MEDDPICC, live on the call.
The enterprise qualification standard, and the one most teams run on paper after the call. Kairos tracks all eight elements while the conversation is happening and fires when a senior leader would go get the missing one.
Who else at their company would need to weigh in on a decision like this?
A checklist for whether a deal is real.
MEDDIC was built at PTC in the 1990s by Jack Napoli and Dick Dunkel to explain why some reps forecast accurately and others didn't. The answer was not talent. It was whether the rep had actually confirmed six things about the deal. Two more were added over time, Paper Process and Competition, and the enterprise standard became MEDDPICC.
It is a qualification framework, not a conversation framework. It tells you what must be true for the deal to close; it does not tell you what to say next. That gap is where most teams lose it. The elements get filled in on a CRM form after the call, from memory, by a rep who was busy selling.
Teams that run it well treat each element as a question to be answered by the buyer, out loud, on a call. Teams that run it badly treat it as a field to be populated before forecast review.
The eight elements.
| Element | Letter | What must be true | How reps miss it | What Kairos fires |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Metrics | M | The buyer has stated, in numbers, what the problem costs or what success is worth. | Rep records the pain ("too slow") instead of the measure. Nothing to approve against. | "When you say slow, what does that cost you in a quarter?" |
| Economic buyer | E | The person who can say yes without asking anyone else has been identified, and ideally heard the metrics. | Marked covered on a second-hand "my VP is on board." | "Who signs off on something this size, and have they heard this number?" |
| Decision criteria | D | The buyer has told you what they'll judge vendors on, technical and commercial. | Rep assumes the criteria match the demo they already gave. | "If you had to rank what matters most in this decision, what's first?" |
| Decision process | D | You know the steps, the people, and the dates from here to signature. | Rep takes "we'll discuss internally" as a next step. | "Walk me through what happens after this call on your side." |
| Paper process | P | Legal, security, and procurement steps are known and already in motion. | Discovered in the last two weeks of the quarter. | "Has your team bought something like this before? What did legal need?" |
| Identified pain | I | A specific, owned problem with consequences if unsolved, not a general interest. | Interest is mistaken for pain; nobody owns the problem. | "What happens if this is still the same a year from now?" |
| Champion | C | Someone with influence, personal stake, and willingness to sell for you internally. | The friendly contact gets the title. They have access but not power. | "When I'm not in the room, who's making the case for this?" |
| Competition | C | You know who else is in the deal, including the status quo and the internal build. | Rep never asks; competitor surfaces in the final round. | "Who else are you looking at, and what do they do well?" |
Where reps break it.
Champion inflation.
The friendly contact becomes the 'champion' in the CRM. A real champion has power, has something to gain, and will sell for you when you're not in the room. Most champions in most pipelines fail the third test, and no one asks.
The economic buyer by proxy.
The rep hears 'my VP is on board' and marks EB as covered. The VP has never been on a call, never heard the metrics, and will see the proposal for the first time in procurement. The deal stalls at the exact stage the framework exists to prevent.
Metrics without a number.
"They want to save time" is pain, not a metric. Until the buyer has said a number out loud, hours, dollars, deals, headcount, there is nothing for the economic buyer to approve against. The rep knows this and still moves on, because asking feels pushy at minute 12.
The move, at the minute the element is needed.
Kairos holds the whole call, so it knows which elements the buyer has actually confirmed, which the rep has assumed, and how far into the conversation you are. It fires on three conditions: an element is still open past the point a senior leader would tolerate, the buyer just said something that opens a door to an element, or the rep is about to move to next steps with a gap that will stall the deal later.
It does not fire on every open element. Eight prompts in a discovery call is noise. One, at the right moment, is judgment.
You've mentioned the rework twice. Roughly how many hours a week is that across the team?
Who else at their company would need to weigh in on a decision like this?
Before we wrap: what has to happen on your side between now and a decision?
MEDDPICC says what. Pair it with a framework that says how.
Most enterprise teams run MEDDPICC for qualification and one conversation framework for the call itself. Kairos runs both at once and tags each move with the framework that triggered it.
MEDDPICC + Challenger
Qualify with MEDDPICC, run the conversation with teach, tailor, take control. The most common enterprise pairing.
MEDDPICC + Command of the Message
Metrics and Decision Criteria map directly onto positive business outcomes and required capabilities. Natural fit.
MEDDPICC + your playbook
Your house rules on top: which competitors to name, which metrics matter in your market, who counts as an EB at your buyer.
MEDDPICC with Kairos.
The MEDDPICC coverage checklist.
One page. Eight elements, the buyer-confirmed test for each, the question that gets it, and the minute mark a senior leader would expect it covered by. Built from the captured judgment behind Kairos. Print it, pin it, run it on your next call.