David A. Fields Consulting Group When you have high hopes for winning a consulting project, and are excited about the engagement, hearing “No thanks” from your prospect can be discouraging, disheartening, and dis-is-a-good-time-for-chocolate-ing.
But should it be?
Let’s say you’re waiting for the green light on the proposal you submitted to Turner Dounalot, CEO of Psychout Productions. Psychout is the leading (only?) provider of virtual mental health services combined with online pranks.
You nurtured the relationship with Turner, diligently walked him and his senior staff through a Context Discussion, and endured a full week of April Fool’s jokes before submitting your proposal.
Your proposed engagement will deliver huge benefits to Turner and Psychout.
Plus, it’s great for you and your consulting firm. You’ll collect much-needed revenue, boost morale with your team, improve your firm’s capabilities, collect another case study, and add to your false-bottomed chest of practical jokes.
You’re eager to hear back from Turner and to dive into the engagement.
Turner finally calls to tell you his decision. “Great news on the project,” he exclaims. He pauses a beat then chortles, “Oops, no. Wrong envelope. We’re not moving forward after all.” After thanking you earnestly (you think) for your time and attention, he’s gone.
Frustrating. Heartbreaking. Raid the chocolate bin, because life is more challenging now for you and your consulting firm than it was yesterday.
Except that’s not true.
Your situation is not more dire. It is, overall, exactly the same, with a spoonful of new learning.
Any project your consulting firm loses is a project you didn’t have before you tried to win it.
Your problems, challenges and needs are wholly unchanged.
There’s little point or benefit to mourning the loss of something you never had.
Plus, there’s tons of upside!
Your encounter with Psychout holds a potential treasure trove of learning for your consulting firm. You may have gathered new insights into:
- What the market wants and doesn’t want,
- What parts of your story resonate or misfire,
- Which prospects to pursue,
- Which aspects of your Business Development process need improvement,
- What objections you should prepare for,
- What new sales collateral to develop,
- What chocolates deliver the fastest endorphin rush.
Potential projects are, by definition, opportunities for your consulting firm. And having opportunities is great.
Some work out, some don’t. All of them create a window for your consulting firm to grow and become more successful.
Best Practices from the Real World of Wins and Losses
Remain equanimous in the face of lost opportunities. When you’re persistently enthusiastic, committed and excited, you’ll win more opportunities than when you’re stressed, frustrated or desperate.
Pursue all good opportunities. It’s generally a mistake to pass on some opportunities while you’re waiting for others to close.
That said, avoid “bad” opportunities. Don’t pursue time-sucking, low-probability, low-learning prospective engagements. After all, it does take time and resources to pursue a project.
If you are going to operate in the world of RFPs, leverage AI to eliminate the vast majority of unproductive time sunk into those black holes of the Business Development universe.
Hope for the win without becoming attached to the outcome.
Shake off a dusting of disappointment like an April snow flurry.
You and I both know that losing an engagement you hoped to (or expected to) close isn’t fun; it doesn’t scream, “You have a successful consulting firm.”
Yet, every successful consulting firm endures losses—sometimes a string of them in a row. And your firm has (or will) endure a string of losses too. It’s part of the game we’re in.
Your reaction and management of each No from a prospective client matters. It determines the potential for your consulting firm to reach greater heights.
How do you manage the inevitable disappointment of losing projects you counted on winning?
Text and images are © 2024 David A. Fields, all rights reserved.
Great, positive advice and a good reminder that you can’t win them all, even if you do all the right things. We learn more from losses than wins, experience is the best teacher. Question: do you ever reach out to prospect for feedback? What were their key decision making points?
Great question, Frank. Yes, when you lose a project–particularly an important one, you and an independent party should both reach out.
You reach out to cement the relationship (staying Right-Side Up), to see if there’s a piece of the project that still may be open to you, and to ask for introductions at the moment when they feel like they owe you something.
The independent party asks three follow-up questions to help you understand if you need to change your approach or focus.
Today’s article was about mindset. The actions to take when you lose a project are covered in this article, which happens to have one of my favorite illustrations.
Thanks for the question, Frank, and the opportunity to explore the topic more.
Hi David,
Thanks for another helpful article! Could you clarify or provide examples of what constitutes an ‘independent third party’ in this context?
Good question, Alexis. Anyone that can fairly represent themselves as independent of your consulting practice and that understands how to probe for the right information will work. We do this for clients when they lose projects that were large and/or the client felt they would win. The information you uncover at those times can be invaluable for course correcting and, at times, even resetting the firm’s strategic direction.
If you need more clarification or expansion, let me know!
Good to remember there are unknown variables relating to the win or loss. (We tend to make up stories) about what we did wrong or why we got a certain outcome, but there may be things we will never know, unless you can get them to be honest.
Exactly right, Marlene. That reasons behind the vast majority of projects you lose have nothing to do with you. There are, of course, those few projects you lose that your firm lost for very relevant reasons, ranging from your approach (not Right-Side Up) to your lack of expertise (chasing projects you don’t have a right to win), and it’s worth understanding when those happen. Clients and prospects are more honest with a third party, which is why you should always engage one to solicit feedback on big deals that you lose.
Thank you for your outstanding perspective, Marlene.
You know, David, I usually brush off this feeling that “he’s writing about me!” But this time it just hits so close to home! I had a string of these in February and it’s hard not to start wondering if you’re doing something wrong. This sentence: “Any project your consulting firm loses is a project you didn’t have before you tried to win it.” I had to read that 7 times for my brain to understand the meaning, but it’s true. You miss 100% of the swings you don’t take.
Fun fact: one of those no’s came after months of nurturing, and I remained enthusiastic and supportive of the relationship. It just came back as a new opportunity with a much higher potential for a yes. It’s the long game….
Wow, Jen, kudos to you on continuing to nurture the relationship and turning a short-term No into a long-term, bigger Yes! That’s impressive, and a great case study.
Your string of losses in February put you in good company. In any given week, month, quarter or even year, I can point to dozens of absolutely outstanding consulting firms that are riding a painful slump of rejections. It just happens. Partly because we deal in small numbers–most small firms win fewer than 50 projects per year, and that makes a string of Yeses or Nos feel more important than it really is.
Also, yes, you miss 100% of the swings you don’t take, and the ball is not in a worse position when you miss it than it was before you swung and missed. The latter point was where I was headed with that hard-to-digest-sentence.
Thank you for sharing your reaction and your phenomenal case study, Jen!
We just lost an opportunity we felt would be a great fit. We have to resist the urge to “change everything” when we lose an opportunity. We had a good context discussion, gave them a great proposal, and talked about the value to them, but they still said no. As you stated, David, sometimes it doesn’t work out. A sales mentor said one time, “If they can’t kill you or eat you, it’s going to be OK.”
Bummer on losing that project, David. It sounds like, as you said, you did everything right and the deal still didn’t work out. Your sales mentor shared wise words indeed. We’re fortunate to be in a line of work where the worst bruisings we risk are to our egos or, perhaps, our bank accounts.
I’m glad you shared your situation, David, and am hopeful there’s a win for you right around the corner!
Thanks for sharing David. A very timely article for me – I just lost a project that’s essentially my bread-and-butter.
My learning: I got beat on the price.
I was mourning and heading towards the chocolates but your article was very helpful.
Darn, Hussain, it’s especially difficult to lose a project that you already had in the bag or where you were the incumbent.
One place I’d gently push back is challenging whether you really lost the business on price. If fees were the only issue the client decided on, and you were already working on the assignment, then were you lost was on proving value and building irreplaceable Trust while you were engaged with the client. It’s very difficult to displace an incumbent consultant who’s delivering outstanding work. The real lesson may be to look at your client experience and delivery approach. Then again, maybe this is a situation where the client is totally strapped for cash and the only thing they care about is pennies–that’s not something you can control.
Either way, I very much appreciate your sharing your story and creating an opportunity for me and other readers to learn with you, Hussain.