Mary, an executive vice president of a large company, was frustrated. She had big plans for her division, but when she handed a project off to one of her managers, it would end up either completed late, or not completed at all. She was ready to fire the entire group and start over!

Because she knew she had good people in the positions, we helped her look at her part in project leadership and conveying a vision to her team.

She already successfully uses "outcome-based strategy" for project planning. This involves the following steps: Think through the outcome you want and the benefits you'll receive. Then think through the outcome the customer or employee receives, including what they want, and the benefits to them.

The missing piece of this puzzle is "Outcome-Based Conversations". The same key issues Mary knew so well from her strategy or sales processes can also be applied to her communication process...not just with customers, but also co-workers, employees, and family members!

Build the Outcome

Let's say you need to ask a co-worker to help you with a project. Take five minutes to think about the end result you want--what is the ideal outcome? What is the worst-case outcome? What would it mean to you to achieve either one?

Let's go back to our example:

Mary needs her marketing department to develop some material for a crucial presentation to their client. In the past, Mary would make a quick phone call, or catch the marketing person in the hallway, briefly give the requirements...and run off to the next meeting (time is valuable, after all!). The marketing person, recognizing that his time is valuable, tosses the request on top of his stack of other "urgent requests" and moves on to his top priority (which at this point isn