Right before I left the world of big consulting it was my job to win a big deal for my organisation.

Frankly, I can't remember exactly how much it was worth, but it was many, many millions.

We lost.

Nobody blamed me, but the truth is we really should have won.

We were the incumbent. We'd worked with the client in the function that put out the bid for many years. Our people knew their people. They knew we could get results.

But we fell into a huge trap. One I should have spotted.

We focused all our energy on the past. We talked to them about the great relationship we had. How we understood them. How we knew how to make change happen in their organisation. 

Our opponents, apparently, focused on the future. They created a vision of the results the client would get after the project. They demonstrated deep expertise in the specialist area. 

We talked about the future too, and we demonstrated out expertise. But it was all secondary to the message that we were the safe bet because we'd worked with them before and we understood how to get results in their organisation.

And to be fair, that was the message our key contacts in the client organisation told us would work. 

What we missed was that this work was different to our old work. Much more focused on one specialist area. New people were involved in the decision making. New people we didn't speak to enough as we thought they were just junior compared to our senior contacts.

They were junior, but they were the ones who drove the decision since it was their area. Our senior contacts deferred to them in the end.

And although all our great work in the past didn't count for nothing, it was the vision of the future our competitors painted that carried the day.

Looking back now – and with the benefit of having seen the research on the impact of great service and performance on future business – it's easy to see where we went wrong.

Back then I was mystified. I couldn't understand how we had the senior people all on our side and we were doing all the great things that had kept them hiring us year after year.

Yet for this crucial project, they hired an outsider.

If you haven't read my article from yesterday on what really drives growth with big clients, you really should check it out. It'll clarify why sometimes great service and track record wins, and why sometimes it doesn't (and what you need instead):