We are talking about “apples to apples,” and I could not find any apples; these are socks. When you are pitching to win a project, a competitive sales pitch, orals interview, shortlist presentation—whatever you want to call those things where you do the presentation, then you ask your Q&A, and a selection committee is picking between several teams to award a project to—this is exactly when you don’t want the “apples to apples to apples to apples” comparison. Because the “apples to apples” comparison drives price down or allows the selection committee to pick who they like or who they’ve already worked with because the teams are all the same anyway. You need to be able to differentiate.
When we look at teams on how to differentiate, there’s a number of different dimensions that you can do that on. The number one that we focus on is having a point of view. It’s not just all the millions of things you have to talk about in an interview; it’s that you have a perspective on how they’re going to win, an overarching perspective. You challenge them to see your point of view, and that makes it at least “apples to apples to apples to starfruit.”
There are some other ways to get there. One other way is to really study the selection committee and figure out what the personalities are like. Are they big-picture people who want the point? Are they detail-oriented people who really want to understand exactly how everything’s going to work? Are they team people who want to know the politics, the consensus, how the groups fit together? Or are they vision types who want your passion, they want understanding, alignment to your vision, and they want emotion and passion? You can differentiate your presentation to match the personality styles.
The third way is your approach. Are you traditional? Are you interactive? Don’t be another apple in the line of apples. You want to differentiate on several fronts. In review, the first front is point of view. Be there with a clear perspective. Second, adapt the way you’re presenting the information and your presenting style to the personalities of the selection committee. And third, pick an approach that makes sense, even if they’re parameters given; there’s sometimes wiggle room so that you can differentiate on your choice of how you interact with that selection committee.
If you do all of those things—challenge with the point of view, match the listening styles of your selection committee, and design a standout format—you can differentiate inside of that “apples to apples” comparison. Suddenly, you stand out, and you have a chance to break that pattern that drives price down and says to the selection committee, “They’re all about the same anyway; we can go with the team we like.” You need to be able to differentiate.
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