The Ask
• How can we best work together? • Why don't I ask a few simple questions and prepare a proposal for you? • What are your budget constraints, if any? • What is the decision making process here? • Can you decide on this
The View From Here
I'm in Newport this week conducting the Million Dollar Consulting® College. Each morning I awake to the beautiful view of the bay leading to the Atlantic. Some mornings it's rough, some smooth as glass, but it's always the same vista.
Let’s Talk
Heads will roll in Brussels because government departments didn't talk to each other to share threat levels and terrorists' movements. The same phenomenon occurs within your clients. They focus more on talking to their customers than among their own people. The most
Stop Trying to Be Right
Your prospect has an issue that's been of concern for some time. Don't try to shine by solving it in 20 minutes in the office. You won't prove how bright you are, but will probably insult your prospect and also
Breakfast Is Not Included
At my hotel in Hamburg the woman at the desk specified that breakfast was not included in my room rate. I ignored that and asked if I could upgrade to a suite in any case (I hadn't made the original
Instant Rewards, Just Mix In Attentiveness
My coordinator at Caesar's Palace in Las Vegas reacted immediately when I told her the bartender at the reception the prior evening was terrific. "That was Jimmy," she said, "and he'll get points for that immediately." She explained that any
Go Long
When I was young, we'd gather in the schoolyard to play a variety of games, one of the most popular of which was touch football. In the huddle, the quarterback would actually tell each kid what to do: "You block
My Son Is A PhD, Not the Kind of Doctor Who Helps People
The way the medical system is today, the traditional family doctor (now your "primary physician") can't do very much! The minor stuff is handled by a physician's assistant, who is empowered to treat patients and write prescriptions, and the major
Overhead
Large organizations (and small ones) have bureaucracies, overhead, which eat into profit. Some of it is needed, much of it is not. I believe entire human resource departments, for example, are simply unnecessary overhead. The problem is that many solo consultants
Do They Have Budget?
Many people I coach are flummoxed that what they believed was complete agreement with the buyer fell to pieces when the buyer sees the fee for the first time—even modest fees. Some feel betrayed, others feel like failures. Whenever you're dealing