In chess, middle game is the scene of pitched battles where pawns, knights, bishops, rooks, and queens are slain. Victory does not always go to the player with the greatest number of surviving pieces—board position and the value of the surviving pieces are also crucial—but if you are a betting person, you would be wise to bet on the player who has the advantage in material when the middle game carnage ends. As Jeremy Silman notes, “A material advantage is a wonderful thing to have because it influences all phases of the game. In the opening and middlegame, the side with extra wood possesses more units of force—his army is larger. In the endgame, the side with the material deficit usually goes into a deep depression. In fact, this endgame nightmare is often felt in the middlegame; the material-down defender is basically giving endgame odds and this severely curtails his possibilities.”²
In business development, you gain material advantage in mid–middle game by having better relationships with more of the customer’s key people than your competitors do, by building more time share and mind share than your competitors have, by investing more in the relationship, and by having more influence with the people in the customer’s organization who will make or contribute to the buying decision. In practical terms, you show more willingness to go the extra mile for customers, and this can take many forms: sharing proprietary research with them, writing special white papers, customizing your products or solutions, being flexible in your approach to serving their needs, being open to alternative financing arrangements, being more reasonable on terms and conditions, making services available that they would have to pay for elsewhere, sharing your best practices where appropriate, and so on. Of these ideas, flexibility may be most important. What many customers experience is a “take it or leave it” attitude among some suppliers. If you show that you are more open to new ideas, more flexible in your approach, and more willing to customize your solution for them, you score a lot of behavioral points.