Anyway, we run through our formal validation process and let's assume that there is indeed a driver and justification for new space. We then perform a thorough needs analysis and determine that your business unit needs roughly 19,000 sf. Based on the type and function of the particular business unit, my team suggests that they can locate in a class B suburban concrete tilt-up as long as there is nearby freeway access.

Even without the formal green light to proceed, we call on professionals in our broker network and conduct a preliminary site search. We find two locations that require very little in tenant improvements and are offering incentives such as three months free rent. We run the numbers and present an excellent package of options to you. You are very happy and as your client team leader, I encourage you that timing and open communication is critical. Because you represent the corporation's heavy hand, you willingly recite the company policy to the end user. The policy says the company must use me and my firm exclusively and follow our guidance, adhere to corporate space standards, etc. all to ensure the business unit management makes the right decision every time.

Stop. I hate to interrupt a pleasant daydream but this is where the project can go extremely well or horribly wrong. For everything to go well is for the corporate real estate manager to use his or her relationship management skills. The business unit manager is brought on board, the corporate real estate manager sets policy, and the service provider team executes the 'right' transaction that helps align the end user's business and its real estate.

For everything to go horribly wrong, frankly, happens too often. Real estate managers will tell you they walk a tightrope in almost every real estate transaction--balancing between pleasing the business unit end user, the regional management and two sets of senior management including their own boss. To use the heavy hand is to push one of these vested parties to the extreme, resulting in potentially career limiting fallout. No wonder why service providers often feel stuck in the middle. Because we don't have the authority to exercise any heavy handedness of our own, we sometimes feel relegated to order-taker status. Where's the value in that?

My suggestion is to turn the policy (and not the person) into the heavy hand. If the policy dictates the protocol, the corporate real estate manager saves face, the real estate service provider can do their job and the business unit management knows the boundaries. All the emotion is taken out of the process and everyone lives to see the dawn…from the window of a 19,000-sf class B suburban concrete tilt-up that overlooks the freeway.

Vik Bangia is senior vice president for the corporate solutions group of United Properties in Minneapolis. The views expressed in this article are the author's own.