The Cybertruck...As the Ultimate Mom Car
I just had my second child.
The Model Y is great—but it’s just a little too small.
If we had a third, we're out of luck on Teslas.
That got me thinking not just that I've been wanting the Cybertruck with bigger seats, but how that would be pitched.
And more importantly: how good ideas usually die.
What You Would Do...But You Know Wouldn't Work
..a giant study writeup and list of 3 great reasons for why we should make this product, a perfect powerpoint deck.
You sheepishly feel out if people will validate your opinion because you are self-conscious of putting yourself out there. In one ear...out the other.
You eventually realize, "hey this is a good idea. screw you guys"
People push back, listing all of the reasons it can't be done wrapped in logical fallacies.
Then you come back with even more research, internal support and an exhaustive list of reasons because you work hard and you believe.
You hire McKinsey to validate your market analysis and at some point, it feels like an obvious idea, but nobody seems to get it.
No one cares,
but then someone else says it differently, gets buy off, and takes credit. WTF?!
You're punching air.
This is the most intuitive trajectory and unfortunately, happens all of the time.
The Pitch
The point here isn't to get everyone to understand all the reasons like a report in your head.
Everyone is busy, they know meetings are boring, and even though your company is innovative, ideas are just ideas, they don't always make it through the rest of the company.
You: Crazy idea…but what if we made the Cybertruck
into the Ultimate Mom Car
(Pattern Interrupt because the Cybertruck is a very hypermasculine vehicle)
Everyone: Wait, what?
You: Well think about it,
Bullet proof car for,
a person protecting vulnerable kids all day,
Never has to touch a gas station handle or
get stressed about haggling to buy.
Everyone else: Seriously?
You: Ya, I don’t know about you but my wife is 5’4”,
Loves sitting up high because she always has to look up at the world,
And we’d be the only high up car,
…that can automatically lower itself when she loads a baby carrier.
Everyone else: Is that actually a thing?
You: Ya, my wife loved our F-150 because it felt like a tank,
But she had to lift our newborn just a little too high
And then literally climb into the passenger seat.
What's Going On Here
At this stage, we’ve made our point while maintaining a state of intrigue and letting each intuitive point land (as a pattern interrupt). It follows the natural course of a conversation.
Instead of demanding everyone schedule time,
hear you out while their guard is up, and
without a doubt, nitpick after you ask at the end ("What do you think?"),
You make all your points land as people are intrigued and receptive to what you say.
Why This Feels Odd At First
One of the downsides to this is that in companies, whenever you break corporate lingo (which is inherently unconvincing) you feel a sense of discomfort.
"I can't talk like that. That's unprofessional. What if I sound sexist?"
But talking too academically, too professionally, and too logically takes a lot of work and more importantly, has very little convincing power.
If you just point out obvious truths in intuitive ways, everyone else adopts the frame of "Oh my gosh, he's right. We're just being dumb, smart people with no common sense (facepalm)". It's one of the great ironies of educated people (MBAs, engineers, PhDs) that they can overthink things so much that basic social observations can elude them. The higher up you go in an organization you notice this more and more.
I would add that when you do talk about any protected class (e.g. women, people of color, etc...) especially with a pattern interrupt, there's some that automatically assume you are being sexist/racist due to the shock and subject. Filter out actually bigoted comments that diminish an entire group and anticipate any offense that might be mistaken, so you aren't so caught off guard that you can't address the concern articulately. That being said, still be mindful of the environment, so be precise.
Empathizing with your customer is different than marginalizing them.
Objection Handling
The next stage will just be random objections. As I discovered over the years, pitches are really won during the objection handling stage, which people avoid because they are obsessed with getting buy-off after the initial pitch. Most people don't even know what objection handling is.
Further, some people think the existence of objections are actual reasons their ideas aren't good or won't be understood. Even worse, some take having to handle objections vs. someone just "getting it" as a divine sign it wasn't meant to be (see Limiting Beliefs). This just isn't true.
Anticipating Objections
At this stage, your points all landed, but the group is making up thoughtless reasons not to go forward.
Most of these objections you can see coming a mile away, so the preparation at this crucial stage really comes from running a process where you:
- come up with all of the objections,
- develop great prepared responses,
- with confidence you can handle any other random curveballs on the fly.
If you are prepared and you can deliver without hesitation or flinching that is a pattern interrupt innately: Most people don't know about objection handling when they pitch.
Why The Responses Are Written This Way
You'll notice that I write responses in chunks, with pacing. This is because even with the right words, intelligent, thoughtful people tend to talk in sentences because they write a lot. When you are communicating, especially for something important, that needs to be convincing, you have to consciously "switch modes". You can see how I have to switch modes even writing in this post.
You aren't writing an essay or a memo, you are in person speaking with a goal of making your ideas land.
Thus, a recurring theme is that details with imagery are given their time and space for the listener's subconscious to absorb. Right after someone asks a question, you have maybe one moment where you can chunk 1...maybe 2 sentences worth of information because they are waiting and focused on your response. You don't have a lot of time and room to work with, so you have to make these moments count.
Examples
I don’t know if the boss man would buy off on this…
You mean the richest man in the world
with 14 kids
with 4 different women…?
I don’t know if this a growing market…
You’re telling me
that people,
that have more than 2 kids
aren’t a growing market?
Because every developed country is worried about population collapse
if their people have less than 2…
The Cybertruck is hard to manufacture because we can’t curve the panels:
A suburban is the only design we can justify
as LITERALLY being a box shape.
In the future, the cars will drive themselves, no one will own their own car.
Do you think a mom would trust her 8 yr old to take a cab…
Or do you think she’d prefer to have her self-driving car pick him up while she monitors the entire process.
What about working mothers?
The moms making lots of money
...and have even less time?...
Why Isn’t Rivian doing this?
Their stock is down 99%,
They lose $90k per vehicle they sell
And they have 1 year of runway.
Safe to say they are in zero position to develop a new product and manufacturing line.
Analysis of Objections
The number of objections you can get on any topic are limitless to the subject and the people, thus mapping out all of them especially the ones you are most scared of where you can feel the most confidence that you actually took the time to prepare. You can tell where you could've improved by the moments you didn't handle the objection well.
What Next...Did We Win?
Not necessarily, your ideas can land and you can really nail your pitch all the way through, but one of the things you have to accept is that it may not be enough even if you think it makes all the sense.
Taking rejection is one of the best skills you can have.
Focus on your pitch and your lessons learned. If you did everything well saw your points land, you can be proud that you actually had a lot of moments of great influence: count those moments up.
It's not all about you, how good you are, or well you pitch. This isn't some mystical power. This whole art is about making the most of opportunities not some sort of crutch for insecurity about the future. If you can keep the rejections from winding you up or making you bitter, you'll keep yourself from spoiling your future pitches.
I had a friend that gave me one of the best mantras:
"It's okay. Maybe it's not for you or it's not your time. I'm not looking for the no's I'm looking for the yes'.
Conclusion
The point of this case isn't to irresponsibly promote unprofessional communications, but to highlight how from first-principles, influence is fundamentally understood to the point where many have very deep limiting beliefs holding them back.
A pitch can be the difference between you getting buy-off for your career making idea or being a lone genius that got ripped off. This skill is very important for life's most critical moments, yet it is completely misunderstood by most professionals.
I hope this case study helps you rethink how you might advocate for innovative ideas in your organization that you really believe in.
And if you are at Tesla and have any influence or sway in this matter, please use these skills to develop an adapted Cybertruck for my wife before we have our third child.