Be careful what you promise.
The impossible. Promises should never be broken in Business. So don’t make them until you are 100% certain.
Only promise something to a client if you have full knowledge of the subject matter. It’s better to delay, research, and get back to them as soon as possible than to make an impossible promise.
Promises, Promises
Let’s explore the consequences to a business that has been bullied into accepting a contract for work that is, at best, extremely difficult to perform. The same or similar results can occur when an uninformed colleague makes promises to a client without fully understanding the details of the subject matter. Ignorance and arrogance can cause untold havoc within a business organisation.
Upon analysing the requirements, it may become apparent that they are unrealistic or flawed, so fulfilling them will be virtually impossible within any agreed-upon time frame and budget. How did this happen?
Don’t be Bullied by Clients
It won’t end well if a business is bullied into a contract or a colleague biting off more than they can chew. The sad thing is that, in the first case, it could have been entirely avoided by maintaining a good relationship with the client.
See, “Client Relations must be built on mutual trust and respect.” In this case, the client would never have tried to bully the business into accepting their unrealistic proposals.
Ignorance is Anything but Bliss
The solution is not so obvious for the ignorant and/or overenthusiastic colleague. It depends on the personalities involved. If you have a good relationship with the client, you might be able to renegotiate the deal, but they won’t be happy.
Training and education are the only ways to overcome over-enthusiasm. However, it is always positive to respectfully decline to give detailed answers and make promises until you are comfortable doing so. There is no such thing as losing face in business. It’s better to delay, research, and return with the correct answers than to take a wild guess.
Consequences
Once aware of this situation, never accept it with good grace and try to make the best of it. You will not be successful. At best, you may lose some money. At worst, money will be lost, and other clients will suffer indirectly as you may have to pull in resources to try to limit the damage.
Things can quickly spiral out of control, and the impact on the business can rapidly become significant. So, it’s best to kill these situations immediately. It’s better to have difficulty with a client because you did not or could not provide a service than to destroy your relationship, good or bad, with your client due to non-delivered services after a long delay.
Trust in your ability to talk reasonably with your clients. Apologise, but don’t grovel; groveling is a surefire way to lose respect. Instead, remain professional at all times and never raise your voice, either to the client or to the colleague or colleagues that caused the problem in the first place.
If one person can remain calm and professional, no matter how angry they are, they will calm down and begin to react in a more professional manner. Here we can see human nature in action again. Imagine ranting away at a colleague for some hypothetical reason, but they remain calm, answering your questions and responding professionally to your accusations. Very quickly, you begin to feel quite foolish. Likewise, an argument only works if more than one person is involved. If one side refuses to participate, the anger and the argument rapidly dissipate.
Final thoughts.
This is just one small but vital communication skill that everyone should learn from an early age. But it’s never too late to start learning. Are you listening to those ranting bullying managers out there? You can find much more on manager-managed relations and communication skills in another article, “How to spot a bad manager. And how not to become one”. Enough said.