In Practice: Signals vs. Momentum

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A solution provider began gaining early traction inside biopharma through an engaged and responsive functional team. Meetings were productive, demos were well received, and internal enthusiasm appeared strong. The function engaging most actively understood the problem, appreciated the solution’s potential, and was eager to explore next steps.

From the outside, this appeared to be momentum. The team assumed they had identified their buyer and focused effort on deepening engagement, refining messaging, and tailoring the offering to that group’s needs.

What was less visible was how limited that function’s authority actually was over budget ownership, risk exposure, and enterprise adoption.

The solution provider oriented its narrative, roadmap, and proof points around the priorities of the engaged function. Messaging emphasized operational value, usability, and functional impact—reinforcing alignment with the group that had opened the door.

This approach felt logical. The team believed internal advocacy would naturally extend to other stakeholders once value was demonstrated. Early engagement was interpreted as validation of both relevance and readiness.

What went untested was whether this function could sponsor the decision beyond exploration—or whether its involvement would complicate engagement with true decision owners later.

Elsewhere in the organization, decision authority resided with different stakeholders. Budget ownership, compliance exposure, and long-term accountability were distributed across functions that had not yet been engaged.

From their perspective, the solution raised different questions:

• Who ultimately owns risk if this is adopted? 
• How does this integrate with existing vendors or internal processes?
• What downstream obligations does this create?
• Why is this being introduced through this function rather than another?
   

Rather than accelerating adoption, early functional traction unintentionally narrowed perception—framing the solution as a departmental tool rather than an organization-level capability.

Advisory work centered on disentangling access from authority, including:

• Mapping which functions could open doors versus those that could approve spend
• Clarifying where risk, budget, and accountability actually resided
• Recalibrating positioning to speak to decision owners without undermining early champions
• Reassessing sequencing to avoid forcing alignment before the organization was ready
   

The objective was not to discard early engagement, but to contextualize it correctly and rebuild a credible path to the stakeholders who ultimately mattered.

Early functional interest was reframed as an entry point—not proof of buyer readiness.

Messaging evolved to address enterprise-level concerns such as governance, defensibility, and organizational fit. Engagement expanded to include additional functions, even when that meant slowing visible momentum or revisiting assumptions about scope and timing.

In some cases, this revealed the opportunity was premature. In others, it enabled re-entry with clearer intent and more credible positioning.

The revised approach clarified whether adoption was realistically achievable within the organization’s structure and priorities.

Where alignment could be rebuilt, engagement progressed with greater internal coherence. Where it could not, the team avoided prolonged effort chasing enthusiasm that could never convert into a decision.

The experience reinforced that early traction is not inherently positive or negative—but misread traction is costly.

• Early engagement does not equal buyer authority
   
• The easiest functions to access are often not the ones that decide
   
• Misaligned entry points shape—and can constrain—perception
   
• Separating access from approval is essential to sequencing
   
• Not all traction should be optimized; some must be reinterpreted