Is Abrupt Turnaround Like Big Late Bid or Big Delivery?

It feels like most of the planet's population has heard of the current purge of government waste suddenly underway in the USA.

Related to official foreign aid alone, this chart puts proportional circles on a world map. A kind of bubble chart cartogram.

Denoting the largest project spends of the American overseas development grants. For reference, the Ukraine (non-military) annual amount was $16bn.

Not too shabby a visual actually. As the degree of circle 'fill' transparency applied slightly helps quell the traditional bubble issue of making everything feel similar. As we are meant to gasp at the sole, huge outlier.

Although I am duty bound to say although that particular case does not at first glance seem to have circle and territory neatly aligned, its centre (aka origin or focus) and geographic capital (Kyiv) do appear so when zooming in.

Beyond this presentational tip, the blitzkrieg operation to 'drain the swamp' - effectively attempting a once-in-a-generation rebalance of public sector profligacy - holds great businessplace fascination.

Assessment teams have gone in quick, and gone in hard.

There are surely lessons for our selling ambitions.

Here's Donald Kettl, professor emeritus of public policy at the University of Maryland;

'The speed of action was “part of the genius. Flooding the zone makes it almost impossible for anyone to keep up.” '

We need similar in two specific cases.

That 'major account' bid we may well come in on at the death (the only possibly acceptable stage to join if we neither instigated nor got in first to shape their spec), where the shortlist does truly excite the prospective buyer. Yet we may prove ideal.

That delivery of a key yet potentially tricky offering just bought, where the potential for stalling client personnel/resource, usually because they resent the coming 'change' to the extent they're often secretly trying to undo our contract award, cannot be allowed to scupper implementation success and cause a swift end to the honeymoon and goodwill. Despite not being our fault.

With both it absolutely helps to have a plan to 'flood the zone'. Even if not perfect when you dust it off, to adapt it and make such 'dramatic statement' if nothing else, leaves your prospect/client in little doubt as to how seriously you take them and their desired outcome.