Change Your Mind, Change Your Practice(s)

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We cannot solve  problems with the same level of
consciousness that created them.
~Albert Einstein

Einstein’s quote, one of my all-time favorites, is a touchpoint for our times. We hear about “out of the box” thinking, we know that innovation is a requirement in today’s world, and the only way to produce either is to adjust how we think about whatever we’re facing.

In the context of practicing law, changing how we think about practice (and building a practice) is usually the first step to making a change. For example, if you’re aiming for success in a law firm by being a reliable, industrious, somewhat reserved workerbee but you notice that you keep getting passed over for the big cases you’d like to work on, continuing to work harder and harder without more is unlikely to lead to change.

If you’re constantly running ragged, wondering how you can connect with your spouse and/or children in an hour or so at the beginning or end of each day, it’s a safe bet that you won’t shift your actions until and unless you shift your perspective.  Want a new job?  You’ll have to pull some time and attention away from what you’re doing now to make the time to launch a job search.

And if you believe that business development is something that you’ll begin “later”, you likely won’t recognize business development opportunities that may come your way — because chance favors the prepared mind.

Making a change often requires stepping outside a situation long enough to identify a problem and then making a mental shift that will help in solving that problem. How the shift happens is individual to each person.  But creating and then using a shift relies on several basic principles.

  1. The shift must be authentic. If your partner, your supervisor, your doctor, or anybody else tells you to make a change and you don’t buy into it, there will be no shift.  Remember the punchline to the joke asking how many psychiatrists are needed to change a lightbulb?  One, but the lightbulb has to really, really want to change.  No psychiatry here, but if you don’t really, really want to change (or at least really, really, really believe you need to change), chances are good that you’ll keep on doing the same old, same old.
  2. Maintaining the shift means keeping it in the forefront of your mind. If you’re trying to make a habit of arranging lunch with one key contact a week, put a reminder on your calendar where you see it daily.  If you want to improve your efficiency in the office, use time management tools that keep your eye on efficiency.  Holding onto a shift in a perspective means keeping it in front of you in some way, because it’s often all too easy to slide back to the old, familiar approach.
  3. Reaping the benefit of the shift requires action. While it’s important to recognize a problem or a situation that can be improved, that’s empty if it’s merely recognition without follow-through.  If you want more balance in your life, take some action, even if it’s a small one.  Claiming a 15-minute walk for yourself in the afternoon will not only provide some balance but also will remind you that you’re seeking balance.  (Put it in your calendar and keep that commitment, too!)
  4. It’s easier to maintain a shift, and to design and implement the actions that the shift calls for, when you have support. Tell your spouse that you need to set aside 3 hours on Saturday morning to catch up on work.  Tell your assistant that you plan to eat lunch away from your desk one day this week.  Work with a coach to provide accountability as you set out on your business development plans.  According to a study conducted by the American Society for Training and Development, “consciously deciding” to complete a goal usually yields about a 25% success rate.  Deciding to make a change, telling someone what that change is, and committing to completing it by a certain deadline, raises the chances of success to about 95%.

What do you need to shift in the way you see your practice?

When focus led me astray

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I hadn’t taken the time to pull back from the work I’ve been doing to check on how effectively I was navigating toward my goals in the last few months. Life has been very busy, both professionally and personally.  I’d put my head down, my nose to the grindstone, and I focused on the client work piled in front of me.  I was surprised by what I found:  in some areas, I was right on track to meet my goals, but in others, I’d slowly drifted far afield.

During my mastermind meeting last week, my colleagues and I discussed the tough balancing act of current work vs. future goals. It’s easy to let things slide, especially when there’s plenty of current billable work to do.  (Can I get an amen?)  But focusing on the present is a passive and ultimately fruitless way to build a future.  Growth requires relentless determination and focus on meaningful and clearly articulated “stretch” goals.

So I revisited and revised my goals, and then I designed consequences for failing to reach them. Should I miss, I’ll be making a hefty charitable contribution in some colleagues’ names — enough of a donation that
I won’t get the warm fuzzies of doing something nice but instead the pain of a real financial hit.  My colleagues all set their own goals and consequences, and when we meet again in February, we’ll see the results.  I’m predicting a huge celebration of remarkable successes.

All of this leads me to ask, how are YOUR goals? Whether you’d like to accomplish something big by the end of the year (creating and hosting that seminar you’ve been thinking about, perhaps) or whether you’d prefer to think ahead into the first quarter of next year, there’s no time like the present to get clear on what you want to accomplish or to set up some accountability and consequences to get yourself moving.  If you need a guide on effective goal-setting, check out this blog post I wrote in 2008.

I’d love to hear what goals you’ve set, and what consequences you’ve created to motivate yourself. (And if you’re more motivated by the carrot of a reward than the stick of a consequence, I’d like to hear that, too.)  Just click here to share, and I’ll even set a reminder to check in with you as an added layer of accountability.

Quotes of the Month:

“First, have a definite, clear practical ideal; a goal, an objective.  Second, have the necessary means to achieve your ends; wisdom, money, materials, and methods.  Third, adjust all your means to that end.”
~Aristotle

“Let me tell you the secret that has led me to my goal.  My strength lies solely in my tenacity.”
~Louis Pasteur

How Can You Work Smarter?

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“You’re working too hard.  Why don’t you look for ways to work smarter?” That was a key element of the feedback I received during this quarter’s mastermind meeting.  After hearing my colleagues’ suggestions, I put some new practices in place to help me work smarter, and I do believe I can already see a difference.

And you’ve no doubt heard this distinction before. All sorts of management experts talk about how to work more efficiently, more effectively, maximizing the results of time.  Some of them even have good ideas.

I’ve been thinking about what it means to say that practicing law is hard work.  I don’t have any question that it is challenging and demanding, for reasons that I’ve mentioned numerous times.  When clients question whether it’s possible to “work smart” in practice, my answer is a resounding yes.

Working smart means managing your physical environment. If you take the time to keep your desk clear, so it’s always easy to locate the files and the resources you need.  Nothing wastes time like clutter.  The simple act of taking an extra 5-10 minutes to clear and tidy your work area at the end of the day can yield significant time savings.  I had to learn this the hard way, but having learned it, it’s become a standard for myself in the office.

Working smart means managing energy. If I’m exhausted and I try to power through rather than resting, chances are good that it’ll take me more time than usual to accomplish anything.  I’ll make more mistakes, and I won’t be as creative as I might otherwise be.  I’ve put structures in place to take advantage of my energy rhythms (you’ll often find me at my desk at 6 AM, but only rarely after 6 PM) and I’ve been working to enhance my energy with enough rest, enough exercise, good hydration and nutrition, and fun.

Working smart means managing commitments. It’s easy to say yes to every demand, but it just isn’t smart.  Making intentional and purposeful decisions about which commitments to accept and which to decline allows me to avoid the frazzled, frantic pace that undermines good work.  By the same token, I aim to prioritize my work so that I accomplish what’s most important first.

Working smart means managing people. Good delegation enhances effective work.  Whether it’s requesting research or asking an assistant to draft routine communications for my review and editing, delegation frees my time so I can concentrate on doing the things that others can’t do.  (Thanks to our global marketplace, getting help is easier and less expensive than ever before.  I’m hiring.  Should you?)

It’s important to note that what’s smarter for one person will be useless for another. You must identify what makes sense for your practice, your preferences, and your clients.  (That’s why Seven Foundations of Time Mastery for Attorneys includes numerous exercises that make it easy to figure out now you can best apply the principles I share.)

Does any of this mean that it’s possible to take shortcuts and reap the rewards of practice without putting in plenty of time and effort? Absolutely not.  But attention to smart management will make the time and effort you put into your practice pay maximum rewards.

A Tale of Two Leaders

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One of my heroes died last Wednesday. Not Steve Jobs, though his death is the one that captured popular notice, and not A.C. Nielsen, whose name has become synonymous with popular television and costly advertising dollars.  Jobs and Nielsen each contributed something critical to our world, but neither is among my heroes.

The Rev. Fred Shuttlesworth, who was one of my heroes, also died last Wednesday, at age 89. He lead the civil rights movement in Birmingham, Alabama, then known as “the most segregated city in America”.  Rev. Shuttlesworth sat at lunch counters, called in federal protection for the Freedom Riders and helped after the violence they encountered, joined the march in Selma, urged Martin Luther King, Jr. to come to Birmingham, and more.  He wasn’t especially well-known outside Alabama; certainly, no fame on the order of Steve Jobs’ fame, nor has his name attained the widespread use of Nielsen’s.

But Rev. Shuttlesworth embodied leadership:  the kind of leadership that puts principle and dedication to an end result in the forefront. His actions (along with those of countless others, both well-known and not) led to a fundamental change in the world.  He is described as fearless in the face of intimidation and physical attacks, a firebrand who preached integration from the pulpit and even more through action, a blunt speaker who refused to run even when his home was bombed.  Although he gave rousing sermons and speeches, his focus was action.  As he said, “We got a lot of things done that we wouldn’t have had just by words and philosophy alone.”

Though Rev. Shuttlesworth was the de facto leader of the Birmingham effort, he sought out King’s leadership. King had the credentials and the prominence to be the movement’s spokesman.  Rev. Shuttlesworth’s single focus was on the success of the movement.  He believed that any movement could have only one “person after whom an episode or a generation is named,” King being the one for this instance.

Why should this matter to you in the context of building your practice? It matters because Rev. Shuttlesworth’s life is a remarkable example of leadership.  The juxtaposition of his death with the death of Steve Jobs illustrates that at times a leader determines that the action should get the focus (as Rev. Shuttlesworth decided) and sometimes the personality of the leader himself becomes synonymous with the action, as Jobs and his technology became almost one and the same.  In a similar way, King became the face of the civil rights movement, though behind him (as with Jobs) many, many others were required to act to accomplish the identified mission.  Does Rev. Shuttlesworth deserve to be better known than he is now?  Undoubtedly.  But he determined that the movement needed a different face than his own, and the success of the movement was more important than his own legacy as its leader.

Both style and substance are critical to an effective leadership message and an effective marketing message. Steve Jobs is mourned for the person he was as much as for his role as architect of the technology he created, but had he not built Apple, the world might never have noticed that personality; Rev. Shuttlesworth would not have inspired the people he did had he not shown himself as a plainspoken, mission-driven activist.

As both these leaders did, you must choose when to focus on substance and when to focus on style to get the maximum effect.

Here’s the question you must ask:  how do your clients see you? Right now, do you need to bring in more personality a la Steve Jobs, or would it be more effective for you to focus primarily on the substance?  Should you market the substance of your practice, or should you market yourself in some way?  In other words, does your practice stand on its own, or must you be its face?  Does your practice need a face and a champion other than your own, such as referral sources who may be your representatives in the community?

When you consider marketing through this lens of style and substance, you determine whether substance is the most effective way to connect with potential clients and referral sources. Make no mistake:  you must deliver on the substance, and your style must be such that potential clients are drawn to you, or at least not repelled by you if your substance pulls them in.  And you must decide at every juncture which attribute you will highlight and why.

What makes you special?

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Every professional has some skill, opportunity, or attribute that few (if any) others can access. You may have heard the marketing acronym USP, which typically stands for Unique Selling Proposition.  A USP refers to those distinguishing factors.  Identifying your USP is key not only to letting your potential clients know what makes you different and why they should hire you, but also paves the way for you to market yourself in fresh ways.

For example, a Unique Selling Proposition might be that you draw on your background in tax law to support your clients’ licensing needs. Perhaps you are a divorced father of two who draws on your own life experiences in serving divorcing fathers.  In either case, you might use the USP you’ve identified to craft a marketing message that answers potential clients’ questions or concerns (some of which they may not even be aware of yet) by highlighting your USP.

To identify your Unique Selling Proposition, ask yourself:

  1. What past experience (professional or personal) bears on your practice?
  2. What skill, knowledge, or experience do you bring to your practice that will be helpful for clients?
  3. What kind of practice-related opportunities can you forecast, and how can you position yourself to meet them?

Another way to think of a USP is as a Unique Service Proposition. How can you serve your clients in new or innovative ways?  In addition to your primary services, can you offer any ancillary services or products that will better meet your clients’ needs?  Are there free or reduced-fee services that you might offer as a way of introducing yourself and your skills to a class of potential clients or referral sources?

A Unique Service Proposition might include offering monthly free Q&A meetings during which you respond to potential clients’ questions about topics related to your practice area. For example, if you practice elder law, you might host a monthly gathering to help adult children learn what legal issues they should plan for as they assist their aging parents.  You could offer a fee-based group in which you cover key issues in more depth, and you might have certain forms or templates for sale that the adult children could use to implement your suggestions,

Perhaps your practice spans geographic areas in such a way that you don’t often have an opportunity to meet face-to-face with your clients. You might offer videoconferencing of other technology-based communication and collaboration resources to bridge the distance and interact more directly with clients.  Since many lawyers still limit their interactions to telephone, email, and mail, you might craft a marketing message around the personal service you offer, the importance of tailoring legal solutions to each individual (or business) and weave in your enhanced communication opportunities.

To identify your Unique Service Proposition, ask youself:

  1. How can I meet both legal and non-legal needs that my clients frequently present?
  2. How can I build innovative services that will benefit my clients?
  3. What might I do to answer potential client questions, introduce my clients to beneficial resources, or otherwise extend my services in unexpected ways?

Identifying your USPs and using them to craft a marketing message requires analysis, insight, and sometimes even an intuitive leap. Try brainstorming what can distinguish you and your practice with the proviso that no answer is too wacky to be considered.  Sometimes impractical or unpalatable ideas provide the leap to a truly unique marketing message and practice.

Sometimes it’s hard to gain the 30,000-foot perspective necessary to identify what you can harness to distinguish your practice. If you’re having trouble spotting your opportunities, contact me to set up a time to discuss how I might be able to help.

Excuses and Obstacles

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Hello from Wyoming, where I’m in the midst of the vacation part of my working vacation. By the time you read this, I’ll be in the Teton National Park (shown in the photo here), one of my very favorite locations ever.

A few weeks ago I wrote about starting to work with a personal trainer and noted the similarities between that activity and business development activity. (If you missed that article, you can find it here.)  As I was packing for my business trip/vacation, and especially during the first few days, I discovered yet another layer of similarity.

The first day of my vacation, I went to the resort gym (about a 3-minute walk from my room) and discovered it was locked. It wasn’t convenient, but I walked the extra 10 minutes to and from the front desk to pick up the key to the gym.  And when I got into the gym, I discovered that the elliptical machine (my favorite) wasn’t working and that the distribution of free weights began at 15 pounds, then jumped to 25.  I usually use 8- or 10-pound weights.

Could I possibly have a better excuse to skip my workout? Being on vacation, having to walk all the way across the resort to get a key, and then finding poor equipment seemed like the trifecta for an ironclad excuse.  No one would blame me for skipping, and I’d feel guilt-free.

But (as you know since I’ve already cited the poor equipment) I walked across the resort to get the key. When I got to the gym, I used the bike, even though I grumbled the whole time.  And I did what I could with the too-heavy weights, then did exercises that used my own weight to complete the workout.  It wasn’t my best workout, by a long stretch, but it was good enough.

Why did I do all that, especially for subpar results? Because I knew that skipping one planned workout would be the beginning of a slippery slope.  I knew how easy it would be to tell myself even more excuses for not doing what I’d promised — that I needed to slip in some work, that I’d walked for sightseeing and surely that would count, or that I needed to rest since I’d been so busy before vacation and would pick up the same hectic pace afterward.  And then, before I knew it, everything I’d accomplished would go down the drain, and I’d have to start again.  I also knew that, if it came to that, I might not start again immediately, and maybe not at all.

Doesn’t this ring a bell for business development? It’s easy to lay plans and then to get knocked off-course.  A heavy workload, a sick child or parent, a stinging rejection from a potential client — you’ll always find reasons to pause your business development activity.  But success is composed of small, consistent actions.  How you respond to the reasons and excuses that could justify interrupting your consistently will likely determine your success.

How will you respond to the challenges that present themselves to you? My suggestion is that you power through them, even if it means reducing your activity to respond to the challenges.  Determine what’s an excuse (a long walk to pick up a key, for example) as opposed to a real obstacle (not having the right equipment) and respond accordingly.  When you do, even if you can’t stick to the full plan, you’ll continue moving forward and building a track record of success.

There’s no magic formula

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I joined a new gym last week and had my first appointment with a personal trainer since 2004. I haven’t been totally inactive since then, of course; I’ve hit the gym on my own, gone swimming in my backyard, walked a bit (sometimes even long distances), and played with my dogs a lot.  But none of that is the same as a true workout with someone I’m paying to make me work hard.

The assessment made me want to die. That’s an overstatement, but not much.  Not only did it not feel good, but it also reminded me just how far I am from my goals and even from where I was when I quit going to the gym.  I was surprised that I wasn’t in agony the next day.

The first real workout was much harder. I’d paid the trainer by then, so she knew I was committed, and she probed the edges of my abilities.  (Fair point that the edges aren’t a long distance these days!)  I pushed beyond what she asked of me a few times, and I left feeling a little wobbly and tired, but proud.  And I did hurt the next day.

I can already feel differences — none that are objectively observable, of course, but I see them:  the satisfaction of knowing that I’m moving closer to my goals, the relief that my goals are no longer actually getting further away, and the kind of tiredness and soreness that comes with a good workout.  And the externally observable goals?  As long as I keep it up, they’re coming.  Probably nothing dramatic really soon, but they’re on the way.

That’s how it works with business development, too. You start by doing something.  Preferably, you make a commitment to someone who will hold you accountable and you create a plan that you’ll stick to.  You start seeing shifts immediately, even when no one else does, and they add up over time.  Stick to the plan, and those shifts will result in new billable work.

How was your workout today?

Trading On A Margin?

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When I shifted from practicing law to consulting and coaching, I realized that it’s critical for me to protect my own time and energy. I began to get a deeper understanding that in a very real way, I am my own product and I must protect my product.  The irony, of course, is that the same was true when I was in practice.  My hunch is that if I’d come to this realization sooner, I would have been less stressed out and I probably would have accomplished more.

One of the tools that’s been most important to me is building margins into my schedule. Rather than scheduling myself back-to-back, I leave gaps throughout the day so that I can catch a breath, handle the small fires that inevitably arise, and take advantage of new opportunities that pop up.  The gaps can be fairly small, such as leaving 15 extra minutes on either side of an appointment so I don’t need to worry if we run a few minutes long.  Sometimes, a gap can be as simple as a pause between calls to grab a glass of water, stretch a bit, and breathe deeply to get the oxygen and energy flowing.

When working on a big project, though, a big margin is helpful. That’s why I shudder a bit when a potential client calls me and tells me that it’s urgent to build his clientele because he has only two months of expense money in the bank or because she’s expecting to be up for partner in the next year.  It is possible to build a solid book of business quickly?
Of course.  Is it probable?  Not on a tight deadline.

Resolve to add margins into your plans. How?  Consider these approaches:

  1. Wherever possible, build time between appointments into your schedule. When that isn’t possible, make a conscious decision to move your body and your mind between appointments to create a shift in your own energy.  Doing so will improve your ability to take on the next appointment with a fresh mind.
  2. When you’re working on a big project, estimate the amount of time it will take and add up to 25% of that time as a cushion. If your goal is to design and host a client seminar and you expect to need six weeks as lead time, allow yourself eight weeks.
  3. Use project management principles to plan out all of the steps in your project and take advantage of technology so that you can shift the steps and schedules as necessary. At times, despite your best effort, you will need to adjust your schedule or your project despite building in margins.  Using a task management system that automatically shifts intermediate deadlines when a project deadline changes will minimize the time you’ll need to spend on designing the deadlines so you can maximize your time on the project itself.
  4. When others are involved, communicate not only the deadline but also the margin — but do so selectively. If a team member is a relentless procrastinator, you might choose not to include your margin when discussing timelines.
  5. Underpromise and overdeliver, especially with clients. This has become something of a cliche in recent years, but its validity is beyond reproach.  If you promise a client or a potential client something, be sure to allow yourself extra time just in case your plans go awry.  Far better to promise a deliverable for Friday and provide it on Wednesday than vice versa.

When you add in margin, you increase the chances that you will be able to stick to the schedule, you create opportunities to respond to intervening circumstances as they occur, and you set yourself up for reduced stress. Will margins always work?  No.  Projects sometimes go haywire.  “No fail” software systems fail.  Critical team members get sick.  When that happens, you’ll have to adjust, but building in a margin in advance means that your magnitude of adjustment will be less.

Where do you need to build margins into your schedule?

Total Leadership

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Total Leadership:  Be a Better Leader, Have a Richer Life
By Steward D. Friedman

Spurred by conversations I’ve been having with clients recently, this month’s book review focuses on “work/life balance” or (as I prefer to call it) work/life integration. As I’ve previously written, self-management is a critical skill for leaders.  That it’s also a challenge is reflected on the number of leaders who excel at work but have less satisfactory home lives, or those who prioritize “success” above health and suffer the consequences.

In Total Leadership:  Be a Better Leader, Have a Richer Life, Stewart Friedman urges leaders to seek “four-way wins”, meaning high performance in the four domains of life: work, home, community, and self (mind, body, and spirit).  Achieving these wins creates “total leadership”, which in turn creates sustainable change to benefit the leader and the most important people around him or her.

Traditional “work/life balance” principles, which suggest that there’s one single point called balance and innumerable other points that are unbalanced. That connotation is why I prefer the phrase integration to balance, and why I find Friedman’s approach to be so helpful.  By recognizing that our lives are more than “work” and “everything else”, Friedman opens the possibility that we don’t have to live on a see-saw.  Instead, we can find give-and-take among the domains, ideally finding activities or ways of being that serve all four.  Doesn’t that sound better than stealing time from work to serve life, or vice versa?

Scoring four-way wins is grounded in a clear view of what you want from and can contribute to each domain of your life, now and in the future. Naturally, you must pay thoughtful consideration to the people who matter most to you in each domain (the “stakeholders”) and the expectations you have for one another.  Doing so raises the likelihood that you will take steps that serve not only yourself but also the stakeholders in each domain.  Otherwise, you might end up with a brilliant plan that suits you perfectly but undermines or alienates colleagues, friends, and family members — or one that serves everyone in your life except yourself.

Having done this foundational work, the next step is to systematically design and implement carefully crafted experiments, doing something new for a short period to see how it affects all four domains. If an experiment doesn’t work out, you stop or adjust, and little is lost.  If it does work out, it’s a small win; over time these add up so that your overall efforts are focused increasingly on what and who matter most.  Either way, you learn more about how to lead in all parts of your life.  The ROI that Friedman reports is truly impressive:

In a study over a four-mont period of more than 300 business professionals (whose average age was about 35), their satisfaction increased by an average of 20% in their work lives, 28% in their home lives, and 31% in their community lives.  Perhaps most significant, their satisfaction in the domain of the self — their physical and emotional health and their intellectual and spiritual growth — increased by 39%.  But they also reported that their performance improved:  at work (by 9%), at home (15%), in the community (12%), and personally (25%).  Paradoxically, these gains were made even as participants spent less time on work and more on other aspects of their lives.  They’re working smarter — and they’re more focused, passionate, and committed to what they’re doing.

Four-way wins tend to have direct impact in one domain of life and indirect impact in others. For example, a commitment to working out three mornings a week directly benefits the leader’s “self” domain, with better health and reduced stress, and the work and home domains indirectly benefit as the leader focuses more effectively on matters at hand, has greater emotional stability, and is a better “partner”, whether to colleagues or family members.

Each individual will create his or her own unique experiment, but Friedman has identified eight general categories of worthwhile experiments:

  • Tracking an activity and reflecting on progress toward a goal:  increases self-awareness.
  • Planning and organizing:  find ways to use time more effectively and plan for the future.
  • Appreciating and caring:  building relationships.
  • Focusing and concentrating:  being fully present to key stakeholders.
  • Revealing and engaging:  enhanced communication and relationship-building.
  • Time shifting and “re-placing”:  changing when and where work is done.
  • Delegating and developing:  passing appropriate tasks to subordinates and assistants.
  • Exploring and venturing:  taking steps to align the four domains of life with a leader’s core values and aspirations.

As Friedman recommends, tracking the results of the experiment is critical, tweaking an experiment as it proceeds will often increase the benefits.

What’s in it for lawyers? Friedman’s approach is an evidence-based approach to help lawyers learn to make challenges that will benefit all aspects of their lives.  Choosing no more than three experiments, measuring the results, and then deciding whether to continue the experiment removes the “high stakes” nature that so often tanks sweeping changes.  (For example, how often have you sworn “never” to do something again, only to find yourself doing the foresworn activity within the next few days?)  This excerpt encapsulates why I expect Friedman’s work will speak to lawyers:

The best experiments let you try something new while minimizing the inevitable risks associated with change.  When the stakes are smaller, it’s easier to overcome the fear of failure that inhibits innovation.  You start to see results, and others take note, which both inspires you to go further and builds support from your key stakeholders.

If you’ve been looking for a workable work/life integration solution, pick up Friedman’s book. You’ll find it a rational, sensible approach that will offer substantial directions toward a life you want to lead.

A Tale of Two Sales

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I went shopping a few weekends ago. I’m in the market for a new car, and I need a dark rose or burgundy tablecloth for my dining room table.  I haven’t purchased either just yet (though I’m moving closer), but two very different sales experiences have offered plenty of insight.

Saturday afternoon, I went to the home department of a local department store and asked for tablecloths. The sales associate (Michele) told me that the store no longer carries tablecloths in the stores, only online.  Great, I said, turning away, I’ll take a look.

But Michele wasn’t done.

She asked what size my table is, and what color and fabric I was hoping to find.  Michele suggested that I send her the dimensions on my table and offered to make the first cut of the hundreds of tablecloths I’d find online to narrow down to the ten or so that I might actually consider.  I can’t wait to see what she finds.  It’s an extra step, but how nice to have someone willing to shepherd me through the search and guide me based on my needs.  That’s service.

What was right about this sales experience: Michele’s questions and suggestions were directed toward helping me get what I want and need with the least amount of effort and trouble on my end.  As a result, I left feeling that she was helping me, not just out to get a sale, even though I’m sure she’ll get a commission if I order through her.  Our exchange wasn’t about the sale.  It was about the service.

Next story:  Sunday afternoon, I went to the car dealership where I take my almost 14-year-old car for service. It’s time for a new car, and my only questions were whether I would choose the 2011 or 2012 model, and whether I could find a color I’d like.  I’d done some nosing around online, so I just needed to drive the cars and to get a little more information.

A salesman walked up right away, and I told him I was interested in model XYZ.  I mentioned that I’d looked at it online.  The salesman said that online research would give me the most information, and he invited me to come back when I was ready to place an order. A bit surprised, I asked whether he was telling me that he’d recommend I decide based on my online experience only, and he said yes.  He also told me that stock of the car was limited, so I would need to place an order within the week.  As he started to walk away, I mentioned that the colors shown online were rather dull (several shades of grey, black, white, and just one blue) and that there was some suggestion that other colors might be available.  I don’t control colors, he said, what you see online is what there is.  And with that, he walked away.

After doing a bit of looking at 2011 and 2012 models in the showroom to glean what I could about the differences, I returned to my computer and did a search to see what each dealership in my area had in inventory.  And there, in stock at the dealership I’d visited, was a car I loved:  “passion red” exterior, beige interior, all the options I’d want plus a few I wouldn’t object to. It was a bit more than I’d expected to pay, but if the salesman had shown me that car, chances are reasonably good that I’d own it right now.

What was wrong about this sales experience: where do I start?  First, the salesman sent me back to the Internet without even offering to point me to the most helpful parts of the website or to help me through the page after page of details.  He told me, in so many words, that his role was limited to taking an order.  And, most tellingly, he didn’t ask the basic questions that would have allowed him to discover that there was a car on his lot that matched what I was looking for.

What can you learn from these stories?

  1. If you’ve ever dreaded feeling “salesy” when offering your services to someone, consider how helpful it is to take a potential client by the hand to help him sort out his needs. What could be more of a service than helping someone to accomplish something they want to do, whether that’s buying a new car or developing an estate plan to care for her family?  Being in service and getting paid for it is not the same as selling something that’s unnecessary in an effort to make money.
  2. The Internet offers an ideal way for clients to get information before they speak with you, but chances are good that they need to know more before purchasing. Think of your website as an introduction of your “product” — and for attorneys, your product is a combination of your legal skills and how you bring them to the table.  But remember that even the best website is only a conversational opener, not the end of the conversation.
  3. When you speak with a potential client, be sure you ask enough questions to get a sense of her real needs. Not only will you discover what needs you need to address in talking about your service, but also you’ll show your client that you seek to meet her needs rather than offering a “one size fits all” approach that may not be a good fit.