Subject notebook
Clear scope, credible proposals and commercially sound agreements.
36 entries · Editorial years are reading-sequence years; historic years are capture years, not publication dates.
Editorial essay · 2025
A repeatable service can become a machine for applying yesterday's answer. The checklist is completed, the template is populated and the report arrives on time. Yet the client's unusual circumstance may never have influenced the recommendation.
Value & negotiation · 2 min
Editorial essay · 2025
A partnership often begins with shared enthusiasm and a promising client conversation. Problems emerge when neither firm has defined who owns the scope, who communicates with the buyer and who takes responsibility when work crosses the boundary.
Value & negotiation · 2 min
Editorial essay · 2025
An apparently successful client can consume more effort than the fee supports. Frequent revisions, fragmented stakeholders and urgent requests may turn attractive revenue into poor economics. This is not always a pricing failure; it can reveal a mismatch in how the two organisations work.
Value & negotiation · 2 min
Editorial essay · 2025
A firm can sell work faster than it can deliver it responsibly. The immediate revenue looks attractive, while the cost appears later as delayed starts, overloaded specialists and hurried decisions. Capacity is therefore a qualification issue, not merely an operations issue.
Value & negotiation · 2 min
Editorial essay · 2025
A pilot is useful when it reduces uncertainty that prevents a larger decision. It becomes wasteful when success is undefined, access is incomplete and nobody knows what follows. The project then continues because stopping feels awkward.
Value & negotiation · 2 min
Editorial essay · 2025
Most scope problems do not announce themselves as major changes. They arrive as a request to include one more team, revise one more document or answer a question that requires a new investigation. Each seems too small to discuss until the total becomes substantial.
Value & negotiation · 2 min
Editorial essay · 2025
A monthly retainer can stabilise revenue while leaving the client unsure what they are paying for. "Access to expertise" is sometimes sufficient, but it needs an operating definition. Otherwise the adviser sees a reserved capacity commitment and the client sees an unlimited service.
Value & negotiation · 2 min
Editorial essay · 2025
A paid diagnostic is defensible when it helps the client make a better decision, including the decision to use another provider or do the work internally. If its only useful output is a recommendation to buy your implementation service, the buyer has reason to doubt its independence.
Value & negotiation · 2 min
Editorial essay · 2025
Professional firms often describe flexibility as a virtue. It can be one. But a service that can become anything is difficult to evaluate, price and deliver. The buyer cannot see where the engagement ends, and the adviser cannot estimate the effort with confidence.
Value & negotiation · 2 min
Editorial essay · 2024
An annual sales review can become a story about how the successful deals were predictable and the unsuccessful ones were unlucky. That narrative protects confidence while limiting learning.
Value & negotiation · 2 min
Editorial essay · 2024
The client does not experience your sales team and delivery team as separate moral entities. A promise made by one becomes an expectation of the other. Internal explanations about who said what provide little comfort when the work begins badly.
Value & negotiation · 2 min
Editorial essay · 2024
A signed proposal is a commercial milestone, but the practical agreement extends beyond the signature. When does the work begin? Who owns the relationship? What information is needed? What could delay delivery? An unclear transition can undo the confidence built during the sale.
Value & negotiation · 2 min
Editorial essay · 2024
A deal that goes quiet invites storytelling. The seller imagines a hidden competitor, an internal crisis or a procurement delay. Any of these may be true. None should become a fact merely because it makes the silence easier to tolerate.
Value & negotiation · 2 min
Editorial essay · 2024
"It is too expensive" can mean the buyer cannot afford the work, cannot justify it, does not trust it or does not want to continue. Treating every version as a request for a rebuttal risks answering the wrong question with increasing enthusiasm.
Value & negotiation · 2 min
Editorial essay · 2024
When a buyer asks for a lower price, the seller may hear a threat to the relationship. The immediate concession feels like a way to preserve goodwill. But a price reduction without a corresponding change can create confusion about the offer's value and the firmness of its scope.
Value & negotiation · 2 min
Editorial essay · 2024
Underpricing can look generous at the point of sale and become ungenerous during delivery. The adviser starts counting every extra request, postpones difficult conversations and resents work the client reasonably believes was included.
Value & negotiation · 2 min
Editorial essay · 2024
Offering three packages can help a buyer compare approaches. It can also become a pricing trick in which one option exists mainly to make another look attractive. Professional advice deserves a more defensible structure.
Value & negotiation · 2 min
Editorial essay · 2024
A proposal is often asked to do work that should have happened in discussion. It introduces the diagnosis, scope, price and decision process all at once, then waits for a response. Silence is unsurprising when the buyer has so much to resolve alone.
Value & negotiation · 2 min
