enterprise-deal-strategy

---
name: enterprise-deal-strategy
description: Strategy for complex enterprise deals and named accounts — MEDDPICC qualification with evidence and confidence, buying-committee and stakeholder mapping, champion testing, multi-threading plans, mutual action plans (including security, legal and procurement steps), deal reviews, stalled-deal recovery, close plans and forecast hygiene. Use it whenever the user asks "is this deal real", "who else do we need", "how do we get to the economic buyer", "build an account or deal plan", "deal review", "why is this stuck", "what's the close plan", or shares opportunity notes, call notes or CRM data and wants next steps. Also use it for strategic account plans and expansion plans for Tier-1 targets and existing customers.
---

# Enterprise Deal Strategy

Enterprise deals are rarely lost to a competitor's feature. They are lost to:
- **single-threading**: a single contact who moves on or goes quiet
- **an untested champion**
- **no compelling event**
- **an unknown paper process**
- **"do nothing"**

This skill makes those risks visible early, while there is still time to fix them.

## Core rule: evidence over optimism

Every qualification element carries a confidence level. "Confirmed by buyer" is a stricter form of Confirmed:
- **Confirmed by buyer:** they said it or did it. Record who, when, and their words.
- **Observed:** seen in documents or behavior, but not stated by the buyer.
- **Inferred:** our reasoning, with the basis written down.
- **Unknown.**

Never upgrade an inference to confirmed because the deal "feels good". A realistic deal review is useful; an optimistic one is harmful, because it misallocates time and wrecks the forecast.

## 1. MEDDPICC qualification

For each element, record: current evidence, confidence, the gap, and the **specific next action** that would close the gap (who, how, by when).

| Element | What "good" looks like | Typical gap-closing action |
|---|---|---|
| **Metrics** | The buyer has stated quantified outcomes in their own numbers (e.g. "launch PDPs in 2 days instead of 3 weeks across 40k SKUs") | Discovery on baseline, target and the value of the gap. Co-build the business case |
| **Economic buyer** | The person who can approve the spend is identified, has engaged, and has stated their priorities | Champion-brokered executive meeting; executive-to-executive outreach |
| **Decision criteria** | Written or stated technical, business and commercial criteria, ideally ones we helped shape | Ask for the evaluation scorecard; propose criteria that reflect the outcomes |
| **Decision process** | Steps, people and dates from now to decision are known | Map it with the champion. Ask how they bought something similar last time |
| **Paper process** | Security review, legal and redlines, procurement onboarding, signature authority and timelines are known | Ask early: "Once you decide, what has to happen before a PO exists?" |
| **Identified pain** | A specific pain with business impact and an owner who feels it, ideally tied to a strategic priority | Impact questions: cost of inaction, who else is affected |
| **Champion** | Someone with influence who is selling for us when we're not in the room, **tested by action** | Run the champion tests below |
| **Competition** | Alternatives known, including do-nothing, build-in-house and budget reallocation | Ask directly what else they're considering. Use landmine questions honestly |

**Champion tests.** Someone who likes us is a coach. A champion passes these:
1. **Influence:** others listen to them, and they have credibility with the economic buyer.
2. **Access:** they can and will get us to the economic buyer and the committee.
3. **Personal stake:** a win for them in this project, such as a goal, a career outcome or a pain they own.
4. **Action:** they have already done something costly for us, such as sharing internal information, setting up a meeting, or pushing back internally on our behalf.

If they haven't done anything costly yet, ask for something small and specific and see whether it happens. For example: "Could you introduce me to your VP with this short note?" Allow one or two follow-ups over about two weeks. If it still doesn't happen, treat them as a coach rather than a champion, and use the fallback route in the multi-threading plan, such as executive-to-executive outreach or another stakeholder.

**Deal grade** (use this to decide where to spend time):
- **A (commit-worthy):** pain, metrics and economic buyer confirmed; champion tested; decision and paper processes mapped; a mutual action plan agreed with dates.
- **B (real, with gaps):** pain confirmed and champion likely, but the economic buyer or paper process is unknown.
- **C (early or at risk):** pain is a hypothesis, single-threaded, no compelling event.
- **D (not qualified):** no credible pain hypothesis, no access to anyone in the buying function, or the buyer has ruled it out. Nurture, or disqualify.

Grade on the **weakest** element. Any C condition caps the deal at C, even if other elements meet B or A. One strong element can't carry a deal that has a structural gap.

## 2. Buying committee map

Typical enterprise roles. One person may hold several; large organizations often have 6–10+ people involved.

| Role | Cares about | Fears | Needs in order to say yes |
|---|---|---|---|
| Economic buyer | Strategic outcome, ROI, risk to their plan | Wasted spend, failed rollout | A credible business case, references, executive-level confidence |
| Executive sponsor | Visible progress on their priority | Being associated with a failure | Milestones and early wins they can report |
| Champion | Solving their problem and looking good | Backing a loser | Ammunition: internal deck, business case, answers to objections |
| Technical evaluator / IT / architecture | Integration, scalability, maintainability | Another system to support | Architecture fit, documentation, a proof of concept |
| Security / privacy / risk | Data protection, compliance, AI risk | A breach or regulatory exposure | Security package, questionnaire answers, DPA, certifications (exact) |
| Procurement | Price, terms, vendor risk, process compliance | Overpaying, missing a step | Clean vendor onboarding, competitive justification, standard terms |
| Legal | Liability, IP, data terms | Unbounded risk | Reasonable paper, a fast redline process |
| End users / functional leads | Daily workflow, quality, workload | Disruption, being replaced | A hands-on experience, a training plan, role clarity |
| Blocker (often the owner of the current approach or vendor) | Status quo, their prior decision | Losing control or credibility | Being heard, a role in the new state. Never route around them crudely |

For each person, record: name and title (verified), role(s), stance (supporter / neutral / skeptic / unknown), what we know about their priorities (with source), our relationship owner, last touch, and next step.

**Coverage rule:** a deal past early discovery should have active relationships with the economic buyer (or a confirmed path to them), the champion, and at least one technical or risk stakeholder. Single-threaded deals are flagged red regardless of how enthusiastic the contact is.

## 3. Multi-threading plan

- **Order of approach:**
  1. Start where you have the strongest relationship, usually the champion.
  2. Engage the economic buyer with a business-level message, ideally introduced by the champion, or executive to executive.
  3. Then the technical and risk stakeholders, with their specific content.
  4. Then end users.
- **Different angle per role, same core story.** Every message must be consistent with what everyone else in the account hears.
- **Separate threads.** Never CC people who aren't already in conversation together. Stagger the timing.
- **Ask the champion's permission** before going around them. Surprising your champion with a call to their boss can kill trust.
- **Assign owners on our side:** AE, SE, executive sponsor, CSM, partner. Peer-match by level.

## 4. Mutual action plan (MAP)

Build it *with* the buyer. Work backwards from **their** go-live or business date, not our quarter-end.

```
Goal: <business outcome> by <date> · Decision target: <date> · Signature target: <date>
| # | Milestone | Owner (them) | Owner (us) | Due | Status | Exit criteria |
1 Discovery & success criteria agreed
2 Solution/technical validation (demo → POC/pilot with written success criteria)
3 Business case co-built and reviewed with EB
4 Security review (questionnaire, docs, AI/data review) — start in parallel, not after
5 Reference calls
6 Commercial proposal & negotiation
7 Legal (MSA/DPA redlines) — start early; often the longest step
8 Procurement (vendor onboarding, supplier portal, PO)
9 Signature (confirm signatory + approval chain)
10 Kickoff / implementation start
```

**References:** track how often each reference customer has been used, brief them beforehand, and ask permission every time.

**Regulated buyers add gates.**
- **Banks and insurers:** third-party risk, model risk and DORA terms.
- **Health systems:** BAA, HITRUST, AI governance and value analysis.
- **Payers:** downstream-vendor oversight.

Map these from the matching playbook in `account-targeting-and-research/references/industry-playbooks/`.

Run the security, legal and procurement steps in parallel with evaluation wherever possible. Ask for the buyer's typical durations for these steps, and plan the timeline from their answer rather than guessing.

## 5. Deal review and stalled deals

**Red flags. Name them explicitly in any deal review:**
- single-threaded
- no economic buyer access
- champion untested
- no compelling event or date
- close date with no mutual action plan behind it
- "send me a proposal" before discovery
- pricing requested before value has been established
- paper process unknown late in the cycle
- evaluation criteria written by a competitor
- buyer has gone silent after a pricing conversation
- stage advanced without meeting its exit criteria

**Diagnosing a stall:**
- **Lost urgency:** urgency comes from their calendar, never ours.
  - Look for dates that are already real for them: a budget lock or planning deadline, a launch or season date, an incumbent or agency renewal, a peak-season change freeze, or a goal an executive has stated publicly.
  - If you don't know the date, ask for it: "When does the plan lock?"
  - Then work backwards from that date in a mutual action plan, and state the cost of missing it in their numbers. For example: "Missing the plan means another year of [their current process] at [their stated volume]."
  - If no date exists, agree an honest pause with a revisit date.
- **Lost access:** the champion left or went quiet. Go to other threads, through executive sponsors, with a useful reason to engage.
- **Hidden objection:** price, risk, politics. Ask directly and gracefully: "When deals like this stall, it's usually X, Y or Z. Is one of those happening here?"
- **Lost to do-nothing:** be honest. A clean "close the loop" message preserves the relationship for when timing changes.
- **Silence after pricing, especially pricing sent before value was established:**
  - Don't send more pricing, and don't discount into the silence.
  - Go back to value and process. Ask: "Has your VP seen the number yet, and in what context?" Offer to build the business case together, so the number reaches the economic buyer alongside the value rather than on its own.
- **"Budget planning is happening":** ambiguous, and very common. Ask which budget it is:
  - **Next year's budget** means our job now is to get into the plan. Offer the champion a business case and a one-page summary for the planning process, then align the close date to when the budget is released.
  - **Spare money in this year's budget** means confirm who releases it, and by when.

**Walk-away criteria.** Disqualifying is a skill, not a failure. Walk away when:
- there is a hard requirement we can't meet
- there is no access to the decision after repeated attempts
- the economic buyer has confirmed there is no budget or priority
- we are a "column fodder" third bid with a competitor's criteria

## 6. Forecast and CRM hygiene

- Each stage has exit criteria based on buyer actions, not seller activity. "Sent proposal" is not an exit criterion; "EB reviewed the business case and agreed to the MAP" is.
- **Forecast categories** (map these to the user's own category names):

| Category | Requires |
|---|---|
| **Commit** | Deal grade A, plus a signature date the buyer agreed to in the mutual action plan |
| **Best case** | Pain and champion confirmed; economic buyer identified with a credible path to them; buyer-stated timing exists but isn't locked in a mutual action plan |
| **Pipeline** | Grade B or C: credible pain (confirmed, or a hypothesis with evidence), but timing, economic buyer or process not yet established |
| **Omit / nurture** | Grade D, or no buyer activity for an extended period |

- Close dates come from the mutual action plan or from a timeline the buyer stated, not from quarter-end. If no date has been agreed with the buyer, mark the close date **unvalidated**. Don't move it arbitrarily. Use the user's fiscal calendar (in their company-and-offer file; the project instructions say where it lives) to judge what "this quarter" means. If it's unknown, assume calendar quarters and say so.
- **CRM writes** (stage, amount, close date, notes):
  - Show a before/after diff of the changed fields.
  - Get explicit user approval.
  - Never blank out existing data without flagging it.
  - Read the record back after writing.

## Outputs this skill produces
**Answer the user's actual question in the first two lines** ("No, this isn't commit-worthy yet, because…"), then give the supporting detail. Sellers skim. Default to a short version: verdict, the play, top 3 actions, and any drafts. Keep everything before the drafts to about 250 words. Put the full tables in an appendix, or provide them on request.

- **Deal review:** the verdict and grade first. Then **the play**, in five lines or fewer:
  - **Compelling event:** the date to anchor on. It must be *their* date.
  - **Where the money comes from:** new budget, or existing spend we would replace (an agency, contractors, an incumbent tool, internal hours).
  - **Smallest closable deal:** the smallest scope that could close on their timeline, such as one season, category, brand or phase under the approver's signing limit.
  - **The question that decides it.** For example: "Why didn't last year's evaluation go ahead?"
  - **The next move.** If they've gone silent, call first.

  After the play, list the top 3 actions with owners and dates. The MEDDPICC table and red flags go in an appendix. Close cheap gaps yourself: look up a half-known name or title now rather than listing it as unknown.
- **Committee map** table, with coverage gaps highlighted.
- **Multi-threading plan:** who, angle, channel, owner, timing.
- **Mutual action plan** draft (a customer-shareable version is written in buyer-friendly language with internal notes removed).
- **Close plan** for late-stage deals: remaining steps, risks, the negotiation position (see negotiation preparation in `business-case-and-proposal`).

Internal assessments (grades, champion weaknesses, red flags) must **never** appear in customer-facing versions. Run any shareable mutual action plan through `customer-facing-quality-gate`.

## Related
- `meeting-prep-and-discovery` for preparing the next conversation that closes a gap.
- `competitive-and-objections` for competitive positioning and objection handling.
- `business-case-and-proposal` for metrics, ROI, the proposal and negotiation.
- `references/account-plan-template.md` for a full strategic account plan (Tier-1 accounts and existing-customer expansion).

From writer/skills at 20837c9, shown as plain text under its license: CC0-1.0 (permissive). The license text is in LICENSE.

• SKILL.md16 KB · 2ebd5aecca64
• references/
• account-plan-template.md2.5 KB · 1efa7657cd35

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