When is a decision not a decision?

Brian, is my favourite graphic designer, he is very creative. But ask him to make a decision it is a very different matter.

I suspect he’s afraid that he might make a bad decision and let me down.

So to ease his pain and to encourage him to make decisions, I have told him that a bad decision is better than no decision! Because if you make a bad one you soon find out it was a bad decision, whilst no decision can delay action indefinitely.

When I think about it I actually know a lot of people that don’t like to make decisions.

Probably because they're not confident enough. They fear responsibility or the prospect of some form of reprisal; and even some believe that decision making is actually more about consultation and peer decision making.

Some people are actually incapable of making decisions.

Probably, because they can predict every potential pitfall or eventuality. They wait to receive even more information, progress reports or mistakenly believe that the timing isn’t quite right.

Surely a ‘best guest decision’ is better than no decision.

In my world, I hear a lot of my clients say ” sounds really good, we really ought to get you involved”. But I also hear them say” I need to talk to colleagues” or “the time isn’t quite right” etc.

What they really mean is NO, or my boss wouldn’t support me on this or I don’t want the responsibility for it if it fails to deliver the required results.

I think we would all prefer a decision i.e. an honest Yes or No rather than I will think about it. No decision or I will think about it is the worst of all answers or positions to be in.

So as Nike says “Just do it”.

Choose a destination before you plan your route

I have just finished a very interesting conversation with a ‘Heritage Architect’.

I was trying to introduce one of my client’s services to him, when he decided to take control of our conversation in order to give me his take on why architectural detailers could never become design leaders!

He said “design concept or project strategy first; then sort the detail”.

It sounded logical to me.

So why do I find so many people wanting to talk about detail when we haven’t even agreed the direction of travel! I have to admit I don’t know.

Well, more importantly from my point of view, how does this help or influence construction business leaders?

It should remind us that in the first instance we need to focus our attention upon those key issues that really do need to be focused on!

In today’s challenging economy it is most likely to do with what does it take to survive the recession?

It’s about having a viable plan.

The danger during the planning phase is that we can get lost in the detail.

Keep your focus on the big issues and the detail will fall in place in due course.

If you need any help you know a man who can.

WHAT DO YOU NEED?

I ask this question every time I meet a new prospective client.

 I also ask what you do not need.

These simple questions don’t half get folk thinking!

All of a sudden, they are being asked (possibly for the first time) two really searching questions.

Some people find this line of questioning difficult to cope with.

Once I get some sort of semi coherent reply, I say in that case, all you have to focus on next is to find sufficient time to focus on them in order to find a solution.

In certain instances it means reducing the number of clients or projects you are pursuing , with others it means doing just one thing better or could mean sacrificing something so more time and money is made available to put to a more desirable project.

What you need or need to do now can be crucial.

If you need any help you know a man who can.

What do you really need from me?

I am often surprised by how many questions I have to ask before I get a proper answer to a simple question.

I recall asking a prospective client a fairly straightforward question i.e. how long have you been doing it that way? I found myself listening to him for a full 45 minutes, but I still really didn’t get an answer.

What I was trying to establish was what he considered to be his main or real problem and what level of budget was required to fix it.

Eventually, he somewhat reluctantly allowed me to know that one of his biggest clients had been lost and the firm needed to replace him quickly. Well as we all know, there aren’t too many ‘quick wins’ out there.

Almost without thinking our focus was put onto the firms other clients. After all, they have already bought from us, know and trust us.

But how do you boost your turnover with an existing client?

You go talk to them.

 As Woody Allen once said “just turning up is 90 % of selling”

So we started to contact them. What do you think a good proportion of them said?

“We thought you had forgotten us”!

So never forget a customer and never let a customer forget you!

If you need some help you know a man who can!

The time will never be just right.

I recently had a very frustrating meeting with the Managing Director of a large piling contracting business.  He told me that until the timing was “just right” he would not react to what was going on in his marketplace.

Bit he had already lost two major clients, new competitors had emerged and one had actually taken work away from them.

He admitted that he had not seen any of this coming.

BUT HE SHOULD HAVE!

Regardless, he didn’t seem at all willing to act.  I felt compelled to point that his indecision was not only hurting the firm financially, it was also causing his team to lose confidence in his leadership.

Losing market share and giving ground to a new entrant was not a smart move.

Eventually he accepted the need for action and began to muster the troops.

He said “Ok we have wasted enough time, no more excuses we need to act decisively, we now need to find enough time to fully address our various problems and all the challenges we face.”

Furthermore, he reasoned that his firm’s various set backs were no longer acceptable and needed to be reversed quickly.  His whole team volunteered to make enough time to get the firm back on track.

Once the decision to act had been made, I was soon pleasantly surprised at the amount of progress that was made over the following weeks.

It was interesting to witness, that once the leader and his team had decided that they wanted achieve something bad enough, they all made the necessary time regardless of other commitments, self interests or obligations.

Start with the end in mind

I was reminded recently that I frequently say this.

Well ,before I started to do so, I often found myself getting side tracked by  ‘opportunities’ that I had no right to invest my time and money in.

I now see this happening a lot to other people.

I find myself asking ‘Why did they do that? It’s not remotely relevant to their ‘apparent’ plan of campaign. So why do they do it?

Most of the time I am unable to work it out.

Often the reason only becomes apparent when my client and his team sit down to work out what is actually going on in their business, what needs to addressed and what sort of firm they are or want to be.

Often, I will ask them what they think their end game should look like. To assist, I ask “If you were to put your firm up for sale next year what state would it be in; what would the range of products be, and what turnover/profits would have been achieved”?

As you can imagine in most cases I get a UGH or HHHM in response.

I think it is crucial to always have in mind what your end game needs to look like. It can make all the difference, especially if you are the owner/manager of a small firm and its end value represents your sole retirement pot!

So when I am helping people at the Planning Phase I always ask them to START WITH THE END IN MIND.

A well thought out plan will provide most of the answers.

If you need any help you know someone who can help!

We solve our own problems here with thanks.

Not a great start to a meeting when your prospective client says “we solve our own problems”. So what are you suppose to say when you are meeting to help him solve his marketing headaches? Fortunately, he was talking about solving the problems they experience in the design and manufacture of their products i.e. concrete fames and cladding panels. So with that behind us we got onto discussing how to move the firm forward and how it could attract more enquiries and clients.

The discussion eventually hinged on one issue. How could they get across to prospective clients that their products are unique and that they can’t get them from any other source? So we looked at the nature of the various supply chains that they played a part in. We discovered that whilst their products were not actually unique, they would be very difficult to compare. But few buyers really appreciated that fact.

So with a view to gaining an edge on the competitions ‘similar’ products we went about creating a positioning offer that conveyed both the ‘unique’ benefits of the product and its related services.

Client testimonials were used as the main tool or mechanism to get across the message.

It worked and enquiries rose immediately by a significant amount.

Does your firm do something important?

During my first meeting with a partner of a large architectural practice, he said “I like to think that the work we do is special, has great meaning and has importance “. At first I thought that sounded rather pompous. But no, I soon realised he had meant every word. So I thought shouldn’t our roles and the services we provide have a similar relevance and value.

During our discussion we went onto discuss how his firms business was going, what challenges the practice faced and how successfully they were dealing with them. Then he said “you do appreciate we are now talking about my life’s work”. Surprise number two!

Having had two very strong reminders that this guy and his colleagues took their work very seriously I realised we were contemplating the development of a very meaningful Strategy/Business Development Plan that had to be perfect.

So how do you convey to potential clients and associates that your offer makes peoples lives better?

We took the view that their message had to be delivered essentially via the firms Brand.

We agreed to revisit the subject in a couple of weeks time after we had all had had an opportunity to review and consider.

He and his colleagues would work out what they stood for, why their work should be valued in the marketplace and what types of clients they wanted to work for; whilst I put together a check list that would guide our thinking in a structured way.

I am confident something really special will come out of it.

After all if you have to work for a living, why not make your work something that really matters.