Executive Travel SkyGuide

SELLING

The Recalcitrant Client
Teaching difficult customers how to do business with you.
by Susan Scott – Executive Travel – 10/01/04

Great salespeople don't just make the sale. They keep the sale, deepening and enriching relationships with customers once they've begun. Rarely, but importantly, keeping a sale may require that you let a customer know you're considering making him or her available to industry. After all, life is short, and with some customers, it seems too long. Way too long!

If you have problem customers, it's your problem to solve. We get what we tolerate, and it's amazing what some people will tolerate, even when it ruins day after day after day. When our customers (thankfully, very few of them) cross the line, we have an approach that almost always gets us back on track.

I'll share the approach with you in a moment, but first, have you defined your intolerables? A useful exercise would be to gather your staff together, define your ideal customer and then give your staff permission and the training needed to have transformative conversations with customers who are making their lives miserable.

Here's our list of intolerables:

Vendor mentality: We don't do our best work with customers who view and treat vendors as lower life forms, as opposed to valued partners.

Disrespectful behavior or rudeness: We don't enjoy working with people who play nice with senior members of the team and are disrespectful to support staff.

Failure to communicate: When a customer doesn't return calls to nail down dates, for example, then shrieks when we give the date away, we begin to lose our enthusiasm.

Perpetual fire drill: Some customers seem addicted to high drama. Living in the churn quickly gets old.

No access to decision-makers: While we understand going through proper channels, it is inappropriate to continue investing in endless meetings that do not include decision-makers.

An obsession with price: Immersion and the outcomes it produces aren't achievable for a buck ninety-nine.

Integrity outages: On the rare occasion that our core values collide with those of a customer who is in no immediate danger of changing, we exit stage left.

When you encounter problematic customers, consider teaching them how to do business with you. While no single conversation is guaranteed to change the trajectory of a relationship with a problematic customer, any single conversation can.

There are three stages to confronting anyone about anything:

Preparation. Write, practice and deliver a 60-second opening statement. Your opening statement should:
• Name the issue.
• Select a specific example that illustrates the behavior or situation you want to change.
• Describe your emotions around this issue.
• Clarify why this is important-what is at stake to gain or lose for you, for others, for the team or organization.
• Identify your contribution(s) to this problem.
• Indicate your wish to resolve the issue.
• Invite your partner to respond.

Interaction. Inquire into your partner's views. Use paraphrasing and perception check. Dig for full understanding; don't be satisfied with just the surface. Make sure your partner knows that you fully understand and acknowledge his/her position and interests.

Resolution. Ask your partner: What was learned? Where are we now? What is needed for resolution? What was left unsaid that needs saying? Have we moved? What is our new understanding? How can we move forward from here, given this new understanding? Make a new agreement, and have a method to hold each other accountable for it.

Let's focus on the first step. A clear, concise opening statement is intended to serve as a compelling invitation to confront and resolve an issue troubling you. We helped a customer construct a 60-second opening statement for the following scenario (names have been changed to protect the guilty):

In 2002, Hotbrand identified Big Company's special event as the perfect place to brand themselves as the premier importer in their industry. Big Company's staff created a proposal that offered a premium space for Hotbrand to showcase their brands. The proposal probably gave Hotbrand too much for the amount of advertising and sponsorship money received, but Big Company was very eager to secure the business. It was a difficult year of negotiating, because there were many miscommunications about big and small things, logistical and strategic. The event was a success, but the relationship was strained.

2003 was more successful, but still strained. In 2004, negotiating and debrief meetings have been more positive. However, Hotbrand had not signed a contract past all deadlines. Big Company had included Hotbrand's logos in their communications on a good-faith basis and continued working in an effort to get things done- without a contract. Eventually, Hotbrand said they were not able to make a specific decision because they were not sure if they would be participating.

When Big Company finally thought they were close to receiving a signed contract for participation in 2004, Hotbrand suggested signing a two-year contract, which would have required all parties to begin negotiating all over again.

Note the seven essential elements in our eventplanner customer's 60-second statement:

Catherine, (1) I want to talk with you about the effect Hotbrand's negotiating approach is having on our relationship. (2) We have booked hotel rooms, party spaces, ordered logo bags, created ads and invited people for this year's event, even though clearly communicated deadlines have been disregarded. The event is now at our doorstep, and we still have no signed contract. The recent request for a two-year contract would require us to begin negotiating all over again. 3) I am frustrated and concerned because there is a great deal at stake for both our organizations. 4) Lacking a signed contract, you will be dropped from the event, resulting in the loss of this highvisibility opportunity to brand yourself as the premier importer in your industry. We may be unable to deliver on your latest additional demands, given the late date. Our increasing concern that our goodfaith planning on your behalf may have been for nothing has effectively brought our activities to a standstill. Clearly, our relationship is at stake. 5) I want to acknowledge our contribution to the problem. We have failed to hold our ground when firm deadlines have been disregarded, and in our attempt to under-promise and over-deliver, we did not clarify that over-delivering has to do with the overall experience, and not the scope of the project itself. 6) I want to resolve this with you, Catherine, because I believe that our relationship with Hotbrand can and must be mutually rewarding and enjoyable. 7) Please share with me your perspective regarding our ongoing difficulties and how we can resolve them.

Once you've presented your opening statement, keep the following in mind:

1. If you start off with a strong position, follow it with a sincere invitation for your partner(s) to share a counter view. Demonstrate a genuine willingness to encourage learning, yours included.

2. Inquire into the other person's view. When you hear a position with which you disagree, the natural reaction is to defend or strengthen your position, especially when the other person responds with, "You're wrong." Instead, test and inquire. Say, for example, "Help me understand where you are coming from, because clearly I don't see it that way."

3. When you fail to inquire into the other person's view, it can raise the tension to very uncomfortable levels. But when you inquire into the other person's position and try to understand where they are coming from, it keeps the tension down and brings valuable information into the conversation.

4. When you inquire, sit still and listen. The worst thing you can do is inquire and then keep on talking, because that shuts the other person down. It sends a subtle but powerful message that you really aren't interested in hearing their position.

Engaging in fierce conversations requires courage and skill. The tendency is to fall back into old behavior, especially during conflict and emotionally charged conversations. An organization's success or struggle accurately reflects the quality of its conversations with employees, customers, partners and vendors. Those relationships are built one conversation at a time—ideally, face-to-face. Often they must be on the telephone, but never via email. I encourage you to "sit beside" a difficult customer, and begin.

Susan Scott is the author of Fierce Conversations: Achieving Success at Work & in Life, One Conversation at a Time. Fierce, Inc. (www.fierceinc.com), provides leadership development, cultural transformation and sales training to organizations worldwide.