The truth is, most customers or end users for Big Software aren't capable of handling the process of researching, trying, deciding, convincing higher ups, negot

The truth is, most customers or end users for Big Software aren't capable of handling the process of researching, trying, deciding, convincing higher ups, negotiating, designing, implementing (or finding an integrator), and supporting it themselves. If they think they are, there is an astronomically high chance something will be wrong. And you know who takes the blame for that? The company with the logo on the software that doesn't work right. That and the guy who did it wrong. The argument scales as the software and customer does, but it's still a truth. Unless your software is dead simple, if you give people enough rope they will cause problems. That prevents the company from more opportunities, makes the customer's life difficult, etc. The solution to this is to be hands on as much as possible before things are implemented. Properly done, it's mutually beneficial spent time. It would be logical to compare the complexity of the product solution (see steps above) to the amount of pre-sales steps required. Disclosure: Pre-sales engineer for big software/hardware