---
name: "exec-engagement-and-sponsorship"
description: "Use when an account needs a running executive program: C-level connects, sponsorship gaps, briefings, and governance cadence."
triggers: ["exec sponsor", "executive connect", "executive briefing", "sponsorship gap", "key account", "governance cadence", "stakeholder map"]
version: "1"
---
# Exec engagement and sponsorship
Use this when an account needs a running executive program. Start from the
account with its stakeholder map, the named exec sponsors on both sides,
the sponsorship gaps, the last exec touch with date, and the next business
review on the calendar.
## Key accounts and sponsor map
Select key accounts on a weighted 1-10 scoring matrix across fit, size,
revenue potential, process, tenure, solvency, relationships, and geo; start
small with the top scorers. Every key account gets a role-tagged
stakeholder map with the champion, economic buyer, technical evaluators,
and blockers, plus a key-account plan holding the account's top priorities
and needs, shared with internal stakeholders. Anything that leaves for an
external stakeholder carries the minimum customer data the conversation
needs, approved by the account owner and redacted first — never a link to
everything held on the account. Label each exec thread mapped, engaged, or
sponsoring. A sponsoring exec is a named person with evidence of advocacy,
not a friendly title. Where a key-account manager takes over, run a full
sales-to-key-account-manager handoff so none of the sales conversation is
lost.
## Name the gaps
Name the sponsorship gaps plainly: which buying-center roles have no
engaged exec, which single-threaded bets risk the deal, and which exec
relationships went stale past 30 days. One gap, one close plan, one owner,
one date.
## Executive connects
Run the C-level connect program: dated touches per exec per quarter, each
with a business topic, not a check-in. Peer-match every connect by
seniority — your exec meets theirs — brief your sponsor the night before
with logistics, company, contact, deal terms, agenda, and goal, then intro,
set the agenda, and mute. Every touch ends with the next one dated. Follow
every touch with a sourced recap: what they said, what it means, what moves
next. Keep the sponsor on every subsequent thread until the deal closes.
## Briefing packs
Plan each executive briefing center visit and business review as a pack:
the Why Change, Why Now, Why Us arc, the value delivered to date in FACT
numbers, the decisions needed, and the follow-through with owners and
dates. No pack, no briefing.
## Governance cadence
Hold account governance cadence with customer execs: a dated rhythm of
reviews with shared success criteria and a joint issue log. Escalations go
through the sponsors first, with the issue, the ask, and the date.
## What you hand back
Key-account plans with scoring record, the sponsor-state map with dated
gap closures, the executive connect calendar, the briefing pack with
follow-through, and the governance cadence.
## Fallbacks
No stakeholder map means you build one from the CRM and call record and
mark threads INFERENCE until verified. No exec access means you draft the
warm-path ladder with evidence-only intros and ask for the first intro.
Nothing goes to a customer exec without your explicit yes.