Presale Time

Presale Time

Practical course on Presale in IT

Any PM needs to quickly assess, plan, and manage customer expectations. In the big leagues, this is commonly referred to as the Presale stage, when you are responsible for whether the project will be taken on, whether the Delivery team will suffer or perform the project at a relaxed pace, whether Sales will not sell too much, and whether the Tech Lead will not miss a good opportunity. Just 7 lectures, and you're fully equipped for anything!

Learn more
7 lectures

lectures

3 practical

home assignments

1 Q&A session

with a speaker

Medium

level of complexity

7 lectures
lectures
3 practical
home assignments
1 Q&A session
with a speaker
Medium
level of complexity

Who is this course for?

Any PM needs to quickly assess, plan, and manage customer expectations. In the big leagues, this is commonly referred to as the Presale stage, when you are responsible for whether the project will be taken on, whether the Delivery team will suffer or perform the project at a relaxed pace, whether Sales will not sell too much, and whether the Tech Lead will not miss a good opportunity. Just 7 lectures, and you're fully equipped for anything!

Project manager

Middle Project Manager

sales coordinator

PreSale Coordinator

sales

Sales Manager

bizdev

Project Manager

delivery manager

Delivery Manager

solution architech

Solution Architect

Add these skills to your resume:

  • Gathering requirements from the client and match them with the expertise of the team.

  • Planning and estimating projects quickly and accurately, reasoning about timelines and amounts.

  • Selecting an Engagement model that is appropriate for the business task.

  • Building an effective verbal and written communication with the client to sign contracts on mutually beneficial terms.

  • Forming and managing a Presale team.

  • Preparing documentation at each stage of Presale.

  • Preparing and presenting Proposal for the client.

  • Handling client objections on Presale.

What you will learn

What you will learn

Add these skills to your resume:

  • Gathering requirements from the client and match them with the expertise of the team.
  • Planning and estimating projects quickly and accurately, reasoning about timelines and amounts.
  • Selecting an Engagement model that is appropriate for the business task.
  • Building an effective verbal and written communication with the client to sign contracts on mutually beneficial terms.
  • Forming and managing a Presale team.
  • Preparing documentation at each stage of Presale.
  • Preparing and presenting Proposal for the client.
  • Handling client objections on Presale.

Course Program

How Presale and Client Engagement Works

Is Presale always called Presale, or what if we tell you that you do it every time you start a project, and don't even realize it? How to avoid situations where our client is insolvent, not serious, or working in an “unprofitable jurisdiction”.

✓ Presale: stages, mechanism of work.
✓ Organization: types of companies, types of a Presale process.
✓ First steps: Lead Qualification, potential scope of work, approach, and flow communication.
✓ Inquiries: RFI. RFQ, RFP, RFB.

After the class, you will learn how to properly qualify the client and build a plan for the future work of the Pre-Sale team.

Gathering requirements and managing expectations

Figuring out who decides whether a project gets done or not. Figuring out what to do when a project is not 100% within the capabilities of the team. Learning to win over and manage customer expectations. We will learn to work with clients with or without a technical expertise, past experience, urgency.

✓ Requirements elicitation, UML, StoriesOnBoard.
✓ Technical qualifications: preliminary solution design and technical limitations.
✓ Evaluation: decomposition, alternatives and risks, price negotiation.
✓ Expectation management: types of customers, manipulation, errors.

After the class, you will learn how to identify requirements and manage expectations of different types of stakeholders, conduct an initial technical review of the project and be sure that the team completed the project.

Planning and Budgeting

Figuring out how to plan a project so that the Delivery team can get it done on schedule. Learning how to manage Pre-Sale processes depending on the type of contracts. Budget Calculation.

✓ Project Scope: Discovery, WBS, Feature List.
✓ Engagement models: Fixed Price, Time & Materials, ODT, Outstaffing.
✓ Budget: planning, calculation, buffer.
✓ Risks: technical, process, budget.

After the class, you will learn how to quickly identify Project Scope, select and argue a contract, and plan a budget for a future project.

Managing a Presale Team

Learning how to assemble and coordinate a Presale team. How to prevent Sales Managers from selling impossible things, Delivery Manager from giving up opportunities, and Project Manager from handing over unrealizable things.

✓ Pre-Sale team: roles, responsibilities, organization.
✓ Communication: Sales, Delivery and Project Managers.
✓ Results: business and customer approval.
✓Tips & Tricks: how to act when the team is small.

After the class, you will learn how to assemble and communicate within the Pre-Sale team in order to verify a result the management and the customer will be satisfied with.

Writing and presenting a Proposal

Let's discuss what your Proposal should consist of to be convincing for the client. We will learn how to justify the risks and technical limitations of the project on paper, so that the client believes you. We'll look at examples of ready-made Proposals.

✓ Executive Summary: Case Study and advantages of the company.
✓ Needs: business goals, drivers, and Project Scope.
✓ Solutions: Delivery Approach, architecture, and risks.
✓ Pricing: team, budget, incremental costs.
✓ Terms and Conditions, Risks, Appendices.
✓ Approval: Sales Manager, Architecture, technicians, lawyers, management.
✓ Preparation for Presentation: Format, Dry-run, Tips & Tricks.

After the class, you will learn how to write and coordinate a Proposal for a project at Presale, to prepare a presentation to persuade the client to agree.

Presentation and dealing with objections

All the past work is meaningless if you have failed to convince the client. We will analyze the visual and semantic presentation of the solution to the client. We will learn how to work with the most common objections “expensive”, “long”, “evaluate without Discovery” and others.

✓ Presentation: participants, conducting, visual part.
✓ Customers: types, approaches, objections, up-sales.
✓ Objections: processing, persuasion, honest manipulation.
✓ Handing over the project to Delivery.

After the class, you'll learn how to present your team's solution to the client and work with the most common objections to help the Sales Manager convince them to work with you.

Speakers and mentors

aleksandr kryuchkov A

Alexander Kriuchkov | Speaker

Head of Presale at Avenga

17 years of experience in IT, He specializes in software development outsourcing work.

Has worked as Program Manager at Ciklum. Alexander has 17 years of experience in IT, 14 years of which he has been managing projects and programs with up to 120 people. He specializes in software development outsourcing work. Alexander believes that the process framework must be chosen depending on the type and requirements of the project.

photo_2022-08-17_14-38-34 (1) O

Olga Grom | Speaker

Delivery Manager at Master Of Code Global

10 years+ of experience in IT. Specializes in the full cycle of works in the project from Presale and negotiations with clients to closing and quality control.

More than 10 years of experience in project management. Manages teams of 100+ people. Engages and specializes in the full cycle of work in the project from Presale and negotiations with clients to closing and quality control.

Мария Галаянт M

Maria Galyant | Speaker

Agile Delivery Manager at Ciklum

Has more than 13 years of experience. She is certified PMR, SAFe, ICP-APM . Maria has built teams from the ground up to meet customer needs

Has more than 13 years of experience. She is certified PMR, SAFe, ICP-APM. Maria is engaged in ensuring the engineering quality of products. Also our speaker is actively involved in Presale project activity at Ciklum. Maria has built teams from the ground up to meet customer needs, implementing Best Quality Engineering practices, ensuring end result Delivery process.

Полина Семёнова P

Polina Semyonova | Mentor

Engagement manager at Opinov8

Has more than 8 years in IT, of which 5 years in sales of services of service companies.

Has more than 8 years in IT, of which 5 years in sales of services of service companies.
Polina specializes in the presale process and further client support throughout the LTV. Also, she was engaged in partnership development and closing deals with international consulting companies.

гальченко A

Anastasia Galchenko | Mentor

Pre-sale Busines Analyst at Litslink

12 years in the IT sphere. More than 3 years in the position of Business Analyst in healthcare, insurance, AR/VR, Machine Learning projects.

12 years in the IT sphere. More than 3 years in the position of Business Analyst in healthcare, insurance, AR/VR, Machine Learning projects.
Ready to share her experience in sales and business analysis with the course students.

дормидонтова A

Anastasia Dormidontova | Mentor

Head of Sales

More than 20 years of experience in sales from banking to timber export. Concluded more than 1000 B2B contracts.

Магистр бизнес администрирования.
Degree in Business Administration.
More than 20 years of experience in sales from banking to timber export.
Concluded more than 1000 B2B contracts from cold to warm base with big foreign clients such as Ikea.
I am happy to share my practical experience and knowledge.

What you will get

знания

Universal Knowledge

Even if you don't have a dedicated Presale phase, you still have to work with the client in the project initiation phase. All of the course practices will be equally useful.

повышение

A promotion perspective

Working at a Presale is the highest level of management, and we will help you reach it by taking apart the whole process from finding a client to presenting a solution and handling objections.

Нужные навыки

Document templates

Dozens of examples of documentation and scripts from speakers that you can and should use in your work. Even if you don't have a Presale stage, you can use them to plan, evaluate, and present to your client.

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Subscription to bonus lectures

By purchasing the first stream of the course, you get lifetime access to all course updates, as well as a subscription to all the bonus lectures that IAMPM holds regularly.

знания угол

Knowledge from different angles

In this class, we will look at the Presale process not only from the PM's side, but also from the Sales Manager's and Technical Specialist's side to avoid having to deal with problems from only one side.

Тех.спец

After-course support

During the course, you are assigned a personal tutor who is always ready to help you.

We help with employment

  • Recommendations for improving resumes and portfolios
  • Assistance in creating and improving a cover letter
  • Interview and test preparation
  • Personal career counseling
  • Assistance in finding relevant job openings
  • Internships and special offers from partner companies
  • Recommendation letter from speakers and mentors for the best students

Interested in receiving a sample lesson?

Fill in the application form for a free consultation

    kzt 16.5eur 0.0274usd 0.0274

    F.A.Q.

    Why do I need this course if we don't have a Presale stage?

    The Presale stage exists in any outsourced IT company. If you provide a customized solution for the client, if your sales cycle is more than a week, if in the process of selling you need to involve specialists to form a solution for the client and write a persuasive Proposal, then you have the Presale stage. It can be called differently in your company. 

    We designed the course program based on the needs of managers who face all these tasks in their work. In our course you will get examples of Presale processes in companies of different sizes, scripts for writing a persuasive Proposal and skills for handling customer objections. And even if your company never calls it the Presale stage, you can always just use this knowledge to work with the customer. 

    I am not a PM. Will I benefit from the course?

    This course is designed for professionals who directly or indirectly participate in the Presale stage: Project Managers, Sales Managers, Bizdev Managers, Presale Coordinators, Delivery Managers, Solution Architects.

    The presale process involves quality teamwork under tight deadlines. This is why it is important to look at how the work is done from a management perspective, in order to understand what results the PM expects from you, and how everything is interconnected. 

    If you’re a Sales|Bizdev Manager, you’ll get an understanding of:

    • How the PM and Sales Manager should interact.
    • What results the PM and Delivery team expects from you.
    • What principles of Presale organization exist in different companies.
    • How to evaluate, plan and approve a project from a management point of view.

    If you are a Delivery Manager|Solution Architect, you will learn: 

    • How to help the manager in the technical evaluation phase and what results are expected of you.
    • How to make sure that an infeasible project does not go to Delivery.
    • What inputs do PMs and Sales Managers need to reason with customers.
    • How a project is evaluated, planned and approved from the management’s point of view.
    Won't the course be too easy?

    No, it won’t. The course is designed for Middle level professionals with two years or more experience. 

    In the course, we look at all the challenges that a PM, or other professional, faces during the Presale phase. We’ll break down both the core process and the pitfalls that arise, and you can discuss your case situations and get guidance from our speakers. 

    We’ve conducted over 50 interviews with Middle and Senior positions who face Presale every day, as well as recruiters who are hiring candidates for their respective positions, to create a program that best covers the needs of the marketplace.

    I have a Sales Manager and a Tech Lead performing the main role in Presale, why do I need this course?

    This is often the practice in companies where there is no Presale Coordinator position, and the sales manager does the closing of the client, relying on the expertise of the Tech Lead. This option works well only on small or simple projects where there is no need to do Discovery, and you work according to “an off the beaten track”. But even there can be conflicting situations between the vision and terms of Delivery of Sales Manager and technician. You can become a facilitator of this process and a mediator for the client. 

    A well-tuned Presale stage is an opportunity to avoid most of the risks before the contract is even signed.  

    Can I not buy the whole course, but take only the lectures that are interesting?

    Unfortunately, this is not possible. The course program covers the entire Presale process. The lectures are interconnected, and the material in each lecture can refer to the knowledge gained from the previous lecture. In addition, the course includes homework, practice, and case work. Therefore, for maximum benefit, you should take the lectures in the order given.

    Can I pay for the course in installments?

    Yes, you can by prior arrangement with the course organizers or through bank installments. The conditions for splitting payments are discussed individually for each case.

    Still in doubt?

    Leave your E-mail to receive a sample lesson and a plan for your career development.