The buyer knows within minutes whether you did the homework. This one-page diagnosis makes you answer four questions before the meeting, not during it. Fill it in and you walk in to confirm, not to gather. Enter your email and it lands in your inbox.
The Business Problem Diagnosis from the article. Four questions, already laid out. Free.
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The weather sets the context. The ambition names the destination. The obstacle is where you earn the right to sell. The stake is why the person in the room actually cares.
What industry-wide pressures is this company navigating? Named in their sector's own language, not a generic macro trend. Something you could quote from a trade publication this quarter.
What is this company trying to achieve in the next 12 to 18 months? A stated initiative with a number or a date attached, pulled from an earnings call, a press release, or a job posting. Not an inference.
What stands between where they are and where they want to go? A blocker you can describe without mentioning your product. If your product is the answer here, you have written a pitch, not a diagnosis.
What does the executive in front of you care about personally? Something they chose to say in public, a post, a talk, a hire they made, and what it costs them if this year goes badly.
It is where you show you already understand them. When you walk in knowing the pressure their industry is under, the goal they have committed to in public, and the blocker in the way, the meeting stops being an interview and becomes a conversation between peers. The worksheet forces that prep. If you cannot finish the sentence, you do not know the answer yet.
One page. Four questions to answer before a discovery call: the weather (industry pressures), the ambition (what they are trying to achieve), the obstacle (what is in the way), and the stake (what the executive cares about personally). Each has a "what good looks like" prompt and space to write, plus a go / no-go check to score yourself before you accept the meeting.
Because the buyer can tell the difference between a seller who did the homework and one who is using the call to do it. If you walk in already knowing the weather, the ambition, and the obstacle, you spend the meeting confirming and going deeper, not gathering basics. The blanks you cannot fill are your prep list.
Count your marks before you accept the meeting. Four "Know it" and you are ready to diagnose. Two or more "Guessing" or "Blank" and what you booked is a research call, not a discovery call. Spend fifteen more minutes, or change what you ask for.
90 minutes. Your team. A business case framework they'll actually use.