A better discovery framework: goals, passions, and struggles

Most sales teams say they want better discovery. What they usually mean is they want better access to what is really driving the deal.

That is a different issue.

In complex sales, the challenge is rarely a total lack of information. Buyers will usually give you something. They will explain the initiative, the timeline, the business case, the committee, the budget process, and the stated need. But that still leaves a great deal unsaid. What are they actually trying to achieve in a way that matters to them? What do they care enough about to push for internally? What are they wrestling with that could slow, distort, or quietly derail the deal?

That is where I have found the most useful discovery lens is not just a list of good questions. It is what I call Relational GPS: understanding each client’s goals, passions, and struggles. I have long believed this is the major part of the road map to our success in developing outstanding business relationships. When clients believe you can help them deal with those three areas, you can move through the sales cycle much more meaningfully and successfully. The challenge, of course, is that people do not usually share that kind of information with someone they do not yet see as credible or competent.

That is why I like this as a modern discovery framework. It is human-centered without being soft. It gives sales leaders and account teams a practical way to understand what stakeholders are trying to accomplish, what matters deeply to them, and what is getting in their way. And once you know those things, deal strategy improves. Positioning gets sharper. Consensus-building becomes more realistic. Follow-up gets better. Account planning becomes more grounded in people rather than generic account maps.

Why traditional discovery misses the human side of buying

Most traditional discovery is built to identify the business problem, the process, and the fit. That matters. You need to know the initiative, the timeline, the stakeholders, the requirements, and the risks. But if discovery stops there, it usually misses the human side of buying.

That is a costly miss.

Complex deals are not decided by organizations in the abstract. They are moved by people. People with their own objectives, pressure points, ambitions, hesitations, internal relationships, and political realities. A buying committee may look rational on paper, but every individual inside that committee is interpreting the decision through a different lens. One person may be trying to hit a strategic target. Another may be protecting the team from disruption. Another may care deeply about a change initiative tied to their own credibility. Another may be carrying the memory of a failed project from two years ago.

Traditional discovery often does not get to any of that because it is too focused on the corporate problem statement. It asks what the company needs, but not enough about what the people inside the company are trying to achieve, care about, and wrestle with.

I have found that this is why teams often leave discovery meetings with decent notes and weak strategy. They know the initiative, but not the internal energy around it. They know the budget process, but not the personal risk. They know the requirement, but not the conflict behind the requirement. In other words, they understand the transaction more than the relationship.

That is where Relational GPS becomes useful. It reminds us that every stakeholder has a more complete context than the formal buying process reveals. If you are not learning that context, you are probably not hearing enough to shape the deal well. And it is worth remembering that buyers are generally not inclined to share goals, passions, and struggles with anyone they do not deem credible or competent, which means shallow discovery is often a relationship problem before it is a questioning problem.

The hidden gap in executive discovery

This becomes especially important in executive discovery. Senior leaders rarely give you a full answer just because you asked a polished question. They tend to reveal what matters in layers. They share more when they believe your interest is genuine and your thinking is useful. That means the best executive discovery is not just well-sequenced. It is well-earned.

Defining goals, passions, and struggles

Let me make this framework plain.

Goals are the personal long- and short-term business objectives a client is trying to achieve. Passions are the business and personal causes or activities they care deeply about. Struggles are the obstacles or commitments that are holding them back. Those three elements make up Relational GPS. They are the road map to understanding what is really happening inside a relationship and inside a deal.

Goals

Goals are usually the easiest place to start because they feel legitimate and business-safe. What is this stakeholder trying to accomplish this quarter? What does success look like for them? What would this initiative improve in their world? A good sales team learns not only the company objective, but the stakeholder objective. Those two things often overlap, but they are not always identical.

Passions

Passions are where the conversation gets more interesting. What does this person care about enough to advocate for? What part of the business matters to them beyond the formal requirement? What outcomes energize them? What themes do they return to? In enterprise sales, passions can include culture, innovation, speed, customer experience, team development, modernization, or simply doing the work in a way that reflects how they want to lead.

Passions matter because they tell you where conviction may come from. They help explain why one stakeholder leans in while another stays neutral.

Struggles

Struggles may be the most revealing part of the framework. What is making this hard? What constraints, fears, commitments, or competing demands are shaping the decision? What is the person trying to avoid? What is creating hesitation? What happened before that is still influencing how they think now?

This is the area most teams miss because it requires more trust. It is one thing for a buyer to tell you the initiative is important. It is another for them to admit where they are under pressure, where they have limited air cover, or where internal politics are making the process harder than it appears.

Why this matters

I have always believed that if clients believe you can help them deal with their goals, passions, and struggles on both a professional and personal level, you can advance through the sales cycle much more successfully. That is why this framework works. It helps you understand the buyer as a whole person inside a business decision, not just as the owner of a requirement.

How this framework improves deal strategy

A better discovery framework should do more than produce better notes. It should improve the way your team thinks.

Goals, passions, and struggles do exactly that.

Positioning gets sharper

When you know what a stakeholder is trying to achieve, your positioning becomes more relevant. You are no longer describing your capabilities in general terms. You are selecting and adapting the parts of your offering that best fit that person’s real context. I have written before that learning about specific client goals, passions, or struggles helps you align specific elements of your offering to that client’s Relational GPS.

That is a major advantage in crowded markets because it keeps your team from sounding generic.

Consensus-building gets more realistic

In complex deals, consensus is never just about getting everyone to agree with the business case. It is about understanding where different people are coming from. One stakeholder’s goal may support urgency. Another stakeholder’s struggle may explain caution. A third stakeholder’s passion may be the key to gaining internal momentum. Once you can see those differences, your team can build strategy around them instead of assuming the account moves as one unit.

Follow-up gets more useful

This framework also improves follow-up because it gives your team something more meaningful to respond to. A generic recap says, “Here is what we discussed.” A strong follow-up says, “Here is what I heard matters most to you, here is the issue that seems to be creating friction, and here is how I think we can help.” That kind of communication feels thoughtful because it reflects the person, not just the meeting.

Strategy becomes more human, not less rigorous

Some leaders worry that a human-centered approach makes the sales process less disciplined. I see the opposite. This framework makes account strategy more rigorous because it forces the team to explain why each stakeholder matters, what is driving them, and what needs to happen next to move the relationship forward. That is much more useful than a stakeholder map filled with titles and influence scores but very little actual understanding.

Applying it across multiple stakeholders

This is where Relational GPS becomes especially valuable.

Most enterprise deals now involve multiple stakeholders, and that is exactly where many sales teams get thin. They gather discovery at the account level and then assume it applies to everyone. It does not.

The CFO, the operations leader, the IT sponsor, the business-line executive, and the internal champion may all support the same initiative for very different reasons. Their goals may overlap only partially. Their passions may point in different directions. Their struggles may have nothing in common.

Build a Relational GPS view by person

That is why I encourage leaders to think about this framework by named relationship, not just by account. Earlier in the book, I stressed the importance of identifying important business relationships by name and attaching them to objectives. Once you are dealing with an actual person rather than a line in a system, you can begin learning more about that individual’s Relational GPS and what it means for performance.

In practice, that means your team should not say, “The client’s goal is cost reduction.” They should say, “The operations leader is trying to reduce cycle time this year, the CFO is trying to avoid implementation surprises, and the VP leading the project cares deeply about showing the organization this change can stick.” Now you have something you can work with.

Avoid flattening the account

A flat account narrative is one of the quickest ways to weaken strategy. It makes every stakeholder seem interchangeable, which they are not. The stronger move is to create a simple profile for the few people who matter most and keep updating it as the relationship develops, because interests and priorities shift over time.

Use the framework to spot gaps

This also helps teams see where they are blind. If you have strong clarity on goals but weak clarity on struggles, the relationship may not be deep enough yet. If you know one stakeholder well but have no sense of what matters to another equally important person, your deal is more fragile than it appears. That is the kind of insight leaders need in account reviews.

Turning discovery notes into action

A good discovery framework only becomes powerful when it changes what the team does next.

That is why I like tying Relational GPS directly into action planning. In the Action Plan template I included in the book, one of the required sections is Relational GPS: goals, passions, struggles, followed by commitments and strategy. I did that for a reason. Discovery should not end as notes. It should become a plan for how to advance the relationship and the objective attached to it.

Translate notes into relationship strategy

Once your team captures goals, passions, and struggles, the next question is simple: what should we do differently because we know this?

If the stakeholder’s goal is aggressive growth, how should that shape our message and urgency?

If the stakeholder’s passion is customer experience, how should that affect the stories and proof we bring forward?

If the stakeholder’s struggle is internal resistance, how should we help them build confidence with others?

That is how discovery turns into action.

Review and update it regularly

I also recommend treating this as dynamic, not static. In the Action Plan guidance, I suggest reviewing and updating the plan weekly. That is a useful discipline because people’s priorities shift, especially in long enterprise deals. What mattered six weeks ago may not be the main issue now.

Make it part of account planning

For leaders, this is the practical move. Build your account planning around a discovery framework that captures the information most teams miss. Not just stage, value, close date, and next step, but the goals, passions, and struggles of the people who will determine the outcome.

That is when discovery stops being a meeting skill and starts becoming a strategic asset.

A great sales team does not just know what the account needs. It knows what the key people inside the account are trying to achieve, what they care about, and what they are wrestling with. Once you know that, your positioning gets sharper, your follow-up gets more relevant, and your strategy has a far better chance of matching the reality of the deal. That is why I continue to believe Relational GPS is one of the most practical and human-centered discovery frameworks leaders can put to work.

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