How to qualify a lead
Qualifying means deciding, quickly and honestly, whether an opportunity is worth pursuing. Good qualification protects delivery capacity and keeps the pipeline healthy. Grace Liu, Head of Sales, owns this process.
The five questions
| Question | What you want to learn |
|---|---|
| Need | What problem are they solving, and why now? |
| Budget | Is there an approved budget or a range? |
| Authority | Who decides, and who signs? |
| Timeline | When must the work start and finish? |
| Fit | Can Northwind deliver this profitably with the right people? |
Scoring
Score each question from 0 to 2 and add them up.
| Total | Action |
|---|---|
| 8 to 10 | Pursue. Assign a solution architect and begin a proposal |
| 5 to 7 | Nurture. Clarify the gaps before investing effort |
| 0 to 4 | Decline politely or park |
Procedure
- Capture the lead in the CRM within one business day, with source and contact.
- Hold a 30-minute discovery call; take notes against the five questions.
- Score the lead and record the reasoning.
- For leads scoring 8 or more, ask Isha Patel (Solutions Architect) for a technical sanity check.
- Check conflicts and constraints: does the customer need data to stay in a particular region, as with Orion Energy, or health data protections, as with Stellar Health? Raise them with Legal early.
- Estimate the likely size. Rough estimates use the first method in Estimation.
- Decide pursue, nurture or decline and tell the team.
Red flags
- No named decision maker.
- Customer insists on a fixed fee for an undefined scope.
- Payment terms far longer than our norm (our current customers pay in 30 to 45 days).
- Requests to start work before a contract is signed.
- Requirements that conflict with POL-IT-003 or customer security rules.
Approvals to remember
Even a small deal needs the correct approval: under $50,000 the Head of Sales, from $50,000 to $250,000 the VP Delivery and General Counsel, over $250,000 the CEO, CFO and General Counsel (POL-LEG-001). See SOW process.
Next step
Qualified leads move to the Proposal process.
Owner: Grace Liu - Last updated: 2026-03-19