David A. Fields Consulting Group For your consulting firm to win a consulting engagement, your prospect must explicitly have a Need and also must strongly Want to address their need.
Sometimes, though, a client misunderstands their Need and, as a result they Want the wrong project. What should you do in those cases?
Consider the following four scenarios, all of which you have undoubtedly faced as a consulting firm leader:
What your prospect Wants is far
less than what you know they Need.
What your prospect Wants is far
more than they really Need.
What your prospect Wants is
totally not what they Need.
What your prospect Wants is
unnecessary. They’re basically fine.
In all of these scenarios, what’s the best response? What’s the Right-Side Up response that elevates your client above your consulting firm?
The best path forward follows a straightforward, step-by-step approach, called L.I.F.T.
The L.I.F.T Resolution to Want/Need Incongruence
L = Learn
Listen and learn first.
The height of hubris (and bad consulting) is presuming you know your clients’ Need better than they do.
Yes, there are many cases when your prospects misread their situation and draw the wrong conclusions on the best path forward.
However, there are also many cases when your prospects have more knowledge of their situation, more background, and a fuller picture than you have.
It’s incumbent upon your consulting firm to understand why your client Wants something different from what you think they really Need.
I = Inform
Once you understand your client’s point of view, you can point to factors, information, and consequences they’ve overlooked or haven’t considered.
Explain the rationale behind your perspective on what they Need. Outline the consequences of taking the path they Want.
F = Foresee
If, after informing the client, their Want still does not align with your perception of their Need, then determine, to the best of your ability, whether any significant harm will come from pursuing what they Want.
For instance, if their desired path is likely to lead to food poisoning, that’s quite different from the situation where they simply won’t enjoy their dessert.
T = Tailor
Develop an approach that meets their Wants without risking any significant harm you foresee.
Your consulting engagement’s design should incorporate the ability to gauge progress and to alert your client if the direction you’re taking is, as you pointed out earlier, not going to lead to their Desired Outcomes.
At the same time, be open to the possibility that your client was right all along. That their perception of their Need was correct, and your initial instinct was wrong.
Is it possible a client will blame your consulting firm if the mismatch of Need and Want prevent them from achieving the bliss they desired? Yes. However, if you followed all the steps of L.I.F.T., that outcome is much less likely.
What do you do when a prospective client’s Wants are misaligned with what you think they Need?
Text and images are © 2024 David A. Fields, all rights reserved.
Tell the truth because having the relationship starts with trust. I want to be the one they trust to ask questions first knowing if I’m not the right one I’ll say it or if the issue they think they have might be something else, they know my focus is on their best interests, they trust me.
Honesty and trust are certainly big parts of the equation, Bill. I agree, you’ll rarely go wrong by (tactfully) giving your honest opinion.
Part of the challenge I’ve tried to set up in this article is the idea that a consultant’s “truth” may, in some cases, be incorrect. We’re always operating on incomplete knowledge and some consultants rush to judge that their clients are foolish. If we can avoid that type of misstep, we stay Right-Side Up and we deliver better outcomes for ourselves and our clients.
I’m glad you kicked off the conversation, Bill!
Hi David,
Just had this situation last week. Two partners want to scale up a business in a markedly different vertical than the one they currently work in. For example, they’ve put up a website that is so vague that it looks like they’re selling world peace. Trying to be genuinely helpful while delivering this much bad news is always tricky.
Delivering bad news is tricky indeed, Doc, and I’m sure you handled it deftly. Perhaps they actually want to go into world peace consulting?!
I appreciate hearing from you, Doc!
Believe it or not, I actually considered world peace consulting early in my career, but I discovered that it was hard to monetize and required a lot of travel…:-)
Amen to that, Doc!
Hi David,
What you propose is all well and good when your client is ONE individual. How do you manage a situation where your client is actually a large organization with multiple subunits that Want and Need different things? Also, there is an assumption, isn’t there, that the client is open to listening to your suggestions. How do you handle it when the client’s Wants are literally like he or she has ordered a very specific meal that they want served in a very specific way? At that point, is the consultant a restauranteur who receives and delivers orders as needed or a dietician who listens to client’s wants and can recommend needs?
You’ve brought up a couple of great questions and issues, Hippolyt! Let’s take them one by one.
Typically, even in the largest organization, there are either multiple decision-makers who can hire you for a project for their own unit, or an overarching decision-maker who’s responsible for the project. (The overarching decision-maker may take input from others, of course and include them to some degree in the decision.)
In the first case, sell multiple projects to multiple decision-makers. In the second case, you can invite the views of the various decision-makers, but ultimately you work with the overarching decision-maker to corral the conflicting wants and needs into one or more projects.
Yes, there’s an assumption that you’re in a Discovery conversation (a.k.a. Context Discussion) with a client. If the client has ordered a very specific meal, then you’re just responding to an RFP. Even with most RFPs, you have the opportunity to discuss with the client whether the project they’ve specified will get them where they want to go. If, fundamentally, you think they are asking for the wrong thing and there’s no opportunity to deliver the right project, then bow out.
RFP-driven consultancies operate on a different business model than most of the firms we work with. There are upsides and downsides to chasing RFPs, and it’s just not an approach my team and I devote a lot of cycles to.
I’m glad you asked the questions, Hippolyt!
If you have a true concern for the prospect, you don’t just “bow out”. Explain your concerns for the approach they want and the potential result. Even with an RFP, I have seen a client come back after our concerns came true.
As you’ve suggested, Norm, bowing out doesn’t have to be forever. If, as in the specific circumstance I gave, “there’s no opportunity to deliver the right project,” then bowing out is probably the best course. And, as Hippolyt discussed, prior to bowing out it’s important to explain your concerns to the decision-makers (if they’ll give you the opportunity).
Thanks for chipping in your point of view, Norm.
Thanks, David. Response well noted. Glad to see you have a “bow out” option where there are irreconcilable differences between the perceived wants and needs. Having the option to say no and walk away from an assignment is, I believe, ultimately more beneficial to all parties than trying to make the assignment work when there are too many factors pulling the wants and needs in different directions. Thanks again for initiating this discussion and responding to the questions.
Totally agree, Hippolyt. There’s no law that says your firm has to work on every project. One of the joys of leading a practice is you get to choose your clients and projects!
This is quite interesting. Because a big theme for me when I am renegotiating or negotiating is the negotiate for what you want and settle for what you need.
I presume you know the Rolling Stones song that says:
You can’t always get what you want
But if you try sometimes, well, you might find
You get what you need
Thanks appreciate the insight.
Well said, Marc, and bonus points on the RS reference!