What changes when you are not prime?
Strategy asks whether this is a channel to the work you have named, or a week spent making someone else look complete. Capacity asks whether the same people are writing a schedule they will then deliver under someone else’s programme. Risk asks what flowed down: indemnity, IP, payment, step-in, a no-poach on your staff.
The three axes still apply. The time horizon and the paper change. Do not treat a sub as a courtesy to a friend in another firm. Courtesy is not an axis.
When is a sub the no-bid?
When the only work you would see fails strategy. When the principals are the same ones you need for a prime you actually want. When the flow-down is uncapped and the prime will not reopen it. When you are filling a matrix so they can lodge, and you will never see the call-off.
A late ask (“can you just send CVs by Friday”) is still a pursuit. Cost it. If the answer is a principal’s afternoon at billing rate, say so. Free CVs are how utilisation leaks out the side.
When is prime the no-bid and sub the yes?
When you cannot hold the liability or the roster for the whole, and a named slice fits. Be honest about whether the slice will still be there after award. Primes cut subs. A yes that depends on a handshake is a review with a date.
Do not bid prime on hope that a sub will appear. Named, confirmed, today. The capability matrix does not accept TBC.
How does the letter change?
Decline the prime invitation cleanly if the axes fail. Decline the sub ask cleanly too. Silence while you “see if we can help” is how both relationships get a maybe they cannot use. How to say no-bid still holds. Shorter paper. Same sentence.
If you say yes as sub, write down what you will not do: no unlimited flow-down, no unpaid bid support beyond a named number of hours. That note is part of the gate record. Without it, the next ask will be larger.