https://www.cassidyai.com/blog/genrative-ai-rfp

How Generative AI Is Reshaping RFP Response for Faster, Smarter Outcomes

Cassidy Team, Sep 03, 2025

The RFP. Three letters that can stop a sales team in its tracks.

The document arrives, and it’s massive. Compliance sections, technical requirements, security questionnaires, financials, and a deadline that feels unrealistic. Completing it means chasing answers from half the company. Ignoring it means losing the chance to win a high-value client.

Traditionally, RFPs have taken weeks. They consume time, pull resources away from selling, and are riddled with opportunities for mistakes. But something has shifted. Generative AI is changing how teams complete RFPs, compressing timelines and making accuracy more manageable.

The question is no longer if AI belongs in the RFP process. It’s how fast teams can adopt it responsibly.

Understanding the Modern RFP

At its core, a Request for Proposal (RFP) is a structured way for organizations to evaluate potential vendors. A company sends an RFP when it needs a product, service, or long-term partnership and wants to compare options in a standardized way.

The “best” proposal is rarely just about cost. Evaluation criteria typically include:

Technical capabilities
Security and compliance posture
Company stability and long-term viability
Implementation timelines
Cultural or strategic fit

An RFP is a balancing act. It forces vendors to prove both competence and credibility. That’s why they can be hundreds of questions long and require input from multiple teams.

The difference today is that AI is reshaping how these documents are completed. Instead of manually gathering and drafting responses, sales and proposal teams can now use generative AI to retrieve knowledge, generate first drafts, and manage large volumes of questions more efficiently.

Types of RFPs and How AI Helps

RFPs come in many forms, and each one requires a different approach. Here is how generative AI — and specifically tools like Cassidy — can support teams across all of them.

Open RFPs

Open RFPs are sent widely to a large pool of vendors. Competition is fierce, and speed matters.

The challenge:

High volume of submissions from competing vendors
Many sections that feel repetitive across multiple opportunities
Pressure to stand out while still meeting rigid requirements

How AI helps:

Draft generation at scale: Cassidy can quickly pull from prior submissions and internal documentation to generate consistent, source-backed answers.
Faster turnaround: By automating repetitive sections, teams submit earlier and with more confidence.
Consistency across submissions: AI ensures language and data points remain aligned, even when multiple RFPs are handled in parallel.

For open RFPs, the ability to respond faster and more consistently is often what gets you shortlisted.

Closed RFPs

Closed RFPs are more selective. Vendors are usually already in the running, and the RFP is part of a deeper evaluation.

The challenge:

Less competition, but higher scrutiny
Responses must be highly tailored to client context
Stakeholder expectations are more specific

How AI helps:

Personalized responses: Cassidy can incorporate client-specific details from CRM systems, past interactions, or prior contracts.
Contextual alignment: Instead of generic responses, AI highlights language that aligns with the client’s priorities.
Focus on differentiation: By automating baseline sections, humans have more time to add strategic, client-facing details.

In closed RFPs, AI gives teams the headroom to emphasize what makes them unique.

Structured RFPs

Structured RFPs are rigid. They often arrive in spreadsheets or forms where every vendor answers the same questions for easy comparison.

The challenge:

Hundreds of line items across multiple categories
Complex compliance, legal, and security details
Difficult to manage version control when many contributors are involved

How AI helps:

Bulk completion: Cassidy can ingest structured documents and generate answers row by row, populating compliance and product details automatically.
Parallel processing: Teams can handle multiple structured RFPs at once instead of queuing them.
Auditability: Every AI-sourced answer ties back to a document or record, which helps with compliance reviews.

Here, AI turns what used to be hours of manual work into minutes, without sacrificing accuracy.

Narrative-driven RFPs

Narrative-driven RFPs allow more freedom. They are less about checkboxes and more about storytelling.

The challenge:

Requires persuasive writing and brand alignment
Inconsistent structures make it harder to repurpose past content
Time-consuming because every section feels bespoke

How AI helps:

Story support: Cassidy can pull proof points, case studies, and customer examples from knowledge bases and format them into narratives.
On-brand language: AI generates drafts that align with company voice, giving writers a strong foundation.
Time savings: Writers can focus on refining and elevating the story rather than assembling raw material.

In narrative-driven RFPs, AI accelerates the research and drafting process, leaving humans to add the polish that resonates with decision-makers.

Due Diligence Questionnaires (DDQs)

DDQs are not technically RFPs, but they are equally demanding. They are often compliance-heavy documents used by large enterprises and governments to assess risk.

The challenge:

Hundreds of compliance and security questions
Answers must be exact and sourced from official documentation
Updates are frequent, since compliance requirements evolve

How AI helps:

Source-backed answers: Cassidy only generates responses from verified compliance documents, reducing risk of error.
Update management: New compliance data can be added to the system, instantly improving future responses.
Parallel completion: Multiple DDQs can be handled at once, reducing backlog.

For DDQs, accuracy and reliability are non-negotiable, and AI helps ensure teams can meet those standards quickly.

The RFP Response Process with AI

Once an RFP arrives, the clock starts ticking. The modern AI-augmented process looks different from the traditional scramble.

Ingestion: The RFP document is uploaded into the AI system.
Knowledge matching: AI pulls from company-approved documents, past responses, and compliance libraries.
Drafting: Initial answers are generated, structured, and linked to their sources.
Collaboration: Team members review drafts, refine language, and add context.
Approval: SMEs validate critical sections, especially compliance and security.
Submission: A polished, accurate proposal is delivered on time.

The shift is not that AI eliminates work, it shifts work away from repetitive tasks and toward strategic refinement.

Don’t Forget To Spotcheck

Generative AI is powerful, but it is not magic. Without the right controls, AI can produce generic or inaccurate answers. That is why humans remain at the center of the process.

Proposal managers, sales leaders, and SMEs ensure that responses are:

Accurate and compliant
Tailored to the client’s context
Aligned with brand and voice
Strategically positioned to win

Unless you are using a system with tight processes and accurate training, like Cassidy, AI on its own can create as many problems as it solves.

With Cassidy, automation is paired with built-in safeguards. Answers are sourced from approved knowledge, flagged for review when uncertain, and continuously improved as teams edit and update content. You can also keep humans in the loop at any step, ensuring quality and consistency while building automations that fit your process.

What This Means for Decision-Makers

For leaders overseeing sales, operations, or revenue, the impact of generative AI in the RFP process is clear:

Speed: Responses that once took weeks are now completed in days.
Efficiency: Subject matter experts spend less time answering the same questions repeatedly.
Consistency: Answers stay aligned across multiple RFPs, regardless of who is contributing.
Strategic focus: Teams can spend time refining proposals instead of assembling them.

AI is not about cutting humans out of the process. It is about letting people focus on what actually wins business.

Now that AI Can Easily Get Answers: Will RFPs Go Away?

RFPs are not going away. If anything, they are becoming more common as organizations seek structured ways to evaluate complex solutions. What will change is how teams approach them.

Generative AI has already shown that it can reshape the RFP response process, making it faster, more accurate, and more strategic. Teams that once dreaded RFPs now see them as opportunities to showcase value without draining resources.

For decision-makers, the takeaway is clear: the companies that invest in AI-powered RFP response today will be the ones closing deals tomorrow.

Start using Cassidy to autofill RFPs. Respond in a matter of minutes instead of days.

Learn more by scheduling a quick demo or trying Cassidy for free.

‍