A water technology can meet its performance target while the project around it cannot proceed. The missing condition may sit with a utility, an operating team, a budget owner or a procurement committee. Each can be doing reasonable work while the combined decision remains impossible.
Before adding another proposal to the pipeline, draw the dependencies. Use the exercise below to establish which decision the project needs next and what its owner requires.
Put six columns on one page
| Column | Working question | Useful evidence |
|---|---|---|
| Outcome | What must the customer be able to do? | A defined operating or business requirement |
| Dependency | What connection, input, approval or capability enables it? | The specific condition, not a general risk label |
| Owner | Who can resolve or accept that condition? | A responsible role and a route to that person |
| Evidence | What will that owner accept? | A specification, test protocol, reference or approved analysis |
| Funding route | Which budget or contractual allocation pays? | A named budget owner and approval route |
| Decision trigger | What observable event moves the purchase forward? | A documented gate, deadline or acceptance decision |
Use a separate row for each condition. Water availability and a usable connection deserve separate treatment. A technically acceptable process and the operator's willingness to assume its maintenance also deserve separate treatment.
A hypothetical reuse project
Imagine a factory considering a water-reuse system. This is an illustrative project, not a client engagement or a reported result. The technology supplier can demonstrate the required water quality in a trial. The factory still needs to establish where the system connects, who runs it, which process accepts the recovered water, and who authorizes the capital spend.
The supplier's performance evidence helps with one row. It does not automatically satisfy the utility's connection conditions, the operator's training requirements or finance's investment gate. Giving each row an owner and an evidence requirement turns a broad objection into work that can be assigned.
An unknown funding route is especially revealing. If the benefit belongs to one part of the organization and the cost to another, the investment may need an explicit internal agreement. Repeating the benefit calculation without resolving that allocation can leave the proposal in the same place.
Convert the map into a next decision
Ask the team to choose the dependency whose resolution enables the next binding customer decision. Check that the proposed owner has the authority to resolve it. Agree the evidence required and a date for reviewing it. If the customer's decision route is still unknown, make finding it the task rather than treating an optimistic sales date as a commitment.
The map can also expose a sequencing mistake. There may be little value in scaling partner recruitment before establishing the reference evidence those partners must take into procurement. There may be little value in improving a technical presentation while the investment has no budget owner.
Keep the map honest
Mark assumptions as assumptions. Distinguish an agreed requirement from your interpretation of a conversation. Review the map with the people who own its rows; an internally complete spreadsheet can still describe a buyer who does not exist.
The map does not replace engineering, permitting advice or the customer's own procurement process. Its purpose is to connect their requirements with the commercial work. It is useful when it changes the next action: a different test, an owner conversation, an agreement on costs or a realistic pause.
Background and next step
My July 2026 field note AI's Next Bottleneck Runs Through Water Infrastructure examines infrastructure dependencies in a reported project. The August 2026 Danube field note examines the importance of an operating design boundary. These are dated source analyses; the map above is a new practical interpretation.
If your team needs to map dependencies across current pilots, customer segments or partner routes, explore the Commercialization Architecture Workshop. A free 30-minute introductory call is available from that program panel. Paid scope and fees are agreed on enquiry.
Practitioner working aid by Arpad Talasi. The dated background analyses are linked in the text.