You will be able to build a worksheet that helps a buyer put a number on their problem during the meeting.
Set aside about twenty-five minutes before your next discovery meeting to make and test one page. The page holds the questions and arithmetic for that meeting, and you bring it with you.
In lesson 4.2, "Put a number on the impact, with the buyer", Priya worked out the cost of Joel's problem on a scrap of paper. It worked, but Priya was improvising. On a busy day Priya could have forgotten a question or made an arithmetic error in front of Joel. An impact worksheet removes the improvising. It is a single page you bring to discovery meetings. It holds questions that get the buyer's own numbers, a simple calculation the buyer can follow, and space for urgency.
The example throughout is Hafiz, who sells payroll software to small and medium firms.
Start with your three most common root problems from lesson 4.1, "Find the problem underneath the first problem". Root problems are problems that cost money, time or reputation, as opposed to surface complaints. Three is enough, and if you hear more than three, pick the three you hear most often.
Hafiz listed three. Payroll corrections take admin staff days every month. Managers lose time handling pay complaints. Staff leave partly because they stop trusting their pay.
For each problem, write questions that let the buyer estimate its size. As in lesson 4.2, the questions target frequency, duration and cost per event, and every input should come from the buyer. Hafiz wrote these:
Problem one: how many days a month payroll takes, including corrections; how many hours a working day is for that person; and roughly what an hour of that person's time costs the company. Problem two: how many hours a week the buyer spends on pay questions and complaints; how many weeks a year; and roughly what an hour of the buyer's time is worth to the business. Problem three: whether anyone left in the last year with pay as part of the reason; and what it costs to replace one person, including hiring and training.
Read each question aloud. If one sounds like a form, rephrase it so it sounds like conversation. Lesson 2.3, "Questions that sound like interrogation, and fixes", shows how.
Under each set of questions, write a simple calculation with blanks for the buyer's numbers. Keep it simple enough to check in your head or on a phone, such as hours a week times weeks a year. Leave out any calculation that would need a spreadsheet in the meeting.
Below the three calculations, add a total line that sums the problems. Under the total, leave a line for the reading-back sentence: the total stated back to the buyer using their numbers, with a question asking whether it sounds right or needs changing. It is the same line used in lesson 4.2. Hafiz wrote: "So, using your numbers, that's about [total] a year. Does that sound right, or would you change anything?"
At the bottom of the page, add the two urgency questions from lesson 4.3, "Urgency: why now, and what if nothing changes". They are "What made you look at this now?" and "If nothing changes in the next year, what happens?" Leave room beside them to note the date or event driving urgency, if there is one.
Test the worksheet on a colleague or friend before you use it with a buyer. Give them a short brief describing a buyer with one of your problems, let them invent their own numbers, and run it like a real meeting. While you run it, watch for three things: a question that confuses them, a calculation they cannot follow, and a point where they start to feel interrogated.
Afterwards, ask them directly which question was hardest to answer and why. Then fix those questions.
When Hafiz tested the page, the question "What is an hour of your time worth?" confused the colleague, who did not know how to answer. Abstract value questions like this can confuse buyers as well as testers. Hafiz changed it to "If you hired someone to take this off your plate, what would you expect to pay them an hour?" and got an answer straight away. Asking what the buyer would pay someone else to do the work gets an answer faster than asking what an hour is worth.
Rachel, a buyer, answered Hafiz's worksheet. For problem one, Rachel said payroll takes 2 days a month, a working day is 8 hours, and an hour of that time costs the company S$25 (an example figure). Over 12 months that is 2 days x 8 hours x 12 months = 192 hours a year, and 192 hours x S$25 an hour = S$4,800.
For problem two, Rachel spends 3 hours a week on pay questions and complaints, over 50 weeks, which is 150 hours a year of Rachel's time. Rachel valued an hour at S$40, so 150 hours x S$40 an hour = S$6,000.
For problem three, 1 driver left in the past year, and Rachel estimated the replacement cost at S$3,000. That gives 1 x S$3,000 = S$3,000.
The total line reads S$4,800 + S$6,000 + S$3,000 = S$13,800 a year, built from Rachel's own figures.
On urgency, Rachel answered "What made you look at this now?" with a new night shift starting in two months. Asked "If nothing changes in the next year, what happens?", Rachel said, "overtime would double and I'd lose my mind." Hafiz recorded both answers and wrote the month the night shift starts beside them.
Your page is finished when it covers your three most common problems, with questions that draw out the buyer's own figures for each, a calculation the buyer can follow, and space for urgency and its date. It also needs to have been tested once, with at least one confusing question changed.
Open a blank page, write your product's name at the top, and start with the three problems.
Build the worksheet for your product. Try it with a colleague playing the buyer, then rewrite any question that confused them.
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