---
id: "action-create-qualification-checklist"
type: "action-item"
source_timestamps: ["§ Say No Sooner"]
tags: ["sales-process", "qualification", "risk-mitigation"]
related: ["entity-fyre-festival", "contrarian-rejecting-hype-leads"]
speakers: ["Eric Janssen", "Brian Denenberg", "Benson P. Shapiro"]
action: "Develop a discovery checklist to identify red flags and empower sales to reject poor-fit leads."
outcome: "Avoid acquiring toxic customers that cause reputational and operational damage."
sources: ["commercial"]
sourceVaultSlug: "hbr-seg-commercial"
originDay: 5
articleStem: "hbr-tier1-03-sales-debt-grow"
sourceUrl: "https://hbr.org/2026/01/the-risks-of-prioritizing-short-term-revenue-over-customer-fit"
sourceTitle: "The Risks of Prioritizing Short-Term Revenue Over Customer Fit"
---
# Create a Rigorous Qualification Checklist

**Action:** Develop a specific checklist of questions for discovery conversations to identify **red flags early**. Vague answers to critical operational questions (infrastructure, security, partners) indicate a high likelihood of downstream support and delivery issues. **Empower the sales team to walk away** from leads that fail this qualification — *regardless of their funding or hype*.

**Provenance:** This is the discipline [[entity-eric-janssen|Eric Janssen]] used to reject [[entity-fyre-festival|Fyre Festival]], and the practical embodiment of the [[contrarian-rejecting-hype-leads|reject-hype-leads]] insight. It is the front-line, prevention-side complement to [[concept-incentive-alignment-in-sales|incentive alignment]] for avoiding unintentional [[concept-sales-debt]].

**Outcome:** Avoid acquiring toxic customers that cause reputational and operational damage.


## Related across articles
- [[action-narrow-icp]]
- [[concept-attention-vs-traction]]
- [[concept-discounting-hurdles]]