Being a Professional: Part II
By Craig S. Galati
A few weeks back, I wrote, “Being a Professional” in which I illustrated two current issues I was struggling to address.
The first involved a client concerned with the politics of a situation affecting his project. The second involved a client who, in my opinion, was making shortsighted decisions that were not in the best interest of meeting her long-term goals.
I contrasted a situation from years ago where I didn’t insist more strongly in following my beliefs and the client was unhappy with the outcome even though I had told them of the potential problem that would result from the client’s decision.
I was able to speak with each of these clients over the past couple of weeks. I spoke with conviction, I spoke from the heart and I demonstrated the potential ramifications of these decisions. And then I listened. I heard their concerns clearly and was able to develop empathy for the situations of each of them.
Neither client ended up accepting my perspective as reality, but having taken the time to really understand them, I was in a much better position to help them. In both cases, together we mapped out a better approach to the situation. Together we developed a solution that met my client’s goals and satisfied my concerns as their design professional. And both clients thanked me for caring about them and having their best interests in mind. They also appreciated that I helped them look at the issues with new perspective.
These two issues, which were both personally stressful, helped me develop a greater bond with my clients, and I was able to demonstrate to them how much I cared about them and their projects. This interaction reinforced some things that I have always believed.
People don’t let you help them until they know you care about them. The threshold for demonstrating how much one cares is different for every client one interacts with. But until you cross this threshold, clients are unsure if they should share all of the information one needs to help them. There must be a strong bond of trust developed between a professional and his client. Until this trust is developed, the client is also unsure how much one can help them. Showing you care about your client will help build this trust and will help you move from a vendor relationship to a partner relationship with your clients.
Clients don’t always see the whole you. Many clients hire a professional for a specific task or service. In doing so, they evaluate the professional based on experience, technical ability and approach to solving their problem. Noted management professor Edgar H. Schein defines this as the “Expertise Model” where the client purchases an expertise from a consultant. In this case, the client has self-diagnosed his problem and is looking for a consultant to provide his expertise to implement his strategy to solve it. In this case, expertise rules the day. Not that the client doesn’t care about your personality, fit for your organization or your level of care, but they usually view these through a problem-solving paradigm or viewpoint. That is why initially the client relationship feels contractual. It is much later in the relationship that you get to know the client better and the client gets to know you, and the client relationship feels more like a partnership.
Sometimes it takes courage to do the right thing. General Norman Schwarzkopf said, “You always know the right thing to do; it’s doing it that is difficult.” Your clients are not always right, but in business we have been conditioned to think that they are always right and to just do what they ask of us. Arguing with clients rarely changes their opinion, but clearly understanding why they believe what they do takes courage and conviction–and is the key to figuring out how best to help them. It is much easier and faster to just do what your clients tell you to do. But is that the real reason they hired you? Have the courage to take the time to understand your clients so you can be your best for them.
I had an experience a few years ago with a civil engineer that cemented my beliefs regarding this issue. I asked him to grade a site a certain way. Unbeknownst to me, he disagreed with this request but never confronted me or told me why it was a bad decision. He just did what I asked because I “was the client,” he later told me. Luckily, the issue came to light, we were able to make changes and the project was successful. If the engineer had had the courage and conviction to address this in the moment, we would have both saved valuable time and money not reworking the solution.
I’d like to hear from you:
• Why do you think many professionals just do what the clients tell them to do?
• Do you know of any techniques to help you get to know clients sooner?
• How do you demonstrate care to your clients?
Until next time …
Craig
November 3rd, 2008 at 12:42 pm
I feel in most cases nobody is right or wrong, but people sometimes lose site of their goal. As a professional, it is key to ascertain what it is they are truly after, and if necessary remind them of this. For example, in the past, someone may say, my goal is to be rich. The underlying mindset here is that money brings happiness. Instead, if the goal is to be happy, then one can offer that money is one route to achieve this, but there are many ways to achieve this, and now you may have opened the door for them to listen.
Donella Meadow’s “Places to Intervene in a System,” is my favorite tool for proposing change.
November 3rd, 2008 at 9:08 pm
Thank for your comments, Tim.
November 5th, 2008 at 3:26 pm
My friend Ernie sent me this e-mail which I thought was worth sharing.
As usual you put alot of good information out.
In reference to your questions;
in 35-years as a PE I have never had huge problems with clients directing me as to how I should grade a site or provide utilities. If they have given us direction, we look at that option and if we find it to be flawed, we meet and discuss options.
Usually it comes down to cost for 99% of developer clients. Institutional clients have some flexibility in their budgets and do not always select the cheapest alternative.
Getting to know people is an art form. I have had terrible project engineers in the office that were great with clients.
I have also had good engineers that could irritate a client in a heartbeat. You certainly need a balance. I always try to find out with new clients, where they are from, hobbies and where they went to school. Being as old as I am, I can usually find some common ground to work from. Getting to know family members and genuinely caring about people is important.
The first thing we as professionals must consider for our clients, is what works in their best interest.
This is not always easy to determine based on psyche and personalities. Telling a client he is going in the wrong direction is never easy, but it is our duty to make clients aware of all potential options.