trusting my intuition - and making the call

Last week I had an awkward sales call. I thought we were getting to know each other - "let's talk and decide if we want to work together". So I was prepared to have a deeper conversation about their problems, our philosophy, potential solutions, and how we might structure our work. I left feeling completely ambushed.

As I sat in the parking lot, dazed and confused, I thought about what happened. I didn't have the level of interaction and connection that I have come to expect. I didn't get any positive signals. A few things seemed really strange...

1. The guys I met with continued to stress how complex their change was... I thought OK so this is a relatively big change - restructuring, layoffs, and new roles. But in the big scheme of things?... not so complicated. I wondered - how come he thinks this is so complex?
2. They were concerned about our capacity and scale - how would we be able to ramp up, what happens if they don't like someone on the team... It seemed that he didn't get our approach at all. that we don't build a small empire and that we push the work back onto the managers to lead the change. that having a gigantic team of consultants is not going to change behaviors. They just kept pushing on how we would scale up and make sure people were available
3. They wanted industry experience...considering I had worked at their company for 8 months, I wasn't sure what this was all about. especially considering our variety of industries and depth of expertise. seemed really weird that they kept asking about this.

It seemed that they were looking for reasons to not hire us.

Today I found out that they selected a big-4 consulting firm to help them. All the pieces now fit together. Typical MO... this change is really big and complicated, you need a really big team, and you need a gigantic bench of resources in case it gets even bigger and more complicated. And we have deep industry experts who can provide deep industry expertise.

What I learned - hard, hard lessons.

• Why didn't I ask if they were looking at other consulting firms? - I could have easily turned the conversation around...
• Why didn't I stop the meeting and say that this was not what I expected? - I could have dug to find out what was really going on...
• Why didn't I do one more conversation prior to flying there to confirm expectations for the meeting? - if they met with the other firm and had different priorities I could have prepared...
• Why didn't I get skeptical when the main guy wasn't able to meet with us? - I could have rescheduled, or at least figured out what was going on...
• Why did I accept the meeting getting cut short because they were late?

Because I had worked there before, I had a direct referral, and our phone conversation went well... I trusted that the next step would be continuing to build the relationship. I haven't been side swiped by another firm before. I let my guard down, didn't read the signals, didn't take action when it was obviously needed, and lost the opportunity.

So what a great learning as I develop my sales acumen. But what a crappy way to have to learn these lessons. Hopefully I got it and don't have to learn this again.