Be the Customer Whisperer

Deliberate communication styles to meet the customer where they are at will win their trust and respect. 

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I’ve sometimes been called the customer whisperer. This can come in handy when we have difficult situations to work thru. But how did I gain this capability and how could you be the next customer whisperer on your engagements?

As I was talking to my mom this week I realized that it was a skill learned from having a father like I did. I would have to convince him not by simply requesting, or by argument, but by meeting him where he was at. Whether I had to choose a certain time to bring up the discussion dependent on his mood, or if the request needed to be presented in a way that benefitted him & not me. This is really how you deal with a difficult customer or a problematic project situation. For instance, if you have bad news that you needed to share, you would ensure that it was shared with the customer’s project lead BEFORE you shared with the project sponsor/executive. You would also pick an appropriate time to share it with both the customer lead and the executive sponsor. You don’t want to be seen as escalating around your customer project lead and you don’t want to catch anyone by surprise (both build trust). Another example is that you need to make a proposal that they could see as an added expense/risk, so start by focusing on how it benefits them near & long term BEFORE talking about how much it will cost or what impacts it could have on the customer. 

This takes practice, so discuss and get advice from your project team & project manager before approaching the customer.

Next I will discuss how to defer to the customer even when you know more!

Until then stay safe everyone.