Some Unexpected Advice…
Several years ago, I was chatting with a friend / mentor of mine (someone who had spent years as a management consultant at one of the world’s most well-known consulting firms). I had just accepted a job to work for a consulting firm in Boston, and wanted his advice.
“What is one of the biggest mistakes you see inexperienced consultants make?” I asked
His answer was immediate: “They always forget to pre-wire the room”
I’d never heard of the term “pre-wiring” before. So I asked him to explain. He responded by telling me this story…
The Right Answer, Delivered the Wrong Way
“Back when I was a consultant, I was once assigned to a client who owned a large steel mill operation in the Western USA. Steel mills make money about every 3 years because of the cyclical nature of the industry and the high fixed cost up front.
This client in particular had 2 main products: steel plates and steel coils.
- Coils went through the mill very quickly. They were cheaper to make, but also sold for less. There were also quite a few competitors in the coil market.
- Plate was slow and expensive to make, but was worth a high amount per ton in revenue. Very few competitors could make plate as well as this particular client.
As you would expect, the client liked to make and sell plates throughout the year, as it generally made more money per ton of steel. However profits were struggling, which was why my consulting firm was being brought in to see if they could find a solution.
Long story short: After a few weeks of analysis, my consulting team realized something extremely important. The client’s process was so good at making steel, it could actually produce coil for less cost than most competitors. If they were to lower their coil prices they could grab the entire market!
However, there was a catch. The steel factory had limited capacity. That meant if they wanted to produce more coil, they would have to stop producing plate (the product that was the current money maker for the company). This would mean that the mill would have to essentially fire their plate customers, so they could free up capacity to serve more coil customers.
I went to the CEO and showed him the data. If he were to raise the prices on plate (so most of the mill’s plate customers would choose to go elsewhere) they could free up capacity for the lower priced coil. The plate business would decrease, and the coil business would increase. While the competitors got the slower plate business, the client steel mill would be printing money, to the tune of an additional $100M in profit!
The data was so compelling that the CEO was completely sold on the spot. The consultants were completely sold. Every executive in the room was completely sold. But one person was not. The VP of Sales.
He had spent years building up great long-term relationships with plate buyers. Many had become his friends. And now he was hearing that his company was essentially going to raise prices so high that all of these customers he had nurtured would leave (and probably in anger).
The VP of Sales adamantly refused to go along with the plan.
The meeting ended with the CEO literally pounding the table with his hand while yelling at the VP of Sales that he absolutely had to do this or find another job. The VP of Sales resigned on the spot.”
The Right Answer, Delivered the Wrong Way
My mentor realized he had made a terrible mistake. He had gotten the right answer but didn’t deliver it the right way.
He told me “what I didn’t realize was that my stakeholder wasn’t only the CEO, but his entire team. I should have met with the VP of Sales (and every other executive) privately before presenting to his boss. I should have brought him on-board with the idea. I should have even had him present it alongside me. My job was to make him look good in front of his boss.”
Your job isn’t just to get the answer right. It’s not even to persuade the decision maker. It’s to make sure that the right idea survives and is implemented after you leave the room. And that will only happen if the leadership is 100% bought into it. You not only want the CEO to be nodding in agreement, you want every other head to be nodding in agreement as well. And that only happens if you take the time to “pre-wire them”
This means taking the time to meet with each and every one of your stakeholders in advance and persuade them to the idea, so that when that presentation finally hits the CEO’s desk, they’ve all given it their blessing and buy-in.
How to Pre-Wire Your Audience
Identify the Right Folks
When prepping your idea for presentation, think carefully about who all the stakeholders really are. Think “who else besides the decision maker is going to be impacted by this?” It may not be the person paying your consulting check or giving the green light to a decision. It may not even be someone with a VP or C-level title next to their name.
A great litmus test is to use the questions “whose job will this recommendation impact?” or “who will actually have to implement this idea or change their way of working to accommodate it?” Those are the folks you need to get onboard first.
Pre-Wire Well in Advance of the Pitch Meeting
Ask to meet with each of these stakeholders (in small groups or even individually). Show them the analysis and the recommendation. Tell them “I’m going to present this to the boss in a few weeks, but I want to get this right. You have an invaluable perspective. What would you add/change? What are we missing?”
Ask them to participate. Ask to do a practice presentation with them. Ask them to co-present along-side you (if possible).
Make them feel like this is as much their idea as it is yours. People will defend what they feel like they own. And you definitely want them backing you when pitch day comes.
Give Credit
One clever thing I’ve seen others do is to have a slide (at the very beginning of the presentation) that thanks everyone by name who gave their input. It shows everyone is bought-in to some extent and also builds your reputation as someone who shares credit easily, which is something that builds serious loyalty to you and your ideas.
Downsides of Pre-Wiring
Although I’m a major advocate of pre-wiring, it does have some drawbacks
- It takes far longer and can slow down “time to market” speed for any idea
- Pre-wiring can sometimes lead to the “too many cooks in the kitchen” phenomenon
- The idea can get watered down after passing through too many hands
- In the worst instances, some people just won’t agree with you and may actively try to kill the idea before you ever get the chance to present it!
Last thoughts
Pre-wiring takes time, but it is 100% worth the effort. It will not only ensure your ideas live to see the light of day, but you’ll also build a reputation as someone who brings others along to a united consensus (an incredibly valuable skill no matter the size of the organization you work in).
After all, what good is having the right answer if you can’t get everyone to actually go along with it?
