10 Lessons from 10 Years in Business Lesson two: Qualify well and know your client inside out

A conversation with Niall Anderson 

For the second lesson in our 10 Lessons from 10 Years in Business series, I sat down with smart/tasking CEO Niall Anderson to talk about something he believes sits at the heart of successful consulting, sales and transformation work: truly understanding your client. 

Not surface-level research. Not generic discovery questions. But deep context - understanding the market, the pressures, the ambition, the politics, the risks and the real consequences of action (or inaction). 

Here’s what he had to say. 

Kate Shanks: When you say ‘know your client inside out’, what does that actually look like in practice? 

Niall Anderson: For me, it always starts with context. Before I meet anyone, I want to understand the market they operate in. Is that market growing, flat or declining? Because that changes everything. 

If a market is flat, helping someone grow by 2% is significant. If the market is booming at 10%, then 2% isn’t that impressive. 

Then I want to understand the maturity of the business itself. What are they trying to achieve? What’s their ambition? Are they focused on growth? Optimisation? Retention? Compliance? 

Most of this information is there if you bother to look. Public companies tell you a lot in annual reports and investor updates. You can see how investors feel, where the pressure is coming from, what the strategic priorities are. 

Then I start connecting dots. How are they performing compared to competitors? Who’s growing faster? Why? What are they doing differently? 

That’s where qualification becomes powerful, because you stop talking about products or services and start understanding what really matters to the business. 

Kate: Did you reach a point in your career where you realised qualification mattered more than pitching? 

Niall: Absolutely. 

One of the biggest mistakes businesses make is spending too much time chasing opportunities they were never going to win. Good qualification isn’t just about winning more, it’s about qualifying out faster. 

Sometimes the most disruptive thing you can say is: “We’re probably not the right partner for this.” 

That can completely change the conversation. Either the client accepts it - which usually tells you you were never really in the running anyway - or they open up and start talking properly. 

If I haven’t influenced the brief, if I’m just one of many suppliers in a generic RFP process, the chances of winning are usually low. So I’d rather know that early. 

Kate: What questions do people not ask enough early in a client relationship? 

Niall: People aren’t curious enough. 

They jump too quickly into solution mode. They hear a problem and immediately say, ‘We can do that.’ The better questions are around context and consequences. 

Questions like: 

• Why now? 

• What’s stopping you achieving your ambition? 

• What happens if this doesn’t get fixed? 

• How is this investment funded? 

People avoid asking about budget far too often. But if you don’t understand the financial reality early on, you risk designing a Rolls Royce solution for a Mini budget. 

And the lazy question everyone asks – ‘What keeps you awake at night?’ - usually doesn’t uncover anything useful. 

A better question might be: ‘Your competitors are making more profit per head than you. What’s stopping you closing that gap?’ 

That creates a much more meaningful conversation. 

Kate: You talk a lot about consequences. Why is that so important? 

Niall: Because most projects don’t lose funding to competitors. They lose funding because they simply aren’t important enough. 

Budgets get pushed into next quarter. Then next year. Then eventually they disappear. 

So before presenting any solution, you need to understand the consequence of not acting. 

If I can help someone improve retention, grow revenue, improve NPS or increase profitability, then I need to help them connect the dots between investment and outcome. 

Too many providers focus on what they do instead of what changes because of it. 

Kate: Have you ever walked away from opportunities because something didn’t feel right? 

Niall: Definitely. 

A good partnership requires collaboration. If a client isn’t willing to engage openly, or it feels like the ways of working are fundamentally misaligned, then sometimes it’s better to walk away early. 

That’s difficult to do, especially when businesses feel pressure to chase revenue, but bad-fit clients cost far more in the long run. 

Sometimes the smartest commercial decision is choosing not to bid. 

Kate: How important is understanding the wider political, cultural and economic landscape around a client? 

Niall: It’s critical. 

You can’t look at a business in isolation anymore. Every organisation is being affected by external pressures, things like geopolitics, supply chains, AI, regulation, inflation, energy costs, pension obligations. 

Those pressures influence decision-making whether people openly talk about them or not. 

For example, if I know a company generates 40% of its revenue from a politically unstable region, that matters. If I know they’re part of a larger group structure, that matters too because there may be additional stakeholders influencing investment decisions. 

Most people just focus on the immediate brief. The real skill is understanding the bigger picture around it. 

Kate: Has strong qualification ever completely changed the solution you proposed? 

Niall: All the time. Clients often come asking for one thing, but once you dig deeper you uncover the real issue underneath it. 

Someone might ask for extra resource or delivery support, but after asking a few more questions you realise the real problem is strategy, leadership or organisational alignment. 

We’ve had situations where a simple request evolved into helping rewrite an entire AI strategy, simply because we paused long enough to ask better questions. 

That’s the difference between taking an order and acting as a trusted adviser. 

Kate: What advice would you give to younger consultants or salespeople? 

Niall: Before you ever present a solution, ask yourself: ‘What are the consequences of this outcome?’ 

If you understand the consequence, you understand the value. And don’t force your idea of value onto the client. What you think is important might not matter to them at all. 

Your job is to understand their world first. 

Kate: We can’t ignore AI. Does human understanding become even more important now? 

Niall: Absolutely. AI is incredibly useful for preparation, insight and productivity. But it doesn’t replace human judgement, human relationships or human intuition. 

At smart/tasking, we talk about ‘assistive intelligence’, not artificial intelligence. The technology should help people focus on higher-value thinking, not replace the human side of business. The real skill is still being able to join the dots. 

Kate: Final question. If you had to reduce this entire lesson to one sentence people would remember, what would it be? 

Niall: “Turn up your healthy paranoia.” 

Assume someone else knows more than you. Assume someone else is better connected or better prepared. 

That mindset forces you to ask better questions, prepare harder and understand the client more deeply. And that’s where the real value starts. 

If you would like Niall to understand your company a little better get in touch