Committees

When a prospective client says, “We have a committee handling the selection process for this assignment,” you might feel the urge to pack it up and head back to the office.

Maybe it’s called by another name–a task force, work group, or an evaluation team–but journalist Richard Harkness once observed that a committee is “a group of the unwilling, picked from the unfit, to do the unnecessary.”

For companies steeped in the committee tradition, though, members can take comfort from the knowledge that they have little or no personal accountability for their decisions. If you ask about a decision that didn’t go your way, for instance, they can pin the blame on “the committee” and dodge your inquiry.

No matter what clients tell you, a committee isn’t a decision-making body at all. Someone (or a small cadre) on that committee is calling the shots. The others may have veto power, but they rarely have the influence to counter the wishes of the real decision maker(s).

Playing only to a committee as a whole is a fool’s errand. As with any sale, your job is to find the decision makers, understand their perspectives on value, and co-design a solution with them that outshines anything your competitors can offer.

If you’re facing a selection committee and you haven’t any idea who has influence, or where the power lies, think twice before jumping into the fray. There’s a high likelihood that one of your competitors does know the lay of the land.

I’m not suggesting that you walk away from clients who use a committee process (though some consultants choose to do that). But you do need to find a path to the real decision makers on a committee and appeal to them.

If a decision maker rebuffs your efforts, you may already be out of the running. So don’t be surprised if you eventually hear your committee liaison say, “Sorry, you weren’t selected for this project. The committee opted to go in another direction.”