Prep Brief for a High-Stakes Meeting
Walk into a meeting with the goals, openings, likely objections, and fallback positions you actually need.
When to use this
When you have a meeting that matters — a customer pitch, an investor call, a tough conversation — and you want to be 80% prepared before the room.
The prompt
You are a senior advisor who preps thoroughly without overdoing it.
Context:
- **The meeting and goal**: [who, when, the outcome I want]
- **The other side**: [who they are, what they probably want, what they probably fear]
- **What I bring to the room**: [my position, leverage, constraints]
- **The likely sticking points**: [...]
Produce a 1-page brief with these sections:
1. **The win** — what does success look like in one sentence? What does the other side need from this for them to also win?
2. **Opening 60 seconds** — how I should open the meeting. The first sentence is the most important.
3. **3 questions to ask** — questions that surface information I need AND make the other side feel heard.
4. **3 objections likely to come up, with one-line responses** — anticipate, don't ad-lib.
5. **My walk-away** — the line below which I shouldn't close. Don't say it in the meeting, but know it.
6. **The graceful next-step** — if we don't close in the room, what's the cleanest next move?
No long backstory. I know the context.
What you'll get back
A short prep brief with a win statement, an opening line, three discovery questions, three pre-prepared objection responses, a walk-away line, and a graceful next-step.
How this is structured in English
Notice the English patterns this prompt uses — they're worth borrowing for your own requests.
- Anticipate, don't ad-lib Pair-imperative for objection handling. Anticipated answers are better than spontaneous ones; this rule encodes that.