Don’t Assume! Always Ask!

My former boss and mentor used to say: “When you assume, a** is what you get”. I don't know if he coined this quote himself, or whether he took it from someone else. In essence, however, I know now, he was 100% right.

Assumptions always lead to misalignment. Whether it is about your expectations, requirements, or even payment and remuneration. The misalignment may be minor, or catastrophic. Regardless of the scale, it always leaves a bad taste in one’s mouth.

What can you do, in business, to avoid being served an a** on a silver platter?

Talk! Communicate. Engage in open conversation with your customers and business partners. Be direct with your conversation. If you talk to them, don’t let that conversation be shallow, don’t let it be a mere placeholder. The human-to-human communications have the power to solve most of the issues you may encounter en route.

We also decided to experiment with other forms of dialogue. As brands struggle in their storytelling but also struggle to find out what's wrong with their story expression process, we've decided to create a survey that dives deep into the realm of truly telling stories. With the help of a scorecard, we want to allow you to tell us what the shape of your storytelling is.

The ScoreApp that we use for this is a great tool that fits its purpose. A gamified, engaging quiz tells the interlocutor what can be done to improve his or her business storytelling. We, as Koekepeer, get data that shows us the most common problems our customers may have in that realm. We don’t assume what those problems may be – we ask you to tell us about them.

Should you decide to engage with us further, you can book a free consultation call. In this 15-20-minute call that is completely free of charge, we may help you pinpoint the potential areas that could be improved when it comes to the story of your brand.

And if you decide to ask us for more expertise, we will gladly help you in telling that story – of your brand, and of the human beings that stand behind it. We always strive to tell stories of flesh and blood, and this is our main driving value. In the world where AI is proliferating the infosphere, authentic storytelling is going to stand out – and we strongly stand by this statement.

If you want to find out what you can improve in your storytelling, tell your story in a genuine, authentic manner, and find ways to make an impact, start with filling out the scorecard form – and we'll take it from there!

For now it is available in Dutch, but we're working on English version as well. You'll find the link here: https://scorecard.koekepeer.com/brandscore

Make an impact, stay hungry for it! And never make an assumption - better ask than miss!