Managerial tools: Why do customers demand stupid reports?
At one of the conferences there was a comical event. Suitable listener:
Let me remind you of the original statement of the question: “How can we increase the level of trust in relations with the customer?”
Here about customers today and talk. Or rather, about a simple tool that:
Yes, this is again a 2 by 2 matrix - for the first time we heard it from our colleague Sergey Berezhnoy [1], who deals with the topic of customer relations. The matrix shows what happens to the customer and contractor relationships.
A. Low Trust & Low Transparency. Suppose a new project begins, which you sincerely wish to successfully complete, thereby causing irreparable benefit to the customer. But the customer does not know you yet, and you just started working - it took a couple of days. Where is your relationship with the customer? Most likely, in square A.
Yes, the customer has already chosen you, that is, he has shown some minimal trust. Therefore, your relationship is not at the lower boundary of square A. But they are all the same in this square, if, of course, the customer already had experience working with contractors. Those who have ever done the repair of their own apartment, at this moment certainly nod their heads. :)
With all this, somehow I want to climb into a zone of high confidence, right? After all, it is there:
A natural question arises:
Is it possible to somehow jump to square D in some way? Sure you may! After all, it is for this that people drive customers to the bathhouse. Plus, for this purpose, there are reviews and other references.
But here we must understand that being in square D is very unstable. Any problem on the project automatically drops the relationship in the square A. And then the bath already stops working. And the reviews even begin to work against you: “Eh, I was told that the guys are smart, but in reality ...”
Therefore, the general recommendation is to increase the transparency and gradually move to the square:
B. Low Trust & High Transparency. Just being in square B, provided that there is not only transparency but also RESULT, raises confidence. A person sees that his money, time, reputation, career are used by you for business. And it automatically raises the level of trust and moves your relationship to the square:
C. High Trust & High Transparency. Over time, from square C, you can move to D if the customer sees that building transparency requires considerable resources.
D. High trust & Low transparency. Being in this square is rather unstable. There is an instant drop in square A in the case of:
And that, and that leads to the fact that transparency begins to be induced already at the initiative of the customer. As he sees fit and right.
As Milton Eriksson told us, there is always a positive intention in the actions of people (sometimes positive only for them, yes), and people act in the best way available to them.
The director has a positive intention: to increase the productivity of the company, which, he believes, depends on the level of discipline. And how to raise discipline? That's how. The director is 25 years old, and this method he considers the best.
Same thing with the customer. You do not like the report form? And he obviously considers it the best way to bring transparency in this situation. Here is his experience. Excuse me. Did you get the case in square A, without offering your own way of targeting transparency? Now direct as requested.
Falling relations from square D to square A inevitably affects the team. Only people have lost the habit of writing reports, here on - a new form. Why, why? People really don't understand.
It's pretty hard to explain these things to the team. Therefore, it is better not to bring it to sin, but to act proactively. Let's get started right now.
How to use the tool? Let's do a little exercise:
1. Draw somewhere on a piece of paper a 2 by 2 medium matrix - a matrix of Trust and Transparency
2. Think a bit and put a dot in the square where you think the relationship with the customer of your work. This could be an external customer, an internal customer, a neighboring department, your boss, etc.
At the very center of the point can not be put, do not cheat. :) Be honest with yourself.
3. Ask yourself the question: why do you think so? Why do you think your relationship is there? Do you think that transparency is enough, but there is no trust? Why then no confidence? On what grounds do you understand that the customer is well aware of your work?
Having reports doesn't mean reading them, right? The best way to understand where your relationship is is to ask. The tool is so good that it can be used when meeting or calling the customer:
What to do in case of problems on projects? They often ask what to do when problems arise when the level of trust begins to decline.
I loved this grandmother with all my heart. Then I wondered for a long time: why did she do all this? But this is to talk about motivation. But what did she do technically?
At that moment, when I was dissatisfied with my grandmother, she informed me about the status of the work. General recommendation in case of problems: increase transparency and increase the number of reports - on OWN initiative.
Trust falls - increase the transparency so as not to fall below the red line.
Working professionally with people who complain about customers :), I can say that there are no inadequate customers. There are customers about whom we can not understand why they behave in this way. When you start digging, it often turns out that the problem is transparency. And / or in the experience that the customer has already received, working with opaque teams.
Friends, let's work transparently. Then there will be no problems with trust.
Successes!
Alexander Orlov
Stratoplan.Ru
PS Useful links of this article:
PPS In the next article I want to write about simple tools from 4 questions. which helps clarify a person’s goals and help out of the square of high competence and low interest, which we wrote about in the previous article:
PPPS Previous articles in the “Management Tools” series:
The very last PS Blog of Plantop has moved to a separate site: http://blog.stratoplan.ru - see you there!
- Alexander, there is a question: How can we increase the level of trust in relations with the customer?
- What's wrong with the level of trust?
')
- Well, we have a team, there is a manager. And we want the customer to trust the team and communicate only with the manager. And he climbs directly to the engineers ...
- And why is it bad? The person immediately receives answers to his questions, quick communications and all that.
- You see ... We sell him the junior engineers as the signor engineers ... And we would not want him to discover this fact.
Let me remind you of the original statement of the question: “How can we increase the level of trust in relations with the customer?”
Here about customers today and talk. Or rather, about a simple tool that:
- It will help to understand where your relationship with the customer is
- Show why report forms are sometimes so idiotic.
- It may help to understand the reasons for “inadequate” customer behavior.
Matrix of trust and transparency
Yes, this is again a 2 by 2 matrix - for the first time we heard it from our colleague Sergey Berezhnoy [1], who deals with the topic of customer relations. The matrix shows what happens to the customer and contractor relationships.
A. Low Trust & Low Transparency. Suppose a new project begins, which you sincerely wish to successfully complete, thereby causing irreparable benefit to the customer. But the customer does not know you yet, and you just started working - it took a couple of days. Where is your relationship with the customer? Most likely, in square A.
Yes, the customer has already chosen you, that is, he has shown some minimal trust. Therefore, your relationship is not at the lower boundary of square A. But they are all the same in this square, if, of course, the customer already had experience working with contractors. Those who have ever done the repair of their own apartment, at this moment certainly nod their heads. :)
With all this, somehow I want to climb into a zone of high confidence, right? After all, it is there:
- Your ideas are accepted FAST, without twenty five justifications
- Customer comes with new projects again and again
- The customer is so impressed with the work of your team that he tells you only GOOD, which in turn is converted into:
- MONEY and career or professional GROWTH for your entire team
A natural question arises:
Is it possible to somehow jump to square D in some way? Sure you may! After all, it is for this that people drive customers to the bathhouse. Plus, for this purpose, there are reviews and other references.
But here we must understand that being in square D is very unstable. Any problem on the project automatically drops the relationship in the square A. And then the bath already stops working. And the reviews even begin to work against you: “Eh, I was told that the guys are smart, but in reality ...”
Therefore, the general recommendation is to increase the transparency and gradually move to the square:
B. Low Trust & High Transparency. Just being in square B, provided that there is not only transparency but also RESULT, raises confidence. A person sees that his money, time, reputation, career are used by you for business. And it automatically raises the level of trust and moves your relationship to the square:
C. High Trust & High Transparency. Over time, from square C, you can move to D if the customer sees that building transparency requires considerable resources.
The story of life. My colleague and the second lover of management tools, Slava Pankratov, told how they worked for the American customer of Korean origin, Gina:
At some point, the team grew to 25 people, and the compilation of a weekly report to get in touch with Gene began to take a whole day.
I somehow resort to phoned, out of breath. Jin says:
- Hi, why are we running?
- Well, today I have been collecting data all day.
Jin instantly becomes serious:
- That is, do I understand correctly that my test manager spends four days a month on this report?
- Well yes
At this point, he apparently multiplies my bet by 8 hours and realizes that the weekly report costs him a lot:
- Slav, let's try to live without this paper ...
D. High trust & Low transparency. Being in this square is rather unstable. There is an instant drop in square A in the case of:
- Any more or less serious problems on the project
- Change of person from the customer
And that, and that leads to the fact that transparency begins to be induced already at the initiative of the customer. As he sees fit and right.
The story of life. In a friend of an IT company, the director forces programmers to write explanatory letters by hand, in case they are late. even for 3 minutes. The director even has an explanation: “They get tired of writing and stop being late!”
As Milton Eriksson told us, there is always a positive intention in the actions of people (sometimes positive only for them, yes), and people act in the best way available to them.
The director has a positive intention: to increase the productivity of the company, which, he believes, depends on the level of discipline. And how to raise discipline? That's how. The director is 25 years old, and this method he considers the best.
Same thing with the customer. You do not like the report form? And he obviously considers it the best way to bring transparency in this situation. Here is his experience. Excuse me. Did you get the case in square A, without offering your own way of targeting transparency? Now direct as requested.
Falling relations from square D to square A inevitably affects the team. Only people have lost the habit of writing reports, here on - a new form. Why, why? People really don't understand.
The story of life. At one of the trainings - we tell about this matrix. The manager slaps his forehead: “Damn, we went through this circle 3 times! ..”
It's pretty hard to explain these things to the team. Therefore, it is better not to bring it to sin, but to act proactively. Let's get started right now.
How to use the tool? Let's do a little exercise:
1. Draw somewhere on a piece of paper a 2 by 2 medium matrix - a matrix of Trust and Transparency
2. Think a bit and put a dot in the square where you think the relationship with the customer of your work. This could be an external customer, an internal customer, a neighboring department, your boss, etc.
At the very center of the point can not be put, do not cheat. :) Be honest with yourself.
3. Ask yourself the question: why do you think so? Why do you think your relationship is there? Do you think that transparency is enough, but there is no trust? Why then no confidence? On what grounds do you understand that the customer is well aware of your work?
Having reports doesn't mean reading them, right? The best way to understand where your relationship is is to ask. The tool is so good that it can be used when meeting or calling the customer:
- Do I understand correctly that our relationship is here?
- What can we do to increase transparency?
What to do in case of problems on projects? They often ask what to do when problems arise when the level of trust begins to decline.
The story of life. Three years ago I realized my childhood dream of taking my family on vacation to America. We ended up in Las Vegas, and of course, it was impossible not to go to the David Copperfield show. This is the idol of childhood!
We bought the cheapest tickets in the last row. We arrive - at the entrance we are met by an old such grandmother, ticket collector. Come, says, I will take you to your seats.
We arrive at our last row - there is a table, chairs and a side through which children can not see anything. The grandmother sees this, says: you, probably, will need podopniki (boosters) for the children. Yes, I say, I would like to. Okay, grandma says and leaves.
We sit, until the submission of 10 minutes, there are no podparnik. Grandmother, I see, conducts other viewers. Here, I think, the old hag, forgot about us. At this moment - pat on the shoulder. This grandmother passes by: "Do not worry, I remember about your boosters."
Two minutes before the show, no boosters. I think: well, a Christmas tree-stick, still forgot. Grandma suited: “Unfortunately, the boosters were taken to the dry-cleaner and they don’t have time to bring them up to the show. But I have a suggestion for you. I would like to offer you to transfer to the 4th row. There is no such side, and just there are places. If you don't mind, let me take you. ”
Of course, we were not against it. 4th row! Copperfield during the presentation could really touch.
Leaving, grandma asks: “Tell me, please, do you still need boosters?” I say, yes, I would like to. No problem, he says, now I will send them to the next warehouse. There will be about 10 minutes. In 10 minutes they were.
I loved this grandmother with all my heart. Then I wondered for a long time: why did she do all this? But this is to talk about motivation. But what did she do technically?
At that moment, when I was dissatisfied with my grandmother, she informed me about the status of the work. General recommendation in case of problems: increase transparency and increase the number of reports - on OWN initiative.
The story of life. In one company, we conducted a series of trainings. At first, the guys complained about their customers:
- You see, they are strange. They are silent during the quarter, they do not make any comments, but at the end of the quarter they give us low marks.
The next time we came to them in a month. One of the managers told the real story:
- We just had to pass the project, but we started this deadline. In short, every day we began to write to the customer what we do, what problems we have and how we will solve them. Prior to this, we had reports once a week or at the request of the customer, and here we ourselves began to write every day. As a result, yesterday we received estimates for the quarter. Our assessment turned out to be more than in those quarters when we did not delay the deadlines.
Trust falls - increase the transparency so as not to fall below the red line.
Working professionally with people who complain about customers :), I can say that there are no inadequate customers. There are customers about whom we can not understand why they behave in this way. When you start digging, it often turns out that the problem is transparency. And / or in the experience that the customer has already received, working with opaque teams.
Friends, let's work transparently. Then there will be no problems with trust.
Successes!
Alexander Orlov
Stratoplan.Ru
PS Useful links of this article:
- “Outsourcing as a service” - author's project by Sergei Berezhnoy
PPS In the next article I want to write about simple tools from 4 questions. which helps clarify a person’s goals and help out of the square of high competence and low interest, which we wrote about in the previous article:
PPPS Previous articles in the “Management Tools” series:
- Management tools: How to explain when you feel one place?
- Andragogue Practitioner Tips: How We Learn
- Management Tools: How to play non-linear chess
The very last PS Blog of Plantop has moved to a separate site: http://blog.stratoplan.ru - see you there!
Source: https://habr.com/ru/post/202028/
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