Epiphanies

One of the least appreciated responsibilities of a consultant is not delivering recommendations but recognizing when a client’s mental model no longer matches reality. Over the years, I have learned that the best consultants rarely win arguments where a client is deeply entrenched in a belief. The only way forward for us is to help […]

Recently, I had my annual HVAC inspection. Like most homeowners, I view these visits as preventative maintenance. A technician arrives, inspects the equipment, performs a few routine tasks, and hopefully can assure me that everything appears to be operating properly. This year was different. A younger technician asked me to stay for a minute after

The Difference Between a Coach and a “Great Coach” There seems to be no shortage of “life” and “business” coaches these days, and some of the more entrepreneurial ones appear to be making a fortune selling courses on how to become a coach. That is not what I mean when I talk about coaching. What

When Everyone Agrees, Nothing Can Move One of the most dangerous moments in an organization is not when something breaks. It is when a room full of intelligent, capable people quietly agrees that nothing can move forward. I encountered this again in a recent meeting. The account team was pushing to deliver more value for

When I wrote Epiphany 23 — Contribution Value Beats Contract Value I was trying to call attention to something simple and yet often overlooked: Delivering exactly what was paid for is not the same as delivering what matters to the client. That distinction has held up well over time. But there’s a deeper truth beneath

When I wrote Epiphany 8, Showing the Love, the lesson was simple but powerful: At the time, that felt like the breakthrough. But recently, in a conversation with one of my advisory clients, I found myself asking a harder question — one that exposed a more uncomfortable layer of partnership. Do you think the client

There was a moment in my career when I realized I had been approaching RFPs in the wrong way. I thought RFPs were about demonstrating our expertise, the sophistication of our methodology, and the innovative nature of our work, while staying within the client’s budget constraints. It turns out that’s how you lose. Committees don’t

There’s a moment every consultant eventually faces — the quiet frustration of realizing that no matter how much data you show, how many times you explain it, or how clearly you map the financial impact… the client just won’t act. You see the train coming. You warn them — sometimes repeatedly — but they keep

In Epiphany 7: The Importance of Fundamentals and Root Causes, I wrote that almost every problem—whether technical, organizational, or strategic—can be traced back to a neglected fundamental or an untreated root cause. We don’t fail because we lack ideas or ambition; we fail because we abandon the basics that make progress repeatable. That idea came

Adjusting the Variables Without Challenging Their Authority On our podcast last week, our guest Jason Kilgore outlined a challenge many of us face in our organizations, where executives have already decided to replace team members with AI. The decision was made, final in their minds. They didn’t disclose the variables they used to arrive at