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Developed by Olaf Kaiser · reviewed & implemented by Michael Boese Two MSP practitioners with 30 years of sales experience each · over 1,000 coachings
Sales excellence framework for managed services

The sales standard that makes your team sell measurably better.

MSP COACH is Olaf Kaiser's coaching framework for selling managed services – built on three decades of practice and more than 1,000 personally guided coachings: 7 excellence principles, 14 trainable competencies, one shared language. Your team trains in realistic role plays – and receives feedback that can be traced back to every moment in the conversation.

Demo for your sales team
30 years in MSP sales
1,000+ coachings delivered
7 / 14 principles & competencies
The problem

Your sellers master the technology. The business is decided in the conversation.

In MSP sales, opportunities rarely fail because of the solution – they fail because the customer was not yet able to decide. Exactly this behavior can be trained once it is made observable.

"Everyone sells differently."

Without a shared standard, conversation quality depends on the individual. Results are not comparable and best practices cannot be transferred.

"The training was good – little has changed."

Two-day seminars create motivation but no new behavior. Behavior only changes through repetition with concrete feedback.

"Feedback remains gut feeling."

"That was not convincing yet" helps no one. Without evidence from the conversation, feedback is opinion – and is treated accordingly.

Origin of the standard

Not a textbook model. Two practitioners, 60 years of MSP sales, one standard.

The standard was developed by Olaf Kaiser – based on 30 years of selling managed services and more than 1,000 personally delivered coachings. Michael Boese reviewed it and brought it into practice, contributing another 30 years of MSP sales experience. Every principle, every competency and every observation comes from real conversations with real customers in the MSP business.

Avatar of Olaf Kaiser
Developer of the standard

Olaf Kaiser

Developed the MSP COACH framework: the excellence principles, the 14 competencies, the observations and the coaching logic. The foundation is 30 years in MSP sales and more than 1,000 personally delivered coachings.

Avatar of Michael Boese
Review & implementation

Michael Boese

Reviewed the standard professionally and brought it into practical use. He also contributes 30 years of MSP sales to the framework – as a corrective ensuring every rule holds up in everyday MSP business.

"MSP COACH does not train successful conversations. MSP COACH develops successful sellers."
Guiding principle of the framework
2 × 30years of MSP sales
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From practice, not from theory

The standard emerged from real sales conversations and trainings – not from the drawing board. Anything that makes no difference in practice is not in it.

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Over 1,000 coachings as data basis

The typical thinking errors, the recurring patterns and the observations in the framework come from more than a thousand observed conversations.

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Four-eyes principle

Developed by Olaf Kaiser, reviewed and implemented by Michael Boese: every principle had to pass the practical test of two experienced MSP sales professionals.

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Built specifically for the MSP business

Not a generic sales training loosely adapted to IT: developed for system houses, managed service providers and the sale of recurring IT services.

The framework

Seven principles describing how an excellent MSP seller thinks.

The Sales Excellence Model does not answer the question "How do you sell managed services?" but "How does an excellent MSP seller think?" – solution-neutral, vendor-neutral and compatible with your existing sales methodology – derived from 30 years of practice in MSP sales.

PRINCIPLE 01

Business Value First

Technology is never an end in itself. Every recommendation makes a recognizable contribution to the customer's business.

PRINCIPLE 02

Conviction Before Communication

Only what the seller is personally convinced of after critical examination is recommended.

PRINCIPLE 03

Decision Before Deal

The task is to help the customer reach a good decision. The order follows from that.

PRINCIPLE 04

Clarity Before Conclusions

Facts, assessments and assumptions are separated before conclusions are drawn.

PRINCIPLE 05

Company and Person

Every decision is both a company decision and a personal decision of the conversation partner.

PRINCIPLE 06

Lead the Decision Process

The seller recognizes which steps, in which order, lead to the ability to decide.

PRINCIPLE 07

Ownership Before Excuses

Responsibility for one's own actions – successes and failures are reflected on openly.

FIRST PRINCIPLE

Increase the ability to decide

The north star of the entire framework: MSP sales means systematically increasing the customer's ability to make a decision.

Each principle is translated into two trainable competencies.

For each competency, the framework describes observable behavior, typical thinking errors, clear boundaries and a development path from beginner to expert.

01 Understand the business context
08 Verify assumptions
02 Translate value individually
09 Understand the company perspective
03 Examine value critically
10 Understand personal motivations
04 Recommend responsibly
11 Recognize decision readiness
05 Clarify decision prerequisites
12 Shape the decision process
06 Help with prioritization
13 Reflect on one's own actions
07 Make statements precise
14 Apply insights consistently
How it works

One training. One competency. Feedback that can be proven.

The training goal is set before the role play. That distinguishes MSP COACH from a pure retrospective – training is targeted, not random.

1

Choose a scenario

Realistic MSP situations with five context elements – business, customer, sales, technical and the competency to be trained. Solution-neutral: no scenario prescribes a technology.

2

Run the role play

The seller leads the conversation – repeatable, without risk to real customers. The conversation is the only data source of the entire method.

3

Observation & coaching

Every piece of feedback consists of an observation, evidence and a coaching hint. Side findings remain side notes – depth is created around the one trained competency.

The smallest unit: the observation.

One sentence describing what the participant actually did or did not do – addressed directly, without judgment, always with evidence from the conversation. Only then follows the coaching hint. Development before evaluation.

The AI takes care of the legwork: recognizing, substantiating, prioritizing. The standard it judges by comes from the practice of experienced sales trainers – not from a model.

  Scenario 04 · First meeting with head of IT · Training competency: understand the business context
Observation

You went straight into the technical solution without understanding the business context.

Evidence · After the customer said "our incidents keep piling up", the conversation immediately continued with the description of a monitoring package. There was no follow-up question about the impact on the business.
Coaching hint

Before you describe a solution: ask what the incidents cost the company – in time, revenue or trust. That turns a technical symptom into a business trigger, and your later recommendation gains a foundation.

For managing directors and sales leaders

A standard you can lead with.

MSP COACH never evaluates the quality of a technical solution and never the success of a conversation – only the competencies that became visible. The framework does not train successful conversations. It develops successful sellers.

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A shared language in the team

Principles, competencies and observations are named and defined. Feedback becomes debatable instead of personal.

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Faster onboarding

New sellers train on realistic scenarios before entering real opportunities. The development path shows where they stand.

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Development instead of evaluation

No examination instrument, no ranking. The trainer is a coach – which noticeably increases acceptance in the team.

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Neutral towards your portfolio

No product or vendor references. The framework does not replace your sales methodology, it combines with it.

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Repeatable, not one-off

Behavior changes through repetition. Training becomes an ongoing process instead of an annual event.

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Justified and traceable

Explainable coaching: every piece of feedback can be traced back to a concrete moment in the conversation.

Next step

See how your team sells by a standard.

In 30 minutes we show you a complete training scenario, the observations derived from it and how to introduce the standard in your sales organization.

Arrange a demo

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