There are things we'd like to know or find out, but it can be difficult for the professional in day by day engagement with a client to ask some of the tough and telling questions.
If you want to get answers to the questions which matter most, it's best to enlist some support: someone external to the on-going relationship will get more frankness than you can expect in everyday professional contact.
My work confirms this useful rule of thumb: the greater the perceived distance between the client and questioner or interviewer, the greater the frankness and clarity. That applies to what's right in the relationship, but most especially to what's not.
Fresh eyes and ears come away from client interviews and relationship reviews with important perspectives and insights and some telling characterisations.
Previous eTips I've written have talked about what to ask in client interviews. Others offer tips and a great best practice framework I developed for a relationship review.
Here are some more of my personal favourites to add to the list of questions which lead to insights to propel business development:
- Just how well does this firm understand you and respond to your needs ?
- When you go elsewhere for service, what do you expect that is different from our work ?
- Thinking about this firm and its competitors, what is it that competitors do much better ?
- Where else does this firm fall short of the competition ?
- Are their people or politics which create problems or obstacles ?
- Are there any areas where this firm shines ?
- What would it take for this firm to be your most favoured service provider ?
- What would it take for this firm to get a greater share of your work ?
- Is it realistic for this firm to aim to get all your work eventually ?
- If you were managing this firm, what are the big changes you'd make ?
Worthy professionals value client relationships. Sometimes we flatter ourselves that things are travelling better than the reality. Smart and brave professionals know that tuning in to how clients evaluate our performance can yield important insights which underpin efforts to do better and increase the value produced in the relationship.
Externalising the process can make a massive difference to obtaining full, frank, and forthright feedback.
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