The problem with 'yes'
Every day, journals and social media are overflowing with the latest in business trends, whether it’s digital transformation, consumer experience, data privacy risks and so on. While understanding and adapting to these changes in the marketplace is crucial, it’s incumbent on companies to never forget the basics of business which I believe will generally transcend any new developments, no matter how profound, for the foreseeable future.
Your client asks if you can add a ‘bit’ more scope to your current contract, but she doesn’t have any additional funding and hence you and the firm will need to somehow absorb the work. They’re a great client, so obviously your answer is ‘yes’, right? Your customer asks if you can deliver your product or service in a time frame that is impossible or near impossible. You want the additional sale, so of course you respond ‘yes’? Your boss or your boss’ boss asks you and your team to take on an additional initiative, but the crew is already buried and likely to miss some existing critical deadlines. You don’t want to risk your job or the image of your team, so your answer should be ‘yes’? Not so fast and not necessarily. These scenarios and similar situations play out every day in business. I don’t think anyone is keeping score, but I’m going to guess that in most cases, the response is indeed ‘yes’. Why? It’s usually the path of least resistance. In the case where a customer is asking, the fear of losing the deal or future business weighs heavily on those responsible for driving revenue. In an internal corporate setting, not doing what the organization’s leadership is asking is usually seen as a bad idea.
In many cases, it’s either too easy to say ‘yes’ or too risky or hard to say ‘no’. And, in many circumstances, getting on with the request can be the right thing to do but in many situations it is absolutely the wrong way to respond. The repercussions are many and in some cases can have a lasting effect on a client relationship, the firm’s profitability or a company’s fundamental culture. Highlighted below are a few outcomes when ‘yes’ is not the right answer as well as some thoughts on how to avoid the situation in the first place, or reduce the impact after the fact.
- Inability to execute or deliver: you commit to a challenging or impossible deadline, or modifications to a product. You push the team to deliver but to no avail. This results in a loss of customer confidence or a burned out team, and more likely both. Depending on your ability to mend your relationship and re-build trust, you may have just lost a client or at a minimum, it will bring into question your firm’s abilities. Despite the fact you were responding to a customer’s request, you and your organization own the end result and had an opportunity to decline or adjust the requirements before starting out on the difficult journey. Once the damage is done, have a genuine conversation with the buyer, letting them know that it was probably not in either their or your company’s best interest to accept the challenge and that you will make things ‘right’ but that you will be a more thoughtful and pragmatic partner in the future.
- Loss of profitability: you managed to deliver on the customer’s needs but you had to bring in reinforcement. The larger team burned the midnight oil to successfully execute on the revised requirements but at a significant additional cost to the company. Profitability at the transaction level is now lower and if the deal is large enough, it may affect the overall financial metrics of the division or company. In the end, and for this particular contract, the added effort and costs may have been the right decision but just be sure that the choice to forego some margin was a conscious one, and know that it cannot be sustained. If a hit to margin was not considered before responding to the client, it might make sense to put some governance in place to ensure that similar decisions in the future have some oversight.
- Setting the wrong expectations: we all know that managing expectations is a huge part of successful execution. Of course, balance is required as setting expectations too low can result in lost business and bring into question your company’s ambitions and its capabilities. However, consistently setting the expectations high will require that your firm continues to perform beyond its normal mode of operation as your customer will quickly become accustomed to the higher standard which is likely not maintainable for your employees or the bottom line. Let your customer know in a respectful way that the efforts of the firm were extraordinary and the right thing to do but are not the norm and not something you can likely repeat.
- Value loss: going above and beyond all the time isn’t necessarily a bad thing but may lead to a loss of perceived value of your product or service. ‘Free’ is usually not a good price and when additional goods are given away at the request of your customer, it will devalue the product or service. Use different techniques to ensure that the true worth of what you are delivering is known. For example, include a zero dollar line item in your next invoice showing the original price of the product or service. Or have a frank conversation with the customer beforehand to let them know that what you are doing is indeed above and beyond.
- Unhappy team: More need usually leads to more work and increased pressure on the team. Some team members may relish the opportunity to step up and shine when the going gets tough, but it’s likely that the majority of the team will not have enjoyed the experience especially if they’ve seen this movie play out time and time again. While the leadership may never hear about the dissatisfaction, they should assume that it exists and should not be surprised if a few bad decisions lead to increased staff churn and poor engagement. Know that the team wants to understand the company’s rationale in making the tough decisions, and that it recognizes the impact to its team members. Having the discussion and not making a habit of the situation can go a long ways to mitigating the potential negative impact to the collective psyche of the organization. I have seen ‘customer first’ environments turn into living nightmares for the staff who are constantly struggling to keep up with demands from leadership and the sales team, creating a toxic environment in need of fundamental change.
- What you are about to do, is, or borderline unethical or illegal: It’s amazing what clients will ask of their suppliers and partners; or managers of their team members. What they think is a valid and reasonable request may indeed require you to break the law, violate company policy, or contravene the core values of your firm or those of your customer. This is not uncommon – sometimes it’s an innocent request while in other situations, it is unfortunately quite purposeful. There shouldn’t be a lot of hesitation here – just say ‘no’. If you think it is on the fringe of acceptability, just ask yourself the age-old question of whether you would want to see your deal or efforts written about in the news.
Many will argue that if you don’t stretch the team, the rules, or the product to respond to a customer’s needs, you will never win the business, or you will not win as often. I would tend to agree as quality opportunities, let alone deals, are generally hard to come by. However, I contend that if a business consistently relies on stretching their capabilities and resources to win business, it will have a lasting effect on its ability to retain both customers and staff. In other words, it cannot be a sustained business and if it manages to survive it will likely have a notorious reputation among both prospective clients and employees.
From a company standpoint, large or small, it sometimes doesn’t take much to demolish a firm’s bottom line or shatter a reputation built over years or maybe even decades. It’s not just about profitability and brand but the impact to an organization’s staff and its culture can be irreparable, especially if the company’s antics persist over a period of time and indeed become its modus operandi. In today’s war for talent, you don’t want to be labelled the next sweat shop or the company that always lives on the edge.
It’s not about saying ‘no’ all the time or consistently turning down clients. It is about understanding the impacts of your decisions and perhaps considering possible alternatives. Sometimes ‘yes’ is the right response and in other cases, you might wish to state what you can do if not what was requested. There will, however, be situations when you do need decline and seek different ways to approach the requirement.
This article is not intended to give client-facing leaders or the general workforce reasons to slack off or to reject all requests that come their way. It is, however, a reminder to all that you might want to pause a bit before responding to that next demand from your boss or client.
About the author: David Tom is Managing Director at the Inthink Group and has successfully led both sales and delivery organizations. As a management consultant, he advises leaders and teams on how to improve their approach to customers as well as the associated end-to-end engagement processes. In this article David explores the pitfalls associated with taking the path of least resistance when responding to client and internal requests, and offers some techniques to avoid repeating the same mistakes or mitigating the impacts of a bad decision.
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