1 min lesson
The mock discovery call
Show why this lesson detail matters. "An interviewer plays an engineering-leader buyer and you run discovery."
Step 1 of 3
An interviewer plays an engineering-leader buyer and you run discovery. They grade three things: the quality of your questions, whether you actually listen and how rigorously you qualify. This is the round where 'happy ears' candidates get filtered.
Run a methodology visibly. You don't have to name-drop the acronym, but the interviewer should be able to map your questions onto a qualification framework such as MEDDIC/MEDDPICC or Command of the Message.
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Full explanation
The Discovery Arc
Interactive diagram. Step through it with the Next and Previous controls below, or Tab to a region to read its detail.
Qualification is the gate. Wrap without surfacing economic buyer, decision criteria and champion and you've failed the round.
"Where does your team lose the most time when a new engineer joins? So you're onboarding about twelve engineers a quarter and each one takes six weeks to ship on their own. If that dropped to four, what would those two weeks per hire be worth to you? Who besides you would weigh in on a tool that changes onboarding, and who owns that budget? Let's put thirty minutes on the calendar this Thursday with your platform lead to agree what a pilot would need to prove."
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Advanced table
MEDDPICC element
- MEDDPICC element
- Metrics
- What you're uncovering
- How they measure dev productivity today
- A question that gets there
- "How do you currently measure engineering throughput or velocity?"
- MEDDPICC element
- Economic buyer
- What you're uncovering
- Who controls the budget
- A question that gets there
- "Who ultimately owns the tooling budget for engineering?"
- MEDDPICC element
- Decision criteria
- What you're uncovering
- What 'good' has to clear
- A question that gets there
- "What would a tool have to prove before you'd roll it out?"
- MEDDPICC element
- Decision process
- What you're uncovering
- The path to signature
- A question that gets there
- "Walk me through how a tool like this gets approved here."
- MEDDPICC element
- Paper process
- What you're uncovering
- Legal, security and procurement steps to signature
- A question that gets there
- "What does Security and Legal need to see before a contract can be signed?"
- MEDDPICC element
- Identify pain
- What you're uncovering
- The real bottleneck
- A question that gets there
- "Where does your team lose the most time in a typical week?"
- MEDDPICC element
- Champion
- What you're uncovering
- Who'll sell internally
- A question that gets there
- "Who on your team is already pushing for better AI tooling?"
- MEDDPICC element
- Competition
- What you're uncovering
- What else is in the evaluation, including the status quo
- A question that gets there
- "What else are you evaluating, including keeping what you have?"
| MEDDPICC element | What you're uncovering | A question that gets there |
|---|---|---|
| Metrics | How they measure dev productivity today | "How do you currently measure engineering throughput or velocity?" |
| Economic buyer | Who controls the budget | "Who ultimately owns the tooling budget for engineering?" |
| Decision criteria | What 'good' has to clear | "What would a tool have to prove before you'd roll it out?" |
| Decision process | The path to signature | "Walk me through how a tool like this gets approved here." |
| Paper process | Legal, security and procurement steps to signature | "What does Security and Legal need to see before a contract can be signed?" |
| Identify pain | The real bottleneck | "Where does your team lose the most time in a typical week?" |
| Champion | Who'll sell internally | "Who on your team is already pushing for better AI tooling?" |
| Competition | What else is in the evaluation, including the status quo | "What else are you evaluating, including keeping what you have?" |
When the buyer hands you an opening to pitch, name the discipline out loud: 'I could show you that now, but I'd rather make sure I understand your review bottleneck first.' Visibly choosing discovery over a premature demo is exactly the maturity this round rewards.
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Optional practice
Test yourself on The mock discovery call
QIn the mock discovery call, the buyer says 'that sounds interesting, can you show me how Cursor handles that?' ten minutes in. What's the strongest move?