learn-course-design-with-phoebe / Delivery session 6 of 6
Learn Course Design with Phoebe · Delivery track, session 6 of 6

Selling it internally

Nobody has ever wanted a course. They want a problem to stop happening, and a course is the shape their request arrived in. Tonight, the last session: what the sponsor is actually buying, the one-page business case that fits on a screen, what to promise, and the one thing you have to refuse - because promising behaviour change while the manager conversation is somebody else's to have is promising something that is not yours to deliver.

🟠 Hands-on Bring everything from b1 to b5 Final scorecard tonight 45 min
0-3 · Welcome 3-18 · What they are buying, and the one page 18-40 · Build-along: write the case 40-45 · Q&A
Part 0

Where we are

Eleven sessions of designing and delivering. Tonight is how it gets funded, staffed and agreed - which is the part that decides whether any of the other eleven ever happen.

🎫 Clear all three quiz questions to stamp your passport Live = presented in the 45 minutes Self-study = the full depth, after class

★ What you walk out with tonight. A one-page business case, a clear list of what you will and will not promise, and the whole course finished.

Part 1 · covers the buyer

What they are actually buying

6 min live
They ask for They want So the proposal leads with "An hour on data contracts" the dashboards to stop breaking 34 assets, three times this year "Some training for the team" to have visibly done something about it what will be different, and by when "An onboarding programme" new people productive in six weeks not twelve the six weeks, and what they cost today A proposal that opens with a course outline is answering a question nobody asked.
🔍 Click to zoom - the left column is a solution, and you were given it instead of the problem
LiveThe one-page case, in five blocks5 min▶

Exactly the structure from learn-communication-with-phoebe session 3, because a business case is a message with money attached and the same rules apply. Ask first, detail below.

  • The ask, first. "I need two days of my time and one commitment from you, by Thursday." Not at the bottom - at the top, where somebody deciding in one sentence can see it.
  • The problem, with a number. From b1 and b5. "Thirty-four assets, three times this year. Contract references are at 18 percent."
  • The design, in three lines. Not a curriculum. What happens, for whom, over what period. Nobody is buying a module list.
  • The measure. From b5. What you will report, when, and what would make you say it did not work.
  • What you need from them. The three non-training rows from b4. This is the block that makes the case honest and it is the one people leave out.

One page. If it is three pages, it will be read by nobody and forwarded to somebody who reads even less of it. The detail belongs in an appendix nobody opens, which is fine - appendices exist to make one page possible.

"Proposed: a 90-minute workshop on data contracts covering the six change types, the contract file format, deprecation notice periods, and the schema registry. Delivered twice, with a follow-up..."

The sponsor is now reading a syllabus and has no idea what it costs them, what changes, or what they have to do. The most likely outcome is "sounds good, let us pick this up next quarter", which is a no with better manners.

"I need two days of my time and one thing from you by Thursday. Thirty-four assets broke three times this year; contract references sit at 18 percent. A 40-minute session plus a CI check plus one line in the definition of done should get that to 45 percent by day 60. The thing I need is you asking your leads about it in week one."

Six lines. They know the cost, the change, the date, and their own part in it. It can be answered yes or no in the meeting, which is the whole point of writing it.

Part 2 · covers the promise

What to promise, and what to refuse

6 min live

The pressure at the end of a good meeting is to promise the outcome. Resist it precisely - not by hedging everything, but by being exact about which part is yours.

You can promise They will be able to do it at the end of the session - you measure it The job aid, the manager email, the follow-ups, on these dates The day-60 report, whatever it says You cannot promise That behaviour changes - three of the six levers are not yours That the incidents stop - two of the five causes are not training And saying so is what makes the first column believable "I will get them able to do it, and here are the three things that decide whether they will." That sentence is more credible than a promise, and it is the only one you can actually keep.
🔍 Click to zoom - refusing the overclaim is what makes the rest of the proposal trustworthy
Self-studyIf you are selling this externally4 min▶

The same structure, with two additional decisions:

  • Day rate or outcome? A day rate is easy to compare and caps your upside at the hours. Outcome pricing pays for the design work that never shows up in delivery days - and only works when the outcome is genuinely within your control, which after b4 you now know it often is not.
  • Design and delivery are different products. Designing a session that somebody else runs is a different sale from running one, and it is frequently the more valuable of the two. It is also the one that scales, because it does not consume a day of you per audience.
  • Price the transfer plan separately, and offer it. "The session is X. The transfer package - manager briefings, job aid, day 7 and day 30 follow-ups - is Y, and it is what determines whether the session was worth buying." Now the client is choosing knowingly rather than buying half a thing.

For requirements packs, scoping and full commercial proposals, this course stops here - that is the ship-idea Track B territory.

Build-along

Write the one page

★ 22 min · everyone builds

The ask, first. What you need, from whom, by when. Top of the page, one sentence, exactly as in the communication course.

The number. From b1 and b5. The problem with a count and a baseline on it. Without this the page is an opinion.

The design, three lines. What happens, for whom, over what period. Not a curriculum - nobody is buying a module list.

The measure. From b5. What you will report, when, and the revert line. Including the revert line is what makes the rest credible.

Your three asks. From b4. Manager conversation, scheduled first use, one owner for a non-training action. This block is the honest half of the page.

Write the ask sentence. "I need two days and one commitment from you by Thursday." If it is not answerable yes or no, rewrite it.

Put your b5 baseline in. A real before-number changes the document from a proposal into an argument.

Compress the design to three lines. If you find yourself listing modules, you are answering a question they did not ask.

Include the revert line. "If it has not moved at all by day 60, I will say so and we stop." Counter-intuitive and it is the single most credibility-building sentence available to you.

Write your three asks explicitly. Each with a named owner. Vagueness here is how you end up accountable for things you do not control.

Draft the refusal sentence. "I will get them able to do it. Whether they do it depends on three things and two of them are yours - here they are." Practise it, because the pressure to drop it at the end of a friendly meeting is real.

Check it is one page, then grade the whole thing below.

You diagnosed the request before accepting it, and named your fraction From b1. Five causes, and "training gets you about a third of the way", said in advance.
The objective can be failed, and the activity's verb is the objective's verb From a1 and a4. The two most commonly failed checks in the designer track.
There are at least three transfer actions, and you have asked for the two that are not yours From b4. Manager conversation, scheduled first use, job aid. Asked for, not assumed.
You have a baseline and a dated prediction, pulled before the session runs From b5. Free now, impossible afterwards.
The proposal refuses to promise the outcome, and says exactly which part is yours The refusal is what makes the promise believable. Dropping it under friendly pressure is the failure mode.

If you take one thing from the whole course. Ask for the two things that are not yours. The manager conversation and the scheduled first use decide more about your outcome than everything you do in the room, they cost almost nothing, and nobody will offer them unless you ask.

After the course

Where to go from here

ongoing
  1. Write one real one-page case this month, with a baseline and a revert line in it.
  2. Send one manager email before your next session. Two lines. It is the highest-return four minutes in this entire course.
  3. Diagnose the next request you receive before agreeing to it. Five causes, ninety seconds, and your fraction said out loud.
  4. Report one day-60 number honestly, including the other causes. Note what it does to how the next proposal is received.
  5. Then go sideways. learn-communication-with-phoebe for the delivery craft and the ask-first structure this session borrowed, learn-ai-education-with-phoebe for teaching with AI, learn-experimentation-with-phoebe if you genuinely need causal evidence, and learn-ai-ppt-with-phoebe for the deck.
Check yourself

Three questions

Clear all three and this session gets stamped - twelve of twelve.

1 · Why should a proposal not open with the course outline?

The request arrived as a solution because that is the shape people put requests in. Leading with the ask, the number and what will be different lets a sponsor answer in the meeting. Leading with a module list gets "let us pick this up next quarter", which is a no with better manners.

2 · Why include a revert line - "if it has not moved by day 60, I will say so and we stop"?

Everybody in the room has seen proposals that could only ever succeed. Naming the condition under which you would stop signals you are describing a real bet rather than defending a budget line, and it costs you a sentence.

3 · What should you refuse to promise?

You can promise capability at the end of the session, the transfer actions on given dates, and an honest day-60 report. You cannot promise the behaviour, and saying so precisely is what makes the things you can promise believable. The pressure to drop that clause at the end of a friendly meeting is the real failure mode.

Sources covered

What this session teaches, and where it came from

✓What the sponsor is buyingThree requests, what each actually wants, and what the proposal should lead with instead
✓The one-page business caseAsk, number, design in three lines, measure, and the three things you need from them. Structure borrowed directly from learn-communication-with-phoebe session 3
✓What to promise and what to refuseCapability, the transfer actions and the honest report - never the behaviour change, and the refusal is what makes the rest credible
✓The revert lineNaming your own failure condition, and why it is the most credibility-building sentence in the document
✓External pricing and packagingDay rate against outcome, design as a separate product from delivery, and pricing the transfer plan so the client chooses knowingly
◐Full commercial proposals and requirements packsship-idea Track B. This course stops at the one-page internal case

Every fact on this page, and its verification tier, is recorded in the course's source map.

Delivery b6 cheat sheet · pin this

Nobody wants a courseThey want a problem to stop. Lead with that, never with the outline.
Five blocks, one pageAsk · number · design in three lines · measure · what you need from them.
The ask goes firstSame rule as any other message. Answerable yes or no in the meeting.
Include the revert lineNaming your own failure condition is the most credible sentence available.
Promise capability, not behaviourThree of six levers are not yours. Say which.
Ask for the two that are not yoursManager conversation and scheduled first use. Nobody offers them unasked.