I’m sure at some point in your dating life someone said “it’s not you, it’s me” and you believed them. It doesn’t mean that it was a bad thing that your relationship didn’t work out although at the time you were probably devastated. The same happens every day in business and whether it’s you or me is irrelevant; we’re just not the right fit.
A few blogs ago we talked about our Client Acceptance Protocol and the changes we had to make to ensure we are focused on working with the right clients. We find that there are certain business owner traits that coincide with a certain size and type of client and we’ve learned over almost 5 years where we can and cannot be successful.
Here’s what we look for in a client:
- A unique offering, product or service
- A CEO who knows how to delegate and outsource
- A CEO who understands their sales cycle
- A client who is looking to build long term happy client relationships and not just transactions
- A respectful leadership team and corporate culture
- A leadership team who truly understands their people are their greatest asset
- A leadership team who regularly, consistently communicates and receives feedback with grace
What we know doesn’t work:
- A CEO that’s a micro-manager
- A CEO without a vision of the future of the company
- The CEO who believes that their people are the smartest and their service is better than anyone else – this is usually the person who is not living in reality
- A CEO or corporate culture build on disrespect
- A CEO or leadership team that cannot accept feedback or places blame on everyone else
- A CEO who thinks their team is disposable
As you can see it’s not easy to tell one from the other in a meeting or two. Everyone puts their best foot forward in an interview and no one will tell you they are a passive aggressive nutcase or they micromanage everyone and everything. People have asked why in our Client Acceptance Protocol have we instituted meetings with other members of the company and with clients along with attending new prospect meetings…this is why. You can learn a lot from seeing someone in action, how they respond to questions, how they handle adversity. These meetings allow us to learn more about the company, its process, its unique capabilities, and most importantly it allows us to see who we’re really partnering with. Every day we put our relationships and our reputations on the line for our clients and one bad client can ruin years of work, we look to ensure that never happens. Outsourced business development is a team approach; we rely on each other to close deals and if we can’t trust the behavior of our client, we can’t in good consciousness represent them
