Value-First Delivery - Jan 28, 2026

[00:00] **Introduction** Chris Carolan: Good afternoon, LinkedIn friends. Value-First Nation, welcome to another episode of Value-First Delivery with Erin Wiggers. Happy Wednesday, Erin. How are you?

[00:10] **Series: Seven Commitments Related to Value-First Delivery** Erin Wiggers: Happy Wednesday. Yeah, I should have worn my orange. Next week, I'm going to wear orange. Chris Carolan: Next week. Yep. Um I think it's going to catch on soon. Chris Carolan: But um last week we set the tone talking about the the management manage services trap. Um I say set the tone but I feel like we're probably going to increase the tone a little bit today. Uh with this first uh so the next part of the series, seven commitments uh related to the value first delivery uh manifesto. Um so I'm going to read number one, some related bullets and then and then we'll dive in. Erin Wiggers: Let's do it. Chris Carolan: Um Commitment number one, we will prioritize outcome transformation over requirement fulfillment. We believe that the true purpose of service delivery is enabling meaningful change, not just completing tasks. We commit to focusing on the outcomes customers need to achieve rather than simply delivering what's specified in agreements. This means we will define success in terms of business impact rather than service delivery metrics. We'll adapt our approach when requirements aren't achieving the intended outcomes rather than rigidly following initial specifications. We will measure and report on transformation progress rather than just activity completion. We'll take responsibility, we will take responsibility for connecting our work to actual business results rather than limiting responsibility to deliverable completion. And we will design every interaction to move customers closer to their desired outcomes rather than just fulfilling contractual obligations. Chris Carolan: It's hard to imagine that there's six more commitments after this. I feel like that was everything, but um what there uh peaked your interest as far as something we should dive into first?

[03:08] **Prioritizing Outcomes** Erin Wiggers: Yeah, I think the commitment to outcomes that you have a responsibility in seeing come to fruition. Um and and aligning around that first, I think because I've seen a lot of clients come into like a discovery process or a scoping process, and they're, you know, tech savvy enough, tech savvy enough to be dangerous, um and they're a little over prescriptive, like like they they think they know what they want. Um, you know, I want a website. I need some automation to do XYZ. And I think when you frame it as okay, well, we need to kind of zoom out and look at what are we trying to accomplish with those things? Like what is the change in your daily daily operations that is going to be a result of of what you're saying you want. Um, I I think it it just sets you up, it sets everyone up to be happier, honestly, because at the end of the day, they're paying you to be the expert. And so if you just build what they told you to build, um and it's not accomplishing the goal, that's still kind of on you. Um, because you're like you have to be the expert in the room and and say like, you know, maybe you don't need a custom code action for that actually, like you could, you know, um, you know, change your process, do XYZ. Like I think what it really emphasizes is there's a lot of nuance to how you get to the outcome. The requirements tend to be more fluid than people are willing to admit and or accept. Um, because you kind of have this idea of well, I need to know everything first and then I'll get in and I'll do those things and that'll be that. And I guess just my background as a developer, the best laid plans, I'm telling you, like so many times I'm like, oh, that's just a quick fix. And I get in there and I'm like, oh, actually this is like connected to this over here and if I change that, that has all these downstream consequences. And so I think framing it as outcome first primarily aligns you around what's actually important to to get out of the engagement. Um, because it's not tasks and click up and stuff. Um, that's not what. Um, and then it also kind of gets everyone on the same page as far as, you know, we're going to we're going to make the best decisions to steer us towards that goal until we get there. Um, and if that means changing tactics, if that means we see that something's not working, um, you kind of have to build in a little bit of that uh comfort with ambiguity. Um, and I think that's again, something I'm good at because I've been a developer for so long that like I know that I I there's no way I can see all of the different paths um just from the from the outset. And so so yeah, it's a it's kind of a fundamental shift though in Chris Carolan: Oh, that's huge, right? Erin Wiggers: Like uh and I think I was guilty of this even um with um so previous iterations of my app that I I think I've shown you before um where a lot of what I had done in the past was strictly requirements. Like this this is an app for solutions architects to come in and build the exact requirements that we need. And kind of just realized along the way that number one, sales people can't get there because that's not their job. To is to they're not supposed to know all the requirements. Um, and also if the sales people can't articulate it then the client sure can't either. Like they're not going to be able to tell you how those requirements meet their goals. Um, and so yeah, I think with this latest iteration of my app, um Dealwiser, I added the the two extra kind of steps of um project types and outcomes where it's a little more like the taxonomy is just a little different. So you can kind of wrap your head around what the the different requirements could be based on them rolling up into these other kind of categories. Uh, and that was a huge unlock for me. Um, I'm frankly I'm mad at myself that I did not come to that conclusion earlier. Um, but but yeah, I think it was uh, it was really crucial to bridge the gap between business speak and HubSpot solutions architect speak. Chris Carolan: Yeah. Erin Wiggers: Um and and that's a gap that is very much needed to be uh addressed.

[13:49] **Artificial Intelligence and the Evolution of Software** Chris Carolan: It certainly uh does uh and I think we're starting to see it addressed in in various spots, but it's it is a it is a fundamental shift um related to this whole part of any engagement. Um and because whether you like it or not, AI is here and it itself is evolving like faster than anything we've experienced before. It'll allow, it's allowing every software that we could come into contact with to evolve faster than ever before. And our humans, like you start to unlock some of those capabilities related to working with AI, you get a month in and like of course, like you get access and you unlock part of this like all of a sudden the scope like could become like meaningless, like you're just building for the bygone age, right? And that's where if we put ourselves in a spot where it's like, all right, this is the stuff that we have to get done, and the contract reads as if it's not successful unless we get that stuff done. Right. Chris Carolan: Both parties are in like, oh, I guess well, I guess that's what we got to do. And now we feel super uncomfortable because we know it's not the right thing to do. Right. Chris Carolan: We see all this value happening, right? And and leaders especially like SAS has has kind of like this whole idea that it's just like get the quick wins, right? Like just leads to this kind of behavior where it forces you into this like activity focused, you know, mode. And I'm curious as you've started to go that way with your app. And by the way, like I I'm still learning some of this too is is in terms of like everything is supposed to be like customer problem focused and then you try to solve their problem and when they come in saying, oh, I need help with with leads, then you try to like go right to that problem, right? But uh, when you dig in, it's actually like they want to grow revenue. So many ways to do that. Chris Carolan: So as you're starting to build that into your app, um, like this emergent thing that's happening where all of a sudden outcome could change, right? Like how are you thinking about like systematizing that?

[18:15] **Systematizing the Nuance to Get to Outcomes** Erin Wiggers: Yeah, so I think um the way I I kind of approach it in the app is anything anything in the that is in the scope is a standard deliverable. Like anything that uh is part of a a product, um, that's a deliverable that I have done before uh or you know, the user has done before. Um, and so you have an idea of like this is what it's going to cost me as a business to to to do this thing. And so when you look at it like that, you can kind of you can kind of take the blocks out and replace them with other things based on the mutual kind of understanding of value where you know, this was going to take 15 hours and I was going to have to do it all in AWS and you know, we were going to it was going to be infinitely complicated versus oh well we can just tack on this integration or, you know, you can up upgrade your HubSpot and now we can do everything in serverless functions or custom code actions or things like that. Um now I can be objective in that and say, okay, well, this was only going or this one was going to cost me X XYZ, uh as far as like time, effort, expertise, then I can swap that out and maybe this other, maybe the new block is way less effort. Maybe it's, you know, not going to take me nearly as long. Now I can add more value um in those spaces. And I think that's kind of I think that's the key to kind of making sure everyone is happy with what's going on. Um, because you can throw in a little delight or add something from the wish list, um, that maybe was going to be like a phase two thing. Um, so I think having that agility, the ability to be objective about those standard pieces that you're swapping out, um, is really critical just so that value is aligned on on both sides.

[23:11] **The Value Alignment is Everything** Chris Carolan: Yeah. Um it's like that alignment is really everything, right? And at the same time trying to make space for the value that we don't know like could exist. I think is possible, but it's just like again, the the transparency needs to be there about things like and something that we've started doing is like putting space for like adaptive scopes like as a as a phase or um, you know, talking about emergent scope uh like that um because so much of this is like understanding that the the priorities of the business like could change at any time right now. Right. Chris Carolan: And if you're not aligned with that and you don't give the ability to change with it, right? Everybody, you know, just feel like it's hard to have a healthy relationship. Right. Chris Carolan: Right. Um so it's uh there is a way to do it, but um the tangibility that everybody wants to know, like this is what I'm paying for, this is what I what I'm going to get. Um but it just impresses on the importance of having like like reframing the conversation and like this whole like it's not that hard if you can get out of like build mode, right? Um like simple question, shift between like what do you need us to build versus what business outcome do you need to achieve? Erin Wiggers: Right. Chris Carolan: And but what I'm also finding is it's easy to have that conversation and have them not be like have they don't know what they're going to get like in the first three months so they're like, all right, what's going to happen? Like what are we going to feel in month one? And uh and so much of that has been build focused, but if we can like what I'm seeing now, unified customer views, right? Even allowing ourselves, giving ourselves permission to call that a quick win, right? In terms of just documenting it. Right. Chris Carolan: Right? So that people can align on something that's going to happen that's a good idea. Right. Chris Carolan: Right. Because I think what like you mentioned like, oh, that'll be a quick fix and then you get in there and like all this downstream impact, right? You think about what it takes to like do a traditional campaign and bring in leads and have that matter to the business. Right. Chris Carolan: Right? Like everything that needs to happen after the lead comes in, right? Which is like the rest of the customer facing team. Right. Chris Carolan: Like matters to what the value of of that activity was. And while I make while you can get everybody in the room saying, all right, yeah, we do need more leads. Yep. But then it's on one team to go do that and then we're like, oh well, there's a blocker here and I'm not in charge of that other team. Right. Chris Carolan: So the importance of finding outcomes that at least make it easy for the leader or like the decision maker that needs to be bought in so they can get other people bought in. Right. Chris Carolan: Right? So they can move around. because that's where the emergence comes from like and and that's why traditionally there's these long like discovery processes that nobody likes, right? Because it's like, have we figured out all the gotches ahead of time and who's in charge of what and when, who's going to have impact, right? That's like a six-month thing when there's multiple teams involved and nobody wants to wait for that. Right. Chris Carolan: But it doesn't mean you get to skip it, right? You still have to figure that out, right? Um and that's where I think uh onto something in terms of finding uh finding an outcome that everybody can agree on, but also like not over promising in in terms of like, yeah, we're going to get you a unified customer view like inside of a month, right? That's unlikely. But we can figure out what it is. Right. Chris Carolan: Right. Right? And then say, all right, we're 10% of the way there, we're 50% of the way there. And then now everything that comes after, we can have productive like conversations about. Right. Chris Carolan: Right. And it's kind of like um embracing the fact that it's going to change, like there's going to be changes instead of trying to protect from changes. Right. Chris Carolan: And it's a dramatic difference. And I think a part of the value of AI right now is you don't have to make like decisions based on having done the work already. Like, okay, we've got something working. So let's spend our time over here. Instead, like I remember the first time I used Claude to make properties in HubSpot. It was like 100 properties. And then I continued talking to Claude, I remember like some new requirement and I was like, oh man, we got to redo all those properties. And he was like, yeah, we do. You want me to do that now? I was like, yeah, sure. He's like, done in five minutes, right? Like and that's where I started to figure out like this world of like tech debt based like decision making basically. Like we just don't have to do that. Right. Chris Carolan: Anymore. Um For sure. Chris Carolan: So like how are you, I guess from that perspective, like have you, um, let's say like maybe some advice about like we have to have some kind of scope, um, with some foundation but creating the space for this flex. Like what are you seeing like be successful out there to to kind of support this?

[38:56] **The Tangible of Quick Wins with an Action Plan** Erin Wiggers: I think it kind of comes back to a point you made about um quick wins where people kind of I feel like a lot of people, the connotation is a quick win is like some separate discrete thing that's like low hanging fruit and not really related to what we're doing, but it's it's a quick win. Um and if you can reframe that to to be more like what you were saying like we're 10% of the way there or we're, you know, we're we're 20% of the way towards this ultimate goal. And and in order to do that, in order to be able to quantify progress in that way, you have to do a ton of education for the client about like what the system is going to look like. Um, like what the system needs to look like in order to achieve that outcome so that you can say, you know, because a lot of times, you know, in the first couple of weeks of of an engagement, I'm doing a ton of stuff, but it's all on the back end and it's like data that no one cares about. Like, I made hundreds of properties and associations and custom objects and now everything is like talking to each other how it how it needs to be, but like that I can't put a bow on that. Like and and nobody nobody's going to like log into their portal and be like, oh, Aaron made me a bunch of properties. Hooray. Like that's just not Value delivered. Erin Wiggers: Right, right. But if you can, if you can explain why that's valuable. Yes. Erin Wiggers: If you do a better job of explaining this is the foundation, this is 10%. The next 20% is going to be you being able to see this data. The next 20% is going to be automating it. Um, like breaking it out to where the quick wins don't seem disjointed. Like the quick wins are in line with the direction that we're going and they're not necessarily quick. It's just, you know, it is the win that you get at this phase, you know? Right. Erin Wiggers: Um because I also don't want to discredit because sometimes a quick win is a huge impact and it almost does it a disservice to to kind of use this term. Um, like just because you can do something quickly doesn't mean it's not like hugely impactful. So, um, yeah, I think as far as advice, honestly, I think um educating the client as much as possible, like being able to speak to being able to speak both languages essentially. Like you can speak the technical here's tactically what we're going to execute versus what that means for the client and being able to bridge that for them so that because at the end of the day, our clients are reporting to someone for the most part. Some of them are the CEOs, but like for the most part, they've got somebody, somebody on the board, some investor, somebody uh in the sea suite that wants a a memo that they can read in under five minutes that tells them you're doing a great job. And so I I also kind of see a lot of my job in these engagements is like equipping the team that's kind of facilitating the work to communicate that back up the chain, just so now we've got executive buy in. Now the executives are talking about it on monthly calls. Now it's it it you kind of have to push it upstream so that it comes back down. Um Yeah. Erin Wiggers: And uh, yeah, and so I think a lot of it really comes down to change management and being able to communicate really well throughout that process. And that process is messy and it's people don't like it. People do not like change. Um, and so my advice would be to lean in to empathy in that process and education would be my two biggest points there. Chris Carolan: Yeah. No, I um yeah, so much of what we're trying to do here uh with all these pillars and all this content is give everybody kind of a language refresh so that they can so that we can help them go up the chain so that the chain can come back down um with like language that matters, language that people can align on. Um because what often happens, like when we go the outcomes route, it's like, okay, well, we want to grow like by X. I want to hit this dollar amount. Okay, if that's the only outcome that anybody can understand then guess what happens underneath that? Like it's that's where it leads and deals and closed one and like that's the only stuff that makes sense, right? And um that's where it starts to drive the quick wins and I think what I agree um with that. Like getting better at finding the real time to value that is that is fast, but then making sure it lines up with with the plan instead of deciding what the plan will be. Right. Chris Carolan: Right? Right? And that's where if we think about past efforts at least when I was in manufacturing, it was like Google Ads, always. Always the first ask, right? Never a thought of what the landing page needs to look like. What we were going to do after that lead came in, right? But then we got to deal with it once the Google ads are hitting. So then all the all the strategy, strategy becomes supporting that quick win. Right? Chris Carolan: Right. And that's really how this stuff like gets built out. And so whatever whether it's in line or not, like good to like if somebody's saying like, hey, you're the person that can get this done probably just takes a couple days and it's going to have a huge impact on the business. It's a good trust building like element for sure. But don't let that like guide guide the strategy. Right. Erin Wiggers: Right. It's very much like putting the cart ahead of the horse in that situation where it's like you're your quick win is really just adding problems down the road or like setting you up for doing a lot more work that is not as quick um to support the the original idea. Um, I've seen that happen so many times too where it's like the the metric they that we want to focus on is leads. So let's turn up traffic. It's like, well, that's one lever and this kind of goes back to like outcomes, like requirements are different. Like one lever could be turning up traffic. If you have a really great conversion rate, yeah, increase volume will help. Um, if your conversion rate is trash because the content messaging doesn't line up with the ads that you're running. Yeah, like linking Google ads to the homepage. Right. Erin Wiggers: Like you might as well be setting money on fire. Like that is not going to move the needle for you. Um, and I think that's why I gravitate so much to just RevOps in general. Uh, because when anybody tells me like I want to fix this number, in my head, I'm seeing the bow tie and I know all the different numbers along that route and where where the issue could actually be. Um, because it's it's rarely just that you you're not running enough ads or or something like you know, like it's it's rarely that straightforward. Um, and so I think when you anytime somebody gives me a number, anytime somebody gives me anything, I kind of break it down into whatever the smallest component parts could possibly be and then kind of work my way back up to like, okay, is this the actual number or do we need to be looking at these other things? Um, so yeah, just being able to align around around numbers with the system in mind, I think is why I just I just love RevOps so much. It just gives you the ability to say, hey, let's zoom out here. Um, let's not think in a vacuum, let's not like silo ourselves. Um, and uh, yeah, it's just it's a it's better outcomes for everyone in that case.

[51:00] **The Importance of Human Context Engineers** Chris Carolan: Yeah. And huh, defining those outcomes. Um and like I'm looking at the first bullet here like defining success in terms of business impact rather than service delivery metrics like a lot of times especially now like business impact like teams working together like more, right? Aligned teams. Like marketing and sales alignment. Commonly known as the as the number one problem. Guess what? That's really hard to measure, right? But when you can see it in practice, like you you feel it, right? Um, versus finding these metrics. So, uh, it's definitely a skill to try and translate, you know, what the the system like the kinds of outcomes that the system can can provide for. Um and I I've found like trying to create like not making it about the tool but doing the tool work enough to make sure we can start working with humans in a way that uh everybody's taking responsibility for what's happening, right? Um so so very important. Erin Wiggers: For sure, for sure. Yeah, I think everybody wants to automate some process because they because AI can do XYZ. And and I do love building automations. I'm not gonna I'm not going to lie. But my mind always goes to, okay, then what can the human do instead? Like if the human is not manually entering all this CRM data is not manually deduplicating stuff from, you know, coming in from the landing page. Um, what can they kind of pivot to that's going to bring more value? Because I think that is what's truly like transformational in a business. Most people can automate stuff, especially these days. AI can automate most of your stuff. But if you don't enable your team to then really get the most out of that their time that that's freed up by the AI. If they're spending all their time debugging or, you know, tracking down things, um, then then you haven't, you haven't unlocked the full value there. Um, and and I think that is a piece that gets that gets missed a lot, but I but I think it's critical to the change management part of it because you can come in and and say, hey, I'm going to automate all your work for you and people are like, please don't, I like my job. Right. Erin Wiggers: Right. Erin Wiggers: But if you say I'm going to automate all the shit, all the stuff that you don't want to do so that you can spend more time doing what you probably got into this job for in the first place. Um, you know, you can do more strategy, more brainstorming, more talking to people, um face to face even, um Yeah, internally and externally, right? Like communication has always been the thing that we get to later. Right. Chris Carolan: And it's one of the most important things. Um and uh yeah, that's that's a lot of what you're saying is is why like the fifth stage of the value path, like I changed it from customer to value creator. because like there's such a cycle of like not understanding what the person is really, really needs to accomplish like in the moment that we're working with them, both internally and externally, right? And when we can just use labels for things where somebody can look at it and be like, yep, that's me. Uh that's what I need to do right now. That's the that's the the journey I'm on right now. I haven't been a part of this process at all and you're bringing in this new software and you think I trust you just because uh we're a customer and I'm paying you. And it's like, nope. So even though you're going to help with all the things that I hate, those things give me a job. And if like so if we can position it to say like that person needs to create value. They're value creator. Like all of a sudden the the the conversation can change. Like the way it needs to be like because we're going to implement and that thing that we're going to automate like that email about tracking information. It's like how much value are you creating right now that being the one sending that email, right? Right. Chris Carolan: Right. Right. Versus and this this idea is going to stick with me for a long time. At the last gig that I had, you know, the the um, you know, the order um management manager, she was like, man, it would be really cool. I had this idea like to send out these onboarding packages, right? To customers, like we would add this and this and it's like just brilliant idea. And no time. Like I was just got anytime for it. Because they're doing data entry, because they're saving PDFs and then editing PDFs and then uploading them as images and just all this stuff, right? And it's like that idea is what now, not only you give that person a chance to have like a say in the matter, but also it's high, super high value activity. Right. Chris Carolan: That starts to get done, right? And so in that moment if you decide like, oh, we're just going to do this. Now we could help like put that that customer, you know, onboarding package together and if we all if we all decide that that's going to create a lot of value in the moment, like let's do it. Let's make it a priority, let's make space for that. Right. Chris Carolan: Right? So often it's like the people that are concerned for like for good reason, um, like especially the customer facing team, they have, they always have ideas for how to do better for customers. Right. Chris Carolan: And again, internally and externally. And I think that's so crucial for business owners, sea suite, leadership to understand is like your most valuable asset are the people closest to the problem you're solving. And most of the time that is not you at the top. Like most of the time that's people with like boots on the ground who are talking to clients who are entrenched in the processes to get things done, like that is your gold mine. Like the AI is secondary to like the AI is what enables you to to see those ideas come to life. But the idea has to come from a person who has been facing this problem. Um, and yeah, like I because I've done this at several places where, you know, we implement a solution, we've got the new CRM, it's all set up. I've I've automated everything I can think of. And then one of the sales people comes to me and says like, you know, I would really love if I could just do this one thing without switching screens. It's like, yeah, I never would have thought of that. Um because I'm not in it every day. But you are and that's a brilliant idea and that's that's how you start to see that like iterative improvement because now suddenly everybody's got just like a little more time and they're starting to see that it can work too. Like that's the other critical piece is like, oh my life is getting easier. Well, it could be even easier if we did this and then it becomes more of like a collaboration where I'm not, you know, the tech person who's just like handing down orders of like you must use the CRM in this way. It's like, I'm setting up the systems that make your life easier. And if you just tell me what else you need, it can continue to go that way really forever. Um Yeah. Erin Wiggers: Uh, so yeah, I think people need to understand that the real gold mine is the people working on the problem every day. Chris Carolan: Yeah. Uh I like to call them human context engineers. Love it. Chris Carolan: Started started there. Yes. It's the thing like it far and away, the number one underutilized resource in most companies right now as they look for AI to come in and solve these problems. Like just ask the humans that are close to the problem. Right. Chris Carolan: So we're going to keep helping helping you do that uh as we move forward with the series. Um, let's see which commitment we're we're talking about next week. Uh, enabling natural flow rather than controlling it. That's good. Chris Carolan: Yep, that will be a fun one. Erin Wiggers: Brain going and like fluid dynamics and path of least resistance. Oh, I love it. It's It all makes so much sense. Um so that'll be a fun one. Chris Carolan: It does. I I look forward to it and I thank you for uh the awesome conversation today. Erin Wiggers: Yeah, thank you. Chris Carolan: Um and until next time, everybody have a great week. Thanks Erin. Erin Wiggers: Yeah, thanks Chris.