Sample 02 / Anonymised portfolio adaptation
Structured needs-assessment interview guide
A consistent structure with room to explore real working practices.
I used a common set of focus areas to explore how Account Executives approached their work. Follow-up questions sought examples, challenges and the support people used, allowing practices to be compared without treating interviews as a scored test.
01 / Forecasting
- Describe your approach to forecasting an opportunity.
- What prompts you to change its value, timing or likelihood of closing?
- Talk through an accurate forecast and what helped you make it.
02 / Pipeline management
- How do you prioritise opportunities and keep your pipeline active?
- How do you track progress?
- What do you do when an opportunity becomes inactive or unresponsive?
03 / Discovery
- How do you prepare for a discovery conversation?
- What do you ask to understand business needs and objectives?
- How do you check that your understanding is accurate?
04 / Objection handling
- Which objections do you encounter most often?
- Walk through how you respond to a difficult objection.
- What support do you use, and what has worked well?
05 / Deal closure
- How do you check that a deal is ready to close?
- How do you involve decision-makers and establish a realistic timeline?
- What alternatives do you consider if a deal starts to slip?
Adapted from original work for portfolio use. Organisation, participant and customer identities have been removed. Findings are aggregated and paraphrased; no verbatim interview responses or individual performance figures are included.