PLANNING
Your customer Executive sponsor (the Chief Customer Experience Officer) that you invited does not show up to your EBR meeting. How rude of them, I sent out the meeting invite over two months ago. They didn't accept it but then surely their EA looks after their diary?
As a Best Practice I should be reconfirming with all attendees before the meeting.
As a Best Practice I should be sending out the agenda in advance and ensuring that the Exec is in agreement with it and excited about the meeting content.
The Executive keeps going on about ROI but you have nothing to show! Why do they keep raising this, after all it's only money and they have only been testing for 6 months, what do they expect?
As a Best Practice, I should always be including ROI in any EBR being presented to an ATL level or above. As I am also checking with the Exec beforehand what is important to them, I will know ROI is an important topic to cover.
It is a week after your EBR and your attendees are asking you to confirm what the follow up actions are. If only you could remember!
As a Best Practice, I should always strive to send out any follow up notes, actions and relevant links to documents used within 24 hours of having the meeting.
For some reason your attendees look constantly confused. You have no idea why, you are speaking in Optimizely abbreviated language after all!
As a Best Practice, I should avoid using too many acronyms, especially when those acronyms are very particular to Optimizely.
One of the Executives at your EBR has asked you to comment on the big news story that broke last week that featured their company and you have not got a clue what they are talking about. They must have made this up to trip you up!
As a Best Practice I should be conducting my research on the company beforehand to ensure I am up to date with all of the latest news and press releases surrounding the client.
In your EBR, your attendees keep asking you how they relate to others. This is getting a little tiresome, you don't manage every single Optimizely client so how can you possibly know this? Why are they being so competitive?
As a Best Practice, I should always consider using benchmarking data wherever possible. This provides my client with context about how they are doing and helps set a framework for goals to strive for. Execs in particular are normally very competitive, they want to look good for the CEO so they can get a nice fat bonus!
The client's program is largely successful but the Executive keeps bringing up challenges that have happened, this gets your back up!
As a Best Practice, I will avoid getting defensive if any attendees bring up challenges and focus instead on turning those problems into solutions, using them as learnings for the future.
When you get into your EBR, you keep tripping up on what you are trying to say, getting tongue tied over the key messages you wanted to state. Perhaps it was that bottle of wine you had the night before but you made sure you were in bed by 9pm.
As a Best Practice, I should always practice my presentation out loud because it always sounds different to what is in my head. I should do this even if it is just speaking it out loud to myself.
As a Best Practice, I should not drink too much alcohol or go partying late into the night, the day before an important meeting.
After reading out the agenda, your Executive states there are key topics that need to be added, for which you have not done any preparation for. Are they just trying to be difficult?
As a Best Practice, I should be communicating the agenda to my attendees in advance and getting their confirmation that everything is covered.
As a Best Practice, I should be asking the Executives in advance what they would like to discuss and ensure the agenda fits their goals.
I have the CEO at my EBR, very cool but he is being a pain as he keeps asking where the vision is for the experimentation program. My ATL, OTL and BTL keep looking at the floor. Thanks guys!
As a Best Practice, I should be putting a JVS in place ideally before and EBR. An EBR after all is a great reason to get your daily customer team to complete this with you so they look aligned in front of their Exec team.
When you show up for the EBR, you are dressed in ripped jeans, trainers and your favourite ACDC t-shirt whereas your meeting attendees are all in smart business suits. They keep looking at you funny! You have no idea why... perhaps they are not metal fans?
Why did I not as a Best Practice, research into the type of company culture beforehand so that I could ensure I dressed appropriately?
After your EBR, other than feeling immense relief the whole thing is over (the CEO was a little fierce!), you start wondering whether you achieved what you wanted. What was it I wanted to achieve again? Help.... Kate? Lisa?
As a Best Practice, the first thing I should be doing when looking to hold an EBR is to set out my objectives for the meeting. This way I can ensure my preparation, content and delivery are all aligned correctly to ensure I can achieve my goals.
In your EBR, you ask your Executives who they are, what their job title is and if they have any experience of experimentation. You can't work out why but they don't seem very happy - they are not Beyonce after all, so why would you know who they are?
As a Best Practice I should be researching any ATL or Executives joining the EBR so that I had a good understanding of their background, experience, role in the company and what type of character they are.
You think your EBR is going pretty well but 5 minutes before the end the CTO says he has no idea what the next steps are for the program. Everything they have heard so far was more a status report but they do not know how this is going to help them achieve their future goals.
As a Best Practice, I should avoid presenting too much at an EBR on current status and tactical items. A large part should be focussing on the strategic plan and giving recommendations on next steps that will move the Exec team closer to the achievement of their goals.
Your EBR was planned for 1 hour but by the end of the meeting you have only managed to cover half of your agenda and have had enough of hearing your own voice since you did most of the talking!
Why did I not as a Best Practice, remain concise in my delivery and avoid getting into so much detail about some of my agenda items?
Your EBR is finished, you think it went brilliantly so are now in the pub celebrating. An e-mail pings through (darn it, you should have switched it off), it's from your OTL saying they enjoyed the meeting but can they have another next week as they do not know what the next steps are. They are so demanding!
As a Best Practice, I will always ensure my EBR has the next steps and goals for the next quarter well defined and agreed upon by all attendees during the meeting.
In your EBR, your day to day BTL contact keeps piping up saying they were not aware of some of the items you are presenting. This is making you look like you are not in sync with them and doesn't make your BTL look good in front of their superiors.
As a Best Practice, I should always consider sharing my slide deck with my day to day customer team in advance of an EBR to ensure we are all in alignment and present a united front to the Executives.
At your EBR, you are really enjoying presenting on the entire upcoming product roadmap. You do not notice the puzzled looks from your attendees especially when you are talking about Full Stack, you are busy living the dream thinking you might apply for a role alongside Jon and Claire. Full Stack, they have that right?
As a Best Practice, at my EBR, I will always ensure my content is tailored and personal for the client I am meeting. I will avoid presenting on product features the client does not care about or does not even have access to.
You have completed 3 EBRs but you keep showing up on Kate's dashboard as having a low % of closed out Gainsight CTAs. Why is she always hounding you?
Why as a Best Practice did I not update my Gainsight CTA as part of my meeting follow up process, adding all of the required notes and links to the documents I presented?
In your EBR, your day to day contact uses up most of the meeting time by getting into major detail about product and support related issues. You swear you saw your C level Exec yawn and what does he keep looking at on his phone?
As a Best Practice, I will avoid getting into 'the weeds' of low level issues and pull anyone else back on track who tries to 'weed'. This means I can keep the Exec's attention and keep the EBR focussed on what is important to them.