Monthly Archives: March 2017

TNF #079: Fun to work with

Welcome Professionals…

…We have come across the importance of humour a couple of times in the series of Thursday Night Flight. When people share feedback about their co-workers or close supplier relationships, they sometimes use the term “this person is fun to work with”.

The importance of this feedback is very much underrated. We should all strive to be “fun to work with”! That does not mean that we are funny all the time. It rather refers to the general attitude when we show up. It refers to the emotional state of our clients when we work with them.

Of course, first and foremost we need to deliver outstanding results. But this is not enough. For an outstanding premium service we must also pay attention to the customer experience that we already discussed in TNF #039. Being “fun to work with” is creating a customer experience that relieves some of the heavy work load and makes the interaction more pleasant. In the best case, the interaction leaves the client in a better state than he/she was before.

Characteristics of “fun to work with” are:

approaching challenges with an optimistic mindset
acknowledging the client as a personality with specific needs and emotions
taking the positive perspective, rather seeing opportunities than risk, rather searching for solutions than describing problems
listening to personal stories of the client and reacting in an empathetic way
sharing personal stories in balance with the point above
occasionally making a jokingly remark or sharing an anecdote if appropriate

This list is not exhaustive, but it shows clearly that “fun to work with” goes much beyond being funny. Work can be hard. It is the way we approach it that makes a big difference to us and to our clients.

Wishing you lots of fun serving your clients

Malte

Thursday Night Flight is brought to you by Malte Müller Professionals. Sharing best practices for top management consultants on topics like communication, client handling, problem solving, appearance, and fitness. Check out www.mm-professionals.com for more material and free resources!

TNF #078: Moment of Truth

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Welcome Professionals…

…Every great client relationship has its root in a moment of truth. There are some good relationships that can do without such special opportunities. But all great client bonding typically links back to a moment of truth.

For this to happen, three things must come together. Firstly, a client with a rational task of high importance. Secondly, an emotionally intense situation, like a feeling under pressure. Thirdly and finally, a consultant who can help.

But as a consultant you need to be careful. Only if you help with generosity, you will win a client for a lifetime. If you exploit the situation, the client is likely not to call you again.

Here is one of my real life examples for illustration. One of my colleagues had recruited a candidate for a joint client of ours. He had charged the maximum fee for this mandate. But the candidate turned out not to be suited and was dismissed soon after. By this time, my colleague had already left our company and took all revenue credits with him. The client now turned to me and asked for a reparation. There was no guarantee clause within the contract and we all knew this.

The client was under high pressure. The responsible HR person had obviously made a bad deal. He had accepted a candidate which turned out to be a failure, paid a fortune as a success fee for a consultant who was not in business any more, and had overlooked to form a decent contract with a guarantee clause.

What could I have done? I could have insisted that it wasn’t my fault, which would have looked silly. I could have negotiated to charge a fraction of the original fee for my help which would have been unsatisfying for both of us. I decided to make a generous investment.

I said I would make it a guarantee case on my own. I would do the full mandate again for free and guarantee full satisfaction. The client was stunned. I had not yet finished the work, when an additional assignment came. Since then, we have been partners on many further projects. I am really glad we had this moment of truth.

Yours truly

Malte

TNF #077: Name dropping

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Welcome Professionals…

…Do you have trouble remembering names? I did. Since a while though, I am using a simple life hack that I picked up.

It starts with understanding the name correctly. When I get introduced to someone, I immediately repeat the name. Just repeating it may be a bit awkward. But using it in the next sentence or the next question comes quite naturally. You can actually do this troughout the whole conversation. People love hearing their name. This is the first step to remembering it.

The next powerful tool is to build a metaphoric association. Something that associates the person with the name. Let’s take “Natascha” my neighbour as an example. She always carries two large handbags. The word for “bag” in German is “Tasche”, so whenever I see “Natascha” with her handbags, they immediately remind me of her name.

Wishing you lots of fun with your name metaphors,

Malte

TNF #076: Ancient notebook

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Welcome Professionals…

…Do you still keep a notebook? I am not talking about a laptop, I mean those hardcover books of white paper, sometimes bound in leather, sometimes with carved-in initials of the owner. Do you use these?

Despite the fact that we are oversupplied with computing power, I regularly see business people taking notes in a notebook made of paper. Everything is filed in there in chronological order. Meeting after meeting – regardless of the subject or project. It is a mystery to me how someone can find anything within these books. One would have to remember date and time of a certain subject and even then, one would have to go back through many pages, sometimes even moving to another notebook!

What is worse – it also implies carrying around a lot of useless weight. Either old pages with mostly completed tasks and outdated notes or just white sheets of paper. Sorry – other than for journaling or nostalgic handwriting enthusiasts I do not see the use of such notebooks in business life.

I keep a pad of paper on my desk in order to take initial handwritten notes during phone calls or meetings. I usually carry around about 5 key pages of work in process with me. Everything else is either transcribed into tasks in my calendar or information with follow-up dates in my CRM system.

For a while I tested the use of electronic notebook apps like evernote and others. But I actually do not get any added value out of those. Calendar and CRM work fine for me.

Which tools do you use to stay organized? Let us know with a comment to this post.

Malte

TNF #075: Brain recreation

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Welcome Professionals…

…I went to an event yesterday night on mobility solutions for the future. Speakers came from well-known companies like Uber and Hyperloop One, and also from startups like Cargo Sous Terrain and Imagine Cargo. It was a fascinating journey into ideas of the future.

At the beginning of the week I had actually thought about skipping the event and instead to stay in the office to get some work done. I am glad I decided to attend. In hindsight, it feels like I rather gained some productivity and not like losing a couple of work hours.

I think this is attributed to two effects. First, looking forward to the event in the evening, I felt like I had to earn my right to leave the office at 5 pm, so my whole Wednesday evolved more productive than most days. Second, diving into the future was a recreation exercise for the mind. The speakers shared their dreams about delivering cargo in underground logistics tunnels and shooting transportation capsules through vacuum tubes. Meeting new ideas and meeting new people worked as a wellness session for the brain. Again, it led to a highly productive Thursday – and even fueled a new topic for TNF.

Despite all the hard work we need to deliver as consultants, we need to build in some time for giving our brain some rest, gaining some new impulses and receiving some rewards for motivation.

Enjoy your recreation!

Malte