overview, Technical, Management, Team & Experience, and Commercial. Deselect anything the RFP doesn't call for; a smaller selection generates faster and gives you less to prune.

Choose a writing tone

• Formal — traditional government-proposal register
• Professional — polished business writing (the default)
• Conversational — plainer, more direct language
• Technical — denser, specification-oriented prose

Generation options

• Use Past Templates — reference your successful past proposals for style and content patterns (on by default; see Templates).
• Enable Verification — after each section is written, verification agents check the generated content (on by default).
• Auto-Regenerate — sections that fail verification are automatically regenerated (on by default).
• Gap analysis — optionally run a gap analysis before generating (see below). By default, generation starts immediately without it.

Step 2 — Close gaps (optional)

If you opt into gap analysis, Cothon compares the opportunity's requirements against your company profile and lists the places where it lacks the information to write convincingly — each gap with a priority and suggested clarifying questions, such as specific certifications, staffing details, or relevant project examples.

You can:

• Answer the questions — your answers are saved and woven into the relevant sections, or
• Generate with current info — skip the questions and let the draft flag thin areas instead.

Step 3 — Generation runs in the background

Generation is an asynchronous job. You are taken to a live progress page that shows:

• The overall progress bar and current phase — sections are written in six phases, from overview sections through technical, management, team, and commercial content, to the conclusion.
• Per-section status — pending, running, verifying, regenerating, completed, or failed — so you can watch verification and auto-regeneration work in real time.

You can leave the page; the job keeps running, and the finished proposal is saved to the opportunity's proposals list.

What you get

The finished draft contains your selected sections, each with:

• Generated content grounded in the RFP's requirements and your profile
• A confidence score — how well-supported the section's content is
• A "needs review" flag on lower-confidence sections, so your editing time goes where it matters

From there, continue to Editing Proposals.

If a section comes out weak

1. Check the company profile area that section draws on — add the missing capability, certification, or past project.
2. Re-run generation with gap analysis enabled, and answer the questions for that topic.
3. Or simply edit the section directly — for genuinely bespoke content (pricing rationale, win themes), writing it yourself is often fastest.