Getting to the real decision maker

A designer recently shared a tale about how important it is to make sure the real decision maker is involved in a project from the beginning. Here’s what happened to Robert:

Robert recently met with the President of a company about a large project.

Robert noticed that the President seemed to be lacking passion and involvement, but since the company staff was deferential to him, and the title “President” was printed plainly on his business card, Robert decided his authority seemed solid.

After Robert met with the President, he followed up with members of the marketing and operations teams to get more information about the project. A few times, someone suggested that Robert meet the Owner.  Unfortunately, the Owner always ended up being “too busy.”

Robert began to get the impression that the Owner, not the President, was the real decision maker, and considered “pushing” the President to introduce him to the Owner. But he was concerned about challenging the President’s authority – or seeming like he was trying to go over the President’s head.

Ultimately, Robert wrote the proposal, and the President accepted it.  Robert put his team to work. 

When Robert presented the creative, the President forwarded it to the Owner, who said, “It wasn’t what we were expecting.”

In the end, Robert lost the account.

Robert shared this story as a lesson about the importance of finding, and meeting with, the real decision maker.

This topic also came up in a recent interview I did with Petrula Vrontikis. Here's how she finds the real decision maker.

Has this happened to you? What can you do to avoid this scenario? How can you “push” the President to meet the Owner without seeming “pushy”?

Comments

[Ginger Donnan]

When I sit down with the potential client to discuss a project in advance of a proposal, I ask for the names of all the employees who will be involved in the event and how they will be involved. If the prospect is not immediately forthcoming, I start asking questions about individual tasks associated with the project and whether they want me to handle it or they will be handling it. That usually gets them talking about their individual people.

[Jill Anderson]

Thank you so much for bringing up this subject as I'm currently having trouble with too many decisions makers on a project.

I was contracted to do a logo + website for a doctor's office with 6 doctors. My contact is the office manager. While my rapport with the office manager is good and she has generally liked my designs, getting 6 doctors to agree on one of the three logo concepts has been a nightmare with many revisions. After a finally getting the logo completed, we're now in the website stage, and it's so hard to get feedback so I can move the project along in a timely manner. Everything is so dragged out that a project that would usually take about 6-8 weeks has been lagging for months and months.

In the future, I feel like I might not except projects where there are more than 2 decision makers.

Does anyone else have suggestions for dealing with multiple decision makers whose opinions are all equal, as with a doctor's office?

[Catherine]

Jill, we've had that problem a couple of times, with the same exasperation as yours.
What I started to do is ask who the decision maker(s)is (or are)and, indeed, if there are more than two, I will recommend that they elect one or two people at most. I explain that when there are too many decision makers it makes the creative process usually longer and more difficult for all involved, and in the end, not necessarily with the best results.
It has worked well to the benefit of both us and the clients.

But, I also had to put my foot down with a customer last year. I told my contact (very nicely and firmly) that our intention was to complete the project on budget, but they had to help us out on their end because that is not how we usually work, that this was a very unusual situation and if this was to continue, we would have to start billing the extra hours. The client agreed and they started to make decisions faster.
Well, believe it or not, they gave us more work this year and brought me out to lunch twice...
Oh, and yes, we are dealing with a lawyers' association right now and there are 6 lawyers involved(for the past year, actually), and it is hell! I have mentioned that there will be extra fees and why, and my contact said OK. She has no choice, she knows that what they asking for is out of the boundaries of the original contract and that they were asking for too many revisions.

We have since decided that if there are too many people involved we will refuse a contract. After all, it really is not worth the trouble and the energy.

[Jill Anderson]

Thanks, Catherine! I almost feel that even if I charge extra fees, the hassle is just not worth it for the extra decisions makers. I've done some thinking, and it seems my favorite clients with the projects that turn out the best are small business owners where there is usually only 1, maybe 2, decision makers. I'm going to start listening to the voice in my head when I'm talking to a prospect who tells me more than 2 or 3 people will be involved. It almost seems better to turn down a job, so I'll have more room in my shcedule for the types of projects and people I like.

[Neil Tortorella]

The technique I use is to simply ask, "Who, beside yourself, will be responsible for approvals?" This does a few things.

First, it gets me the name or names of others in the approval process and clues me in as to whether or not it's a committee approval thing. If it is, I'll ask that the approval group designate one point of contact for me, although I tell them I'll need to meet the whole group before we go any further.

Second, people can often try to appear as though they have more authority than they really do. Sometimes it's intentional, other times it just kind of happens. Either way, the contact can be put in a potentially embarrassing situation when approval times rolls around. By asking this question, they save face.