Eroding confidence is a precursor to bad client relationships. When your client can’t trust you or doesn’t believe that you can get the job done, you’re in the trouble zone. Here are some tips that I’ve used over the years to keep my clients fully confident in my ability to deliver and relationships on solid footing.
Cherish your clients.
A friend told me once, “If you don’t like your clients, try going 90 days without one.” If you’re a consultant or freelancer, that should put things into perspective. The point here is that clients are gold. Your business needs clients to thrive. Also, every client today is a word of mouth referral tomorrow. If you frequently have animosity in your relationships with your clients, maybe the service business isn’t for you. Keep in mind that acquiring new clients is five times more expensive than keeping existing clients. You never want to lose a client. Learn to love your clients and all their quirks.
Be organized!
Take notes at every meeting. Write down action items and due dates. Prioritize your work. Missing a milestone because you forgot about it or didn’t take the time to write it down is a consulting crime. Clients don’t like to repeat themselves. Provide information before they ask for it. Be on time to meetings and be prepared. Do your homework. Not being organized, prepared or fully present will erode confidence quickly.
Be a relationship builder.
If you’re going to be in the service business, you’ve got to serve. Make connections wherever possible – with users, with the finance team who processes your invoices, with senior management, and with each of your main contacts. These relationships will pay dividends in the event things go sideways.
For instance, I like to reach out to users whenever possible to make sure that there are no friction points or issues after major releases. You have to have compassion for your end-users. I look to get ahead of problems before they fester. I’ve even sent a box of chocolates to my best beta testers. Stay connected. Send a holiday card. The more connected you are with your client, the more you can understand their problems and help to solve them, and the less likely they are to put you in the crosshairs when issues crop up. Build a collaborative environment. Don’t wait for them to do it.
Manage expectations.
Understand your client and their pain points before you sign the contract. If a customer needs a certain delivery date that you are not going to be able to meet or a certain set of features that you are going to struggle to deliver, make a note of that up front and set realistic expectations. Making accurate promises is as big a part of our job as delivering on them.
Most of the tense relationships I’ve seen between freelancers and clients is due to poor expectation management. Recognize that you are setting expectations in every interaction, sometimes explicit (i.e., “I can complete this work in three months”) and sometimes implicit (i.e., not speaking up when there are uncertainties). The customer is making assumptions based on what you say AND what you don’t say. It’s your responsibility to give them the right expectation.
Communicate, communicate, communicate.
In line with managing expectations is frequent and relevant communication. I like to do weekly check-ins with all of my clients, even if it is just 5 minutes. During weekly check-ins, I make sure we are still on track with our original requirements, I check for any potential priority changes, and I give a summary of things that I’ve completed for the week.
If I’m running behind schedule, my client knows it months before it impacts any deadline. We have plenty of time to course-correct. If I’m struggling with a set of features, I raise the red flag as soon as I’m certain that it will impact deliverables and we can adjust priorities, add resources, or just work harder. If I’m way ahead of schedule and we can add new functionality or pull in release dates, I make sure that is known. I’m a big fan of NO SURPRISES. Sometimes there is limited time in the client’s workday for check-ins, in which case I write a well-formatted email with an executive summary at the top and details so the client can digest it at their leisure. Skip this step at your own peril!
Don’t blame the technology / Don’t blame teammates.
I see this one all the time. A developer is late with a deliverable or the quality is subpar and they blame the technology. The client hired you to be their technology expert! There is no faster way to erode confidence than blaming the technology you were hired to work with. No excuses here. Problems are easy to find, solutions are why they hired you. Workaround issues. Try alternate approaches. Be resourceful. Get past the bottlenecks. Overcome the technology hurdles. Propose an alternate path. But never blame the technology.
Also, blaming a teammate is not going to move the project forward. If a teammate is late on getting information or integrating their work, offer assistance. Help them get back on track. Blowing out someone else’s candle doesn’t make your candle burn any brighter. It erodes relationships and destroys project momentum. Be the one that drives the team forward. Blaming teammates is a sure way to create an unproductive environment.
When you communicate a problem, also offer a solution.
This is what separates the good consultants from the great ones. When you find a problem, you want to make sure you communicate it in a timely fashion. But the best consultants also find a solution and offer it up in conjunction with the reporting of the problem. Most clients hire consultants to reduce their problem load. Take responsibility for fixing problems, not just reporting them.
Bite the bullet when needed.
If all of this groundwork doesn’t lead to better client relations and you still end up in conflict with your client, bite the bullet and get it done. I’ve had my fair share of clients where we didn’t see eye to eye. I’ve had clients that pushed me to deliver functionality well outside of the original scope. Instead of burning my time in conflict, disagreement or ass-covering, I do my best to bite the bullet and get things done, and typically I find common ground. Client’s just want someone that can deliver results. If you burn your time (and your client’s time) delivering reasons why you can’t deliver results or why the results requested are not your problem, you will probably end up spending a lot of your time looking for new clients.
You work hard to get new clients. Don’t let that hard work go to waste by mismanaging the relationship or falling into one of these traps. Communicate and understand your client’s pain points and what problems they need you to solve, and then solve them. Avoid drama and upset and put your nose down when you need to. You’ll get more repeat business and referrals and you’ll avoid wasting your time in conflict.
