The BD jigsaw
At LINAR we get up early. Collectively, the team has a bunch of young children and so there are regularly calls at 0630 – 0700 before the school run begins and/or the work calls with customers start.
A couple of weeks ago, I was listening to BBC Radio 2 and the Pause for thought segment. The Irish priest started to tell a story about life being similar to a jigsaw puzzle. A lot of what he said resonated and, as I thought some more about what the priest had said, I found there was a large similarity between jigsaws and BD.
So, thanks to Brian D’Arcy, this week’s Three Things focuses on the sales and BD lessons we can learn from jigsaw puzzles. Enjoy.
#1. See the bigger picture
“I have two kinds of problems: the urgent and the important. The urgent are not important, and the important are never urgent.” — Dwight D. Eisenhower
In professional services BD & marketing, everything always appears urgent. Whether it’s a pitch, webinar, social post or event, the timescales are always too short and we seem to move from one thing to another at breakneck pace.
Get into a regular habit of taking 10-15 minutes every week to look at the bigger picture. Is everything you’re being asked to do really that valuable? What should you prioritise and push back on? How do the activities and tasks you’re working on support the achievement of the firm / sector / practice group / department / team objectives?
Struggling to sort out what’s important? You could do a lot worse than to use the classic four box model below to organise your week.
#2. If the piece don’t fit…
We’ve all been in BD & sales situations akin to pushing sh^t uphill. Despite logic, data and plain common sense arguments, your key stakeholder (lawyer, accountant, engineer) has strong views on the way to proceed that frankly are a work of pure fiction.
Remain calm. Reassess your counter arguments but do not give up. Is there an alternate way to convince your stakeholder? Might there be a path where everyone comes out on top?
Still no luck? It happens. At this point, you have to make a decision. Is the point you’re trying to get across important enough to derail the entire project? If not, you may need to move on and save your ammo for the bigger battle*…
*the author fully acknowledges this is incredibly hard to do and SUCKS big time.
#3. Perserverance is key
Jigsaws take time. Once you’ve got all the edge pieces sorted (the big picture), filling in the rest will take patience and perseverance. Some pieces will be easy, other times you’ll spend ages looking and not see what’s right in front of your faces.
BD and sales campaigns share a lot of synergies with jigsaw puzzles. Pulling together the big picture is relatively simple. Executing that big picture by filling in the missing bits is anything but. Here’s three tips for getting the job done:
- Stick to the plan: it’s common in professional services to get distracted by something new and shiny before the current activity has been completed. Make sure you see your plan out to its logical conclusion and develop SMART metrics to allow you to measure success.
- Get a different view: when you’re head down on an activity, your thinking and perspective can become too narrow. If you’re facing a challenge on a particular aspect of your project, ask a colleague to provide their view. It just might unlock what is required to move on.
- Keep going: at times, the challenge will appear insurmountable. When this happens, get away from your screen and head out for some fresh air. Whether it’s at home or in the office, take 15-20min to gather your thoughts on how to attack the problem anew, one piece at a time. Don’t give up – it’ll be worth it in the end.
