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Selling is not Convincing
Today’s Strategic Alignment Journal Post in two sentences: Selling is not about convincing people to see what you see. Real value is created when you offer clarity with confidence, let people decide what to do with it, and stop making your worth dependent on their agreement. Many of us have been taught that selling isn’t…
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Stop Issuing RFPs Based on Assumed Needs
I was asked to review a Terms of Reference a couple months ago for a twelve-month Commercial Marketing Advisor. It was a thoughtful document. The objectives were clear, the scope of work was comprehensive, and the desired outcomes were well defined. As I read through it, however, I found myself thinking less about the proposed…
assumptions, business decisions, business leadership, business strategy, commercial sustainability, consulting, decision quality, Decision-Making, diagnostic thinking, executive leadership, governance, Leadership & Practice, leadership insights, management, organizational diagnosis, organizational effectiveness, organizational learning, pre-decision diagnosis, problem solving, procurement, requests for proposal, RFP, root cause analysis, strategic reflection, Strategic thinking -
How to Bridge the Gap Between Better Work and Getting Hired
The work itself is often not the issue. The difference shows up in how quickly someone on the other side can understand what you are proposing, see how it connects to what they are dealing with, and feel confident enough to move forward without needing to pause and work it out for themselves. In most…
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Why Smaller Contractors Lose Work to Larger Firms (Even When the Work Is Better)
I was sitting in a room yesterday with a group of technical leads. It was an industry event, and the conversation was around projects that kept looping. Work would be done, reviewed, then redone. Adjustments would be made, only for the direction to shift again. Not because new data had emerged, but because the decision…
Business Alignment, business strategy, Client experience, consulting, Decision-Making, execution, Leadership Thinking, organization alignment, perceived value, StrategicAlignmentJournal BusinessAlignment DecisionMaking Consulting LeadershipThinking ClientExperience OrganizationalAlignment BusinessStrategy PerceivedValue Execution -
The Consulting Crash We Were Warned About
In 2005, Martin Kihn cracked open a world that, until then, largely operated behind frosted-glass conference rooms and perfectly bound slide decks.His memoir, House of Lies: How Management Consultants Steal Your Watch and Then Tell You the Time, was part confession, part dark comedy, and part industry autopsy. Kihn wrote from the inside. As a…
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The Hidden Tax of Influence and the Real Cost of Outsourcing Transformation
In a recent New York Times Magazine interview, [you can listen to the interview here], Brené Brown named something rare that and also costly. She described the “care tax”—the hidden toll of being treated as a national therapist, expected not only to share ideas but to absorb people’s deepest stories of pain and trauma. After…
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Possibility, Profits, and the People You Choose to Bet On
Some people don’t need to be “taught possibility”; they walk into rooms wired for it. They are possibility thinkers. They see the possibilities and immediately begin asking “what if” questions. They are energized by ambiguity and focused on impact. Karrie Sullivan recently posted that “Art of the Possible” sessions are a waste of time. If…
Get Clarity before the Fix
