"I'm running out of time." Mr. Lanz, a wiry man in his mid-fifties, slightly graying with expressive features, dark brown clear eyes with a steady gaze, looked nervous. He sat across from me in my office, dressed in a casual look, slightly bent over, as if he wanted to emphasize the situation with his body language. We'd been through a few meetings already, the lineup for the market had worked out great, the process had gone quite well. There had been a lot of contact with recruiters, and Mr. Lanz had had numerous conversations, most of which started out hopeful, often leading to the second round, but there had not yet been a conclusion. I knew these moments. The preparation perfect, the first steps in the market successful, and suddenly it faltered. He looked at me urgently. "What can we do?" "Maybe it's the paperwork?" I had heard this argument many times before, too. I reassured him by pointing out that, yes, he had received invitations. If the paperwork wasn't in order, appointments and interviews wouldn't have happened. And then I talked about the process, about the fact that we now had a fairly good picture of the market, about the fact that at the moment the market was obviously not offering the job he was looking for, and also about the fact that we would of course have to check whether our argumentation, but also his performance in the interviews, was optimal. I looked at him calmly and said, "We haven't exhausted all our options yet." "I hope so," he replied. "Here's what I suggest: We review again your positioning and the lines of argument in the conversation. And we'll analyze the second round conversations in particular to find out what you're missing in the final step for success." He looked at me frankly, and I could tell he liked this approach. "Okay", he replied, "let's hope that does something". We reworked his positioning, sharpening it again significantly and carefully analyzing conversation after conversation to figure out at what point it might have tipped and why. It turned out, as I had expected, that he had only been a "counting candidate" in the one case. It seemed that the job had long since been awarded internally. In another case, the holding company had first approved the job, but then attached conditions that involved a delay of at least six months. And, of course, there was the case that my client had not "come across" strongly enough, according to the headhunter's feedback after the second interview. We created a matrix of all those conversations and worked out what he should pay more attention to in the future. And I again advised him to prepare even more thoroughly for the interviews, of course with my support at all times. Strengthened in this way, my client went into the next talks. We worked very intensively together, coordinating very closely before each appointment. I frequently gave him advice on what information he should still obtain and how he could better assess people he did not yet know. I noticed how his sensitivity increased from conversation to conversation and how his attitude towards things became more open and relaxed. And so I was not surprised when we met two months later and he gave me the latest update: "Believe it or not: now I have a 'luxury problem' to solve. But I need your help with that too, because I want to choose the 'right' job". I smiled at him, "That's a comfortable situation, isn't it? I'll be happy to show you how they come to a good decision." Today, he's still in that job, has anchored himself well, and we meet as needed for an update conversation, for him always with the great peace of mind that if in doubt, he can jump right back in.

Sometimes you have a "luxury problem