Latest / What is Business Development? / Episode 92: BD Book...Top 3 Tactics from Tim Sleep’s new book, “Forecasting to Win”

Transcript

Episode 92: BD Book...Top 3 Tactics from Tim Sleep’s new book, “Forecasting to Win” · What is Business Development?

• 0:04
  Speaker 1: Welcome to the Business Development podcast brought to you by
• 0:07
  Speaker 1: the Global Business Development Association, delivering the strategies and tactics
• 0:12
  Speaker 1: to boost your career and corporate growth.
• 0:22
  Speaker 2: Hello BD pros, and welcome to the Global Business Development
• 0:27
  Speaker 2: Association podcast called What is Business Development Now? Managing complex
• 0:34
  Speaker 2: business to business deals can feel really daunting, and hindsight
• 0:40
  Speaker 2: is a very powerful teacher. Wouldn't you like to transform
• 0:44
  Speaker 2: that hindsight into foresight? Well? I sure would. Well, before
• 0:49
  Speaker 2: we get into that hindsight and foresight, why don't you
• 0:52
  Speaker 2: take a little bit of foresight and think about where's
• 0:55
  Speaker 2: my BD career going? And if you really want to
• 0:58
  Speaker 2: boost your BD career, then yourself a copy of the
• 1:01
  Speaker 2: Business Development Body of Knowledge. That is the book you
• 1:05
  Speaker 2: need in order to get your BDP your Business Development
• 1:08
  Speaker 2: Professional certification from the Global Business Development Association. And if
• 1:13
  Speaker 2: you like this show, you've been following it, hit the
• 1:15
  Speaker 2: like button, give us a comment, give us a review
• 1:18
  Speaker 2: on the socials and in the podcast systems that you
• 1:22
  Speaker 2: listen to. It motivates me to continue bringing these great
• 1:27
  Speaker 2: authors and leaders and wonderful tactics that you can leverage
• 1:31
  Speaker 2: in your BD career. Okay, let's jump into a book
• 1:35
  Speaker 2: today that I want to introduce you to you to
• 1:37
  Speaker 2: It's called Forecasting to Win. It's available on Amazon, and
• 1:41
  Speaker 2: it's managing and winning large deals and B to B sales,
• 1:46
  Speaker 2: and it's a practical guide on how to bridge the
• 1:48
  Speaker 2: gap between the vendor and the customer. And the author
• 1:54
  Speaker 2: of this book has twenty five years leading world class
• 1:59
  Speaker 2: sales team across Europe and Asia Pacific at industry giants
• 2:04
  Speaker 2: including Sapey, work Day and Thompson Reuters. Tim sleeps our
• 2:09
  Speaker 2: guests and he reveals a straightforward yet powerful framework that
• 2:12
  Speaker 2: significantly boost win rates and sharpens forecast accuracy. His approach
• 2:18
  Speaker 2: is illustrated with compelling case studies which demonstrate real, real
• 2:22
  Speaker 2: world applications. So let's bring to the stage our guest
• 2:26
  Speaker 2: today and Tim Sleep, Welcome to the show.
• 2:31
  Speaker 3: Thanks Tourny, delighted to be here.
• 2:33
  Speaker 2: Yeah, well, hey, it's great to have you and I
• 2:36
  Speaker 2: can't wait to jump into this book. But before we
• 2:38
  Speaker 2: do that, Tim tell us a little bit. How did
• 2:41
  Speaker 2: you get into the business development profession and why did
• 2:45
  Speaker 2: you write the book.
• 2:47
  Speaker 3: I think I fell into business development in sales really
• 2:50
  Speaker 3: straight out of university. It wasn't something I ever aspired
• 2:54
  Speaker 3: to do. But it's the best job in the world
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  Speaker 3: being a salesperson. And you know, the highs are very high,
• 2:59
  Speaker 3: the loads of can be low and challenging, and you
• 3:02
  Speaker 3: learn from those. But straight away, quite quite early in
• 3:05
  Speaker 3: my career, I wanted to lead and manage sales teams
• 3:11
  Speaker 3: and have an impact across people doing that and so
• 3:15
  Speaker 3: and so. That's why through the organizations that you just
• 3:18
  Speaker 3: referenced there, I've been fortunate enough to lead some really
• 3:21
  Speaker 3: really impressive salespeople and sales teams across multiple across multiple
• 3:26
  Speaker 3: regions and got all the war stories to hopefully write
• 3:31
  Speaker 3: some interesting stuff in the book.
• 3:33
  Speaker 2: Hey, war stories in hindsight packed into a book to
• 3:36
  Speaker 2: give us foresight on how to win in business development.
• 3:40
  Speaker 2: And you're right, it is a wonderful profession. It's so
• 3:42
  Speaker 2: much fun and a big part of the fun is
• 3:45
  Speaker 2: all the BD people that you get to work with,
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  Speaker 2: people like you, Tim. So thank you again for joining
• 3:51
  Speaker 2: us on the show. And let's jump into your book
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  Speaker 2: and talk about the top three tactics or takeaways from
• 3:56
  Speaker 2: your book. So let's start off with one number one.
• 3:59
  Speaker 3: What do you have? Well, I think you know. First
• 4:02
  Speaker 3: of all, I'll say the title Forecasting to Win. The
• 4:04
  Speaker 3: book is not about forecasting or how to forecast deals.
• 4:09
  Speaker 3: It is about giving yourself the confidence to be able
• 4:11
  Speaker 3: to predict I'm going to win, I'm going to win
• 4:13
  Speaker 3: this deal. And actually knowing as early as possible whether
• 4:17
  Speaker 3: the deal is winnable and what you can do to
• 4:20
  Speaker 3: influence it is really really powerful in the world of sales.
• 4:25
  Speaker 3: And I focus on deals that you know can take
• 4:28
  Speaker 3: a year, two years, sometimes longer from inception to closing,
• 4:32
  Speaker 3: and of course there's so much that can change throughout
• 4:35
  Speaker 3: that throughout that time. So I think, you know, there's
• 4:38
  Speaker 3: no three big tips, as there's three common I guess
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  Speaker 3: mistakes that people make, or you know, all salespeople love
• 4:45
  Speaker 3: giving good news, they love hearing good news. They want
• 4:49
  Speaker 3: to close the deal as quickly as they can, and
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  Speaker 3: I think that my first tip is to always triangulate.
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  Speaker 3: You always always triangulate, because I've seen in so many
• 4:59
  Speaker 3: instant is people hearing one piece of news about a
• 5:03
  Speaker 3: deal and then going down a path on based on
• 5:06
  Speaker 3: that news, and that news was either not completely accurate
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  Speaker 3: or one person's point of view, and without triangulating, without
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  Speaker 3: being really really sure that what you're hearing about the
• 5:19
  Speaker 3: deal is correct and is right, and is the view
• 5:23
  Speaker 3: of lots of people, all the decision makers and all
• 5:25
  Speaker 3: the stakeholders, not just a person who speaks to is
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  Speaker 3: really really important. So and quite often you know, the
• 5:32
  Speaker 3: account executive or the business development person of course, is
• 5:36
  Speaker 3: leading a team of internal account team members. It could
• 5:39
  Speaker 3: be pre sales, it could be subject matter experts, it
• 5:41
  Speaker 3: can be consultants. So it's a big responsibility, and you
• 5:45
  Speaker 3: want to make sure that if you're going to lead
• 5:47
  Speaker 3: the team down a certain path, that what you've heard
• 5:50
  Speaker 3: is absolutely true. So that'd be the first thing. Is
• 5:52
  Speaker 3: just everything, every stage of the way, triangulate, triangulate, triangulate.
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  Speaker 2: Well, Tim, I've got to tell you, I don't know
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  Speaker 2: of any businesiness developer that I've known of that has
• 6:02
  Speaker 2: over predicted their ability to win a deal. Well, I mean,
• 6:09
  Speaker 2: we those business developers were all optimistic, aren't we. We
• 6:13
  Speaker 2: have to be to deal with all the challenges that
• 6:17
  Speaker 2: we deal with, right, So sometimes a pipeline and you
• 6:20
  Speaker 2: look at the probability of win sometimes and you're like, really,
• 6:23
  Speaker 2: you really think you're going to win it? That I
• 6:26
  Speaker 2: have probability of win? Okay, that's impressive more.
• 6:31
  Speaker 3: Yeah, I've had one conversation with someone said we are
• 6:33
  Speaker 3: going to win it, but I think you know you're right.
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  Speaker 3: You're absolutely right, Jurney. You know, salespeople love giving good
• 6:38
  Speaker 3: news and the pressure can be great as well to deliver.
• 6:41
  Speaker 3: You know, whether you're on a monthly cadence or a
• 6:44
  Speaker 3: quarterly cadence, you're asked to forecast what you're going to
• 6:47
  Speaker 3: what you're going to bring in, and and of course
• 6:50
  Speaker 3: you know most people love to over deliver and and
• 6:54
  Speaker 3: and and therefore forecasting is an important part of any
• 6:57
  Speaker 3: any salesperson's role. So triangulation is much much better so
• 7:00
  Speaker 3: you don't get those last last minute, last minute surprises.
• 7:05
  Speaker 2: Now, when you're talking about the triangulation, tim just to
• 7:09
  Speaker 2: drill down a little bit, you're talking about triangulating across
• 7:14
  Speaker 2: the buying committee, whether that's the champions, it's the decision maker,
• 7:19
  Speaker 2: it's the influencers. Is that what you're talking about? And
• 7:21
  Speaker 2: trying to line up the right people on your team,
• 7:24
  Speaker 2: whether it's your internal team as you said, it could
• 7:27
  Speaker 2: be pre sales folks, it could be customer success folks, whatnot.
• 7:32
  Speaker 2: All kind of lining up subject matter experts, lining them
• 7:35
  Speaker 2: up to then triangulate exactly the right messaging in the
• 7:38
  Speaker 2: people to talk to on the buying committee. Is that
• 7:40
  Speaker 2: what you're saying, Well, that's right.
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  Speaker 3: So you can triangulate through your virtual account team. You
• 7:43
  Speaker 3: can triangulate if there's any external parties involved in the deal.
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  Speaker 3: But there's nothing more. There's nothing more powerful than having
• 7:52
  Speaker 3: a champion or I call it a mentor, and that
• 7:54
  Speaker 3: mental being in the inner circle. So actually they can
• 7:57
  Speaker 3: influence and they're in the decision making and they are
• 8:00
  Speaker 3: very very powerful to that decision if you can, if
• 8:02
  Speaker 3: you can, if you can get that person on your side,
• 8:05
  Speaker 3: then you've got a far better chance of winning. But
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  Speaker 3: even then I would triangulate with as many of the
• 8:10
  Speaker 3: stakeholders as possible. And the more consistent the message you're getting,
• 8:14
  Speaker 3: the more bold you can be in which tactics you
• 8:16
  Speaker 3: choose to deploy on the back of those buying signals.
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  Speaker 3: So it's you know, it's just it's just a really
• 8:22
  Speaker 3: really important trait and people, and one that I've seen
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  Speaker 3: so many times people gloss over. There was one there
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  Speaker 3: was one example I write about it in my book
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  Speaker 3: where we were talking to the Deputy CIO and it
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  Speaker 3: was you know, the decision was him and his boss,
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  Speaker 3: the CIO, pretty pretty much, and we had triangulated that.
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  Speaker 3: But the account exec and the Deputy CIO got to
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  Speaker 3: really really good relationship where they're whatsapping each other over
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  Speaker 3: the weekend and what was the outcome of this steering committee,
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  Speaker 3: and it's the budget being approved and what's the decision criteria?
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  Speaker 3: All these things, and there was no way this deal
• 8:54
  Speaker 3: wasn't going to come in within the time friend that
• 8:56
  Speaker 3: we wanted it to. But the deadline is getting closer
• 8:59
  Speaker 3: and close, and very close to the end of the deadline,
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  Speaker 3: I ended up calling the CIO. My mistake. I should
• 9:06
  Speaker 3: have called him far, far earlier. And actually the deputy
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  Speaker 3: Cio wasn't the deputy Cio. That's who he called himself.
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  Speaker 3: He was a contractor that loved to think that he
• 9:15
  Speaker 3: was a really important influencer. And his decision wad you know,
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  Speaker 3: didn't have a huge amount of weight. And the whole
• 9:22
  Speaker 3: team had been basing themselves on what this deputy Cio
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  Speaker 3: was saying to the account executive over a number of months,
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  Speaker 3: and we had just wanted to believe that this was
• 9:32
  Speaker 3: going to happen. The deal did happen. It was a
• 9:34
  Speaker 3: month later, it fell into the following quarter, but we
• 9:37
  Speaker 3: didn't triangulate enough, and we relied on the wrong piece
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  Speaker 3: of information far, far too heavily.
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  Speaker 2: Like what you said there, that's a great story because
• 9:45
  Speaker 2: not only making sure that you triangulate across the entire
• 9:49
  Speaker 2: buying committee so that you don't single thread your intel
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  Speaker 2: sources and you don't single thread the relationship building, but
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  Speaker 2: also don't single thread on your team. Have a different
• 10:00
  Speaker 2: set of ears engage ears and eyes engage, and then
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  Speaker 2: you can discover these landmines of oh, this isn't the
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  Speaker 2: deputy CIO, this is a contractor with no authority.
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  Speaker 3: Okay, So on that point, that's a really really good point, Tony,
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  Speaker 3: and I think the best account executives, business development salespeople
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  Speaker 3: I've ever seen are very very comfortable asking their team
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  Speaker 3: to triangulate. You know, the slightly less experienced account executives
• 10:29
  Speaker 3: can want to be the hero, They can want to
• 10:31
  Speaker 3: close the deal and bring it, bring it home themselves,
• 10:35
  Speaker 3: and they get uncomfortable by using an executive sponsor or
• 10:38
  Speaker 3: someone else on their virtual account team to triangulate via
• 10:41
  Speaker 3: other stakeholders. But doing that is never a bad thing.
• 10:45
  Speaker 2: Yeah, b D is a team sport and humility is
• 10:48
  Speaker 2: the key to being a great team player. So okay, fantastic,
• 10:51
  Speaker 2: So Tim, let's jump into number two.
• 10:53
  Speaker 3: What do you have? So again, this sounds like a
• 10:56
  Speaker 3: really really obvious statement and most of these things, but
• 11:00
  Speaker 3: I can promise you all of my war wounds are
• 11:03
  Speaker 3: from watching people not do this or observing others not
• 11:06
  Speaker 3: doing this as well as they might. And it's a
• 11:09
  Speaker 3: very simple one. It's just you know, knowing your product
• 11:11
  Speaker 3: and your solution and your value proposition is super important,
• 11:14
  Speaker 3: but as important is knowing the competition. So what are
• 11:18
  Speaker 3: the competition going to be saying about you? What are
• 11:21
  Speaker 3: their tactics, what are they going to be doing, who
• 11:23
  Speaker 3: is their exec sponsor, what is their virtual account of
• 11:25
  Speaker 3: what customer references are they going to be bringing out?
• 11:28
  Speaker 3: And the better you know the competition, all you need
• 11:31
  Speaker 3: to do is beat the competition by a tiny dwny
• 11:33
  Speaker 3: downy bit and all things equal, you're going to be selected.
• 11:36
  Speaker 3: And there's one caveat to that as well, So so
• 11:38
  Speaker 3: understand and then turning into a customer advisor on saying,
• 11:41
  Speaker 3: of course, you know my competition is going to say
• 11:44
  Speaker 3: this to you, this is what they're going to do.
• 11:45
  Speaker 3: And the more powerful and the more knowledgeable you are
• 11:48
  Speaker 3: about your competition, the more you can lead the prospects
• 11:52
  Speaker 3: down the road of anticipating what the what the competition
• 11:56
  Speaker 3: are going to say about you and how they're going
• 11:58
  Speaker 3: to act. The caveat to that, or the additional point
• 12:01
  Speaker 3: I would make is the biggest competitor. The biggest competitor
• 12:05
  Speaker 3: is often do nothing. So you've got to be thinking
• 12:08
  Speaker 3: about what are my actual competitors and then what's the
• 12:12
  Speaker 3: chance of the prospect doing nothing or delaying that decision?
• 12:15
  Speaker 3: And that's a different stream of activity. So just a
• 12:18
  Speaker 3: paranoia about understanding what the competition are doing, but always anticipate.
• 12:22
  Speaker 3: It's easier for large organizations to not make a decision
• 12:26
  Speaker 3: than it is for them to make a decision, because
• 12:28
  Speaker 3: making a decision can be scary, and it can be bold,
• 12:31
  Speaker 3: and it involves change, and it involves hard work, and
• 12:33
  Speaker 3: it involves people having comfortable internal conversations as well. So
• 12:37
  Speaker 3: making sure that you know the competition acknowledging the competition
• 12:40
  Speaker 3: can often be do nothing. So it's just that paranoia
• 12:44
  Speaker 3: about really really bringing home the deal and understanding who
• 12:47
  Speaker 3: the competition.
• 12:48
  Speaker 2: Are yeah, knowing the competition and understanding what their messaging
• 12:53
  Speaker 2: will be. One of my favorite business development movies of
• 12:56
  Speaker 2: all time is the story about Michael Jordan. Yes, the
• 13:01
  Speaker 2: movie is called Air.
• 13:04
  Speaker 3: I write it about it in my book I Do,
• 13:08
  Speaker 3: and how they advised on how to beat Addidas and
• 13:13
  Speaker 3: how to be converse and expect you know, when you
• 13:17
  Speaker 3: bring when you meet addid as, this is what they're
• 13:19
  Speaker 3: going to do, this is what they're going to stay
• 13:20
  Speaker 3: to you. And it was so powerful and in my field.
• 13:24
  Speaker 3: You know, Google did that brilliantly against Microsoft for about
• 13:27
  Speaker 3: a two or three year period about fifteen twenty years ago.
• 13:31
  Speaker 3: They were beating Microsoft all over the place where they
• 13:34
  Speaker 3: shouldn't have been because they knew exactly how Microsoft were
• 13:37
  Speaker 3: going to react as soon as the senior as soon
• 13:40
  Speaker 3: as they realized that there was a threat that were
• 13:42
  Speaker 3: going to get kicked out into in to replace to
• 13:47
  Speaker 3: replace them. But no, that You're absolutely right, I've got
• 13:50
  Speaker 3: I've got a big case study on on that, on
• 13:54
  Speaker 3: that very movie in the book. Completely agree.
• 13:56
  Speaker 2: I think every business developer should watch that book. I
• 13:59
  Speaker 2: can watch it over and over again and just find
• 14:01
  Speaker 2: new nuggets of business development in each one of the
• 14:04
  Speaker 2: scenes and it's just a wonderful movie. But even more
• 14:09
  Speaker 2: wonderful is the powerful lesson you just express to everybody
• 14:12
  Speaker 2: is know your competition and know what they will say,
• 14:15
  Speaker 2: and understand them, probably better than they can understand themselves.
• 14:20
  Speaker 2: And my experience is that oftentimes competitors have hubris, particularly
• 14:23
  Speaker 2: if they are the incumbent contractor already supporting your prospect,
• 14:29
  Speaker 2: and they can feel like, we're going to win this,
• 14:31
  Speaker 2: we have it in the bag. And sometimes you can
• 14:32
  Speaker 2: leverage that to your benefit by ghosting what they're messaging
• 14:37
  Speaker 2: may be. And there's this rule, kind of unwritten rule
• 14:42
  Speaker 2: in business development, that you never want to speak poorly
• 14:45
  Speaker 2: about your competitors. However, there are ways to express things
• 14:50
  Speaker 2: where you know that your competitor has a significant weakness
• 14:54
  Speaker 2: and you can highlight those and emphasize those to your customer,
• 14:58
  Speaker 2: to your prospect as you're engaging with them and constantly
• 15:01
  Speaker 2: reinforcing those key hot buttons to really elevate it in
• 15:05
  Speaker 2: the prospect's mind of this is really important. And then
• 15:08
  Speaker 2: they turn around and they ask your competitor, Hey, can
• 15:10
  Speaker 2: you guys do this?
• 15:11
  Speaker 3: Well?
• 15:11
  Speaker 2: No, ah, okay, so I really like what you said,
• 15:15
  Speaker 2: there tim understanding your competitor and their messaging. Okay, so
• 15:22
  Speaker 2: let's talk about tactic number two. Excuse me, tactic number
• 15:26
  Speaker 2: three that's.
• 15:27
  Speaker 3: In number three. And again it sounds obvious, and again
• 15:30
  Speaker 3: you know i'd encourage you, but of course I would
• 15:33
  Speaker 3: to read the book because it brings it to life
• 15:35
  Speaker 3: in terms of there's a lot of case studies and
• 15:38
  Speaker 3: I should add in the book as well. I've asked
• 15:39
  Speaker 3: the Chief procument Officer to respond to every chapter to
• 15:43
  Speaker 3: make sure that you know the other side of the
• 15:45
  Speaker 3: fence is represented. So when you were selling, well from
• 15:49
  Speaker 3: sell to the CIO or the CFO or the chief
• 15:51
  Speaker 3: operating officer, but at some point the chief procurement Officer
• 15:55
  Speaker 3: and his or her team get involved in the deal,
• 15:57
  Speaker 3: and there on the other side of the negotiation table,
• 16:00
  Speaker 3: see what it likes. What it's like from the other
• 16:02
  Speaker 3: side of the table is quite compelling. Hopefully it is
• 16:05
  Speaker 3: as an interesting thing for the readers anyway. But the
• 16:08
  Speaker 3: third one is you know, understand the decision process and
• 16:13
  Speaker 3: understand how to influence the decision criteria. Again, they both
• 16:18
  Speaker 3: sound obvious, but I can promise you most people that
• 16:21
  Speaker 3: you're selling to don't understand their decision process themselves. They
• 16:25
  Speaker 3: think they do, and there may even be a formal
• 16:27
  Speaker 3: decision process, but there is always an informal decision process
• 16:31
  Speaker 3: as well, and it's never a straight line. So you know,
• 16:34
  Speaker 3: again triangulation comes back to triangulation as well. But you've
• 16:38
  Speaker 3: really if you're going to forecast accurately in terms of
• 16:41
  Speaker 3: what time period a deal is going to come in for,
• 16:44
  Speaker 3: you need to understand the decision process and really really
• 16:48
  Speaker 3: triangulate that that is that is what happens. Because again,
• 16:52
  Speaker 3: people like to over exaggerate their individual role and so
• 16:56
  Speaker 3: often I've seen or I've heard people say, well, I
• 16:59
  Speaker 3: make the decision decisions with me. If I say that
• 17:01
  Speaker 3: this is going to happen, it's going to happen. No,
• 17:04
  Speaker 3: you're you're a stakeholder in the decision process. That there's
• 17:07
  Speaker 3: a there's a long period of governance that may involve
• 17:09
  Speaker 3: steering committees, and may involve audit committees, it may involve
• 17:12
  Speaker 3: all sorts of other sort of internal it and and
• 17:15
  Speaker 3: other sort of procurement lead processes before before a decision
• 17:19
  Speaker 3: is actually made. So understanding the decision processes is important,
• 17:24
  Speaker 3: and knowing that there's a formal one and an informal one,
• 17:27
  Speaker 3: and the other one very closely linked to that is
• 17:29
  Speaker 3: a decision criteria, and that changes. So if at the
• 17:33
  Speaker 3: start of a cell cycle, you say, what what what's
• 17:35
  Speaker 3: the criteria that you want to that that that you're
• 17:38
  Speaker 3: that you're going to make your decision, and typically cost
• 17:43
  Speaker 3: or value is normally quite high on the decision criteria
• 17:47
  Speaker 3: at the start of the cell cycle. And then as
• 17:49
  Speaker 3: you map the length of the cell cycle, there's this
• 17:51
  Speaker 3: little thing called risk, and risk becomes a bigger and
• 17:55
  Speaker 3: bigger and bigger as a as a celle cycle evolves
• 17:58
  Speaker 3: criteria for how that decisions made. So consistently and constantly
• 18:03
  Speaker 3: checking in on the criteria and being able to influence that,
• 18:07
  Speaker 3: you know, it's far easier to sell in a positive
• 18:09
  Speaker 3: way than in a negative way. So if you don't
• 18:12
  Speaker 3: do this, this is what might happen to your organization.
• 18:14
  Speaker 3: To imagine if you do do this and you can
• 18:17
  Speaker 3: influence a decision process, you can influence the decision criteria.
• 18:20
  Speaker 3: There's a whole bunch of their tips and tricks on
• 18:23
  Speaker 3: how to do that. But one thing that's going to
• 18:25
  Speaker 3: delay a deal, another thing that's going to delay a
• 18:27
  Speaker 3: deal is assuming that the person that you're speaking to
• 18:30
  Speaker 3: fully understands the decision process and what they say is
• 18:33
  Speaker 3: exactly what's going to happen. It's not especially not with
• 18:36
  Speaker 3: with some of these larger, more complex deals. Yeah.
• 18:39
  Speaker 2: I like what you said about that understanding what the
• 18:42
  Speaker 2: buying process is and understanding what each individual on the
• 18:50
  Speaker 2: buying committee thinks the buying processes. And I've been in
• 18:53
  Speaker 2: situations where I've talked to one person in buying committee
• 18:56
  Speaker 2: and they are one eighty out of faith with the
• 19:00
  Speaker 2: other person on the buying committee, and I will often
• 19:03
  Speaker 2: bring it up to them. Oh that's interesting, So you
• 19:05
  Speaker 2: think that's the next level, this is the process. I
• 19:08
  Speaker 2: talked to Bob who's the CFO, and Bob's thinks it's
• 19:11
  Speaker 2: it's completely different. Oh really, Oh but yeah, you know,
• 19:14
  Speaker 2: and then you watch them kind of get their get
• 19:17
  Speaker 2: on the same sheet music, and sometimes you know, that's
• 19:19
  Speaker 2: the value of business developers. We're helping them understand how
• 19:23
  Speaker 2: to get on the same sheet of munsic. We are
• 19:26
  Speaker 2: informing them on what type of requirements they should consider.
• 19:30
  Speaker 2: I mean, this is our role. Our role is a
• 19:33
  Speaker 2: consultative role for the and if we're doing it right,
• 19:36
  Speaker 2: we're delivering value every step of the way of Oh,
• 19:40
  Speaker 2: you know, if you do this, that might inject more
• 19:43
  Speaker 2: risk into project execution. Oh really didn't know about that. Yeah,
• 19:48
  Speaker 2: let me give you a couple of use case scenarios
• 19:49
  Speaker 2: where I saw a completely destroy a program before. Oh wow, Yeah,
• 19:53
  Speaker 2: that's very helpful. Yeah, And so building that relationship based
• 19:58
  Speaker 2: on value, trust and shepherding the process. Tim tim us
• 20:02
  Speaker 2: a little bit. You know, you talked about kind of
• 20:07
  Speaker 2: understanding the process, but how do you typically pull that
• 20:14
  Speaker 2: thread with the prospect?
• 20:17
  Speaker 3: Well, I think that's so. There's there's loads of sales
• 20:19
  Speaker 3: methodologies out there. The one which is in vogue at
• 20:22
  Speaker 3: the moment is called MEDPIC, which is which is which
• 20:24
  Speaker 3: is an acarium to basically do what I've said, who's
• 20:27
  Speaker 3: your champion, what's the decision process, what's the paper process,
• 20:30
  Speaker 3: what's who are the influence? You can go through the
• 20:32
  Speaker 3: acronym MEDPIC. There's target accounts selling, there's Millerheim, and there's
• 20:36
  Speaker 3: lots of different sales methodology methodologies out there. And part
• 20:42
  Speaker 3: of my motivation for writing the book was that I
• 20:45
  Speaker 3: see so many large organizations now have a sales methodology,
• 20:49
  Speaker 3: but they don't take it seriously, it's a box ticking exercise.
• 20:53
  Speaker 3: And so what my book does is it talks about
• 20:55
  Speaker 3: the quality that the value of doing those things to
• 20:59
  Speaker 3: to really high level of quality. So you're champion, you
• 21:03
  Speaker 3: come champion. I call the mental it's not always the CFO.
• 21:06
  Speaker 3: You know, and and and and and if you write
• 21:08
  Speaker 3: that down and there you go, I've done my done
• 21:10
  Speaker 3: my forecast. I've used the methodology. You're doing that in
• 21:13
  Speaker 3: a in a in a lazy or or or without triangulation,
• 21:19
  Speaker 3: back to back to one of my points before way
• 21:22
  Speaker 3: of going about it. So I think that you know,
• 21:24
  Speaker 3: lots and lots of sales teams use the methodology they do.
• 21:28
  Speaker 3: They do have a way of doing things, but they
• 21:30
  Speaker 3: don't do it to the level of quality. That means
• 21:33
  Speaker 3: that they're they're not going to have surprises at the
• 21:35
  Speaker 3: end of every quarter. There should be no deals. There
• 21:37
  Speaker 3: should be no deals that slip if you follow the
• 21:40
  Speaker 3: methodology in forecasting to win, and if they do, you're
• 21:43
  Speaker 3: going to know about it in advance, which is why
• 21:46
  Speaker 3: you can, you know, forecast to win rather than just
• 21:50
  Speaker 3: forecast to hope. And I think you know it's not
• 21:54
  Speaker 3: rocket science, but doing it really, really, really well and
• 21:57
  Speaker 3: simply is difficult.
• 22:00
  Speaker 2: It is difficult, and some of these concepts may seem
• 22:03
  Speaker 2: simple to folks, but these are first principles for success
• 22:07
  Speaker 2: in business development, particularly in prospecting, and you may hear
• 22:11
  Speaker 2: them from time to time, but it's always great to
• 22:14
  Speaker 2: have these as anchors, even though they sound so basic.
• 22:17
  Speaker 2: It's like when you play a sport. Yes, swinging a
• 22:21
  Speaker 2: golf club seems simple, swinging a racket and tennis seems simple,
• 22:25
  Speaker 2: but oftentimes things can fall apart mid swing or in
• 22:29
  Speaker 2: the middle of your game. And going back to those
• 22:32
  Speaker 2: those fundamental first principles and getting really good at mastering
• 22:37
  Speaker 2: those is how you have predictable, forecastable success. And you
• 22:43
  Speaker 2: can also get that with Tim's fantastic book for Casting
• 22:47
  Speaker 2: to Win. So Tim, let me summarize some of what
• 22:50
  Speaker 2: we talked about today Tactic number one, and the key
• 22:53
  Speaker 2: takeaway here was triangulate. Triangulate the buying committe, Understand everybody
• 23:01
  Speaker 2: that's on that buying committee, Understand what role they play,
• 23:04
  Speaker 2: and understand not only the buying committee, but your own
• 23:09
  Speaker 2: team and the resources you can bring to bear, and
• 23:12
  Speaker 2: the different eyes and ears all involved, so that you
• 23:15
  Speaker 2: can all get on one sheet of music. The second
• 23:18
  Speaker 2: key takeaway and tactic was understand the competition, Understand them
• 23:22
  Speaker 2: better than they are, Understand what they will say, just
• 23:25
  Speaker 2: like you can do in the movie Air where the
• 23:29
  Speaker 2: lead character was talking to Michael Jordan's mother and she asked, well,
• 23:33
  Speaker 2: what will these other companies say to me when I
• 23:36
  Speaker 2: talk to them? And he told them spot on exactly
• 23:39
  Speaker 2: what they would say. And that's where as a business
• 23:42
  Speaker 2: developer you should always be is understanding the competition better
• 23:45
  Speaker 2: than than they're themselves. Know they're weak points, emphasize those
• 23:49
  Speaker 2: as risk factors when you're talking to the prospects and
• 23:52
  Speaker 2: the buying committee. And then the final tactic is understanding
• 23:56
  Speaker 2: the buying process. Know what the customer and the prospects
• 24:01
  Speaker 2: buying process is and help get them on the same
• 24:04
  Speaker 2: sheet of music because oftentimes they're not even in sync
• 24:08
  Speaker 2: and in coordination. And when you do that, you can
• 24:11
  Speaker 2: be a good steward for them. You can be an
• 24:14
  Speaker 2: advocate for them by identifying risk factors, delivering solutions and concepts,
• 24:19
  Speaker 2: and shaping the requirements so that they show up in
• 24:23
  Speaker 2: the solicitation in your favor. These are three fundamental key concepts. Again, folks,
• 24:30
  Speaker 2: you can get them in Tim Sleep's book on Amazon.
• 24:33
  Speaker 2: It's called Forecasting to Win. Tim, I think you have
• 24:36
  Speaker 2: a copy of the book. They're with you in the office.
• 24:38
  Speaker 2: Don't you look at that? What a beauty.
• 24:41
  Speaker 3: Yeah, it's and big prints. It's not going to take
• 24:45
  Speaker 3: too long to read, but it's hopefully something that's really practical,
• 24:49
  Speaker 3: easy to implement, and good validation of what the great
• 24:52
  Speaker 3: salespeople do already.
• 24:54
  Speaker 2: Yeah, well you're a great validation of a salesperson, Tim,
• 24:58
  Speaker 2: and you packed it all into your wonderful book. Can
• 25:00
  Speaker 2: we thank you so much for everything you do for
• 25:02
  Speaker 2: the business development profession. How can folks follow you connect
• 25:06
  Speaker 2: with you?
• 25:08
  Speaker 3: Well? Do you know what the easiest way is? It's
• 25:10
  Speaker 3: pretty old school. I'm not a massive blogger, but via LinkedIn.
• 25:14
  Speaker 3: I'm always happy to connect with people on LinkedIn. I'm
• 25:17
  Speaker 3: on most of the social channels, but that's the one
• 25:20
  Speaker 3: I'm most responsive to. So yeah, if anyone wants to
• 25:23
  Speaker 3: discuss anything in the book, agreed, disagree with me, or
• 25:26
  Speaker 3: just have a good debate, then I'd be very happy
• 25:29
  Speaker 3: to connect initially on LinkedIn.
• 25:32
  Speaker 2: Oh well, that's wonderful, Tim, and it's been a joy
• 25:36
  Speaker 2: to talk to you today. About your book again, folks.
• 25:39
  Speaker 2: It's Forecasting to Win, available on Amazon and tim We
• 25:44
  Speaker 2: thank you for helping us understand how to forecast to Win,
• 25:49
  Speaker 2: and we look forward to talking to you when you
• 25:52
  Speaker 2: publish your.
• 25:53
  Speaker 3: Next book Pleasure. Thanks Tony, appreciate your time.
• 26:00
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• 26:04
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• 26:08
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• 26:13
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