One conversation, and both of us decide.
Thirty minutes. No deck, and nothing to prepare. By the end of it we both need to know whether this is a fit.
The call is complimentary. I treat it as my side of finding out whether we should work together.
- 01What is happening nowYou talk. I ask the questions that separate what you can see from what is underneath it.
- 02Whether I can helpI only take on work I can move.
- 03What it would takeIf there is a fit, we agree what the session needs to look at and what the prep calls need to cover.
You are choosing me. I am also choosing you. In my experience that changes how the rest of it goes, on both sides.
What the call covers.
What is happening now
You talk. I ask the questions that separate what you can see from what is underneath it.
Whether I can help
I only take on work I can move.
What it would take
If there is a fit, we agree what the session needs to look at and what the prep calls need to cover.
If it is not a fit, you still get something out of the call.
I turn down more of these than I take on.
Not out of scarcity. An engagement that cannot work is worse for both of us than a short conversation that ends with a straight answer, and I would rather be the person who told you the truth in half an hour than the one who billed you for six months to reach the same place.
When that happens I will tell you what I think you need instead. If I know somebody better placed to do it, I will make the introduction. My network is forty-plus years deep and it is the part of this I give away.