The Challenger Sale

Figure 5.2.
The SAFE-BOLD Framework
The way Neil and the KPMG team employed this tool was to ask a
group of KPMG client advisers to brainstorm a Challenger pitch to a
client and then present that pitch to an audience of internal peers, who in
turn graded the pitch using the SAFE-BOLD framework. KPMG tells us
that this has now become a part of the internal vernacular for the

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organization, with client advisers cautioning peers against watering down
and “making too SAFE” their customer pitches.
Remember, Relationship Builders are everywhere, not just in sales,
and chances are pretty good that somewhere along the line, a senior-
level Relationship Builder—maybe somebody in marketing or corporate
communications, maybe a senior line executive—will temper the
message of the pitch, fearful that it will come across as confrontational or
unsettling to the customer.
One of the classic Relationship Builder modifications to a great
teaching pitch is to pull the “who we are and what we do” slides from the
back
of the pitch deck (where they belong in a proper teaching pitch) and
put them in the front of the deck. Relationship Builders feel the need to
establish credibility up front by throwing around company size and
factoids and engaging in some high-profile customer name-dropping.
They are uncomfortable leading with insight and letting their insights
establish credibility for them.
As soon as you’re not looking, Relationship Builders will take out their
belt sanders and smooth out the edges of your sharp pitch. They’ll soften
it until you barely recognize it, pushing it to the SAFE end of the
continuum.
But being a little unsettling is the point of a Challenger approach: to
be provocative, to challenge, and therefore to be seen as differentiated
by the customer. Without an edge, you sound just like everybody else.
Remember, while Relationship Builders seek to reduce or defuse
tension, Challengers constructively use tension to their advantage.
So what does Commercial Teaching look like and feel like in reality?
Now that we’ve laid out the theory of the approach, we can see it in action
at two real companies: W. W. Grainger, Inc., and ADP Dealer Services.