Do the work, or don’t . . .

Posted on | January 3, 2011 | 1 Comment

. . .but if you’re not going to, don’t bother me.

I was pleased to get a call a couple of weeks ago from someone seeking assistance. Not sure exactly where they found me, but they’d seen my work and liked it.

Initial contact/follow up was not that easy, but we finally connected and chatted. I was concerned – this individual seemed to be fairly scattered, with a few different diverse areas she wanted to market, not at all clear what exactly she needed help with, and not particularly responsive. Their website was all over the place, and missing some important info and had broken links, etc. Some effort had been put toward social media, but it was equally unfocused.

Significant warning lights here — you can’t be all things to all people, and you can’t do four things professionally and do them well, in my mind. I have a colleague I respect highly who says “Just as important as knowing who you are, is knowing who you are NOT.” In my mind, the combo of coach, singer/songwriter, artist and technical industry consultant is a bit too much of a mixed bag.

I had a PR lead that I offered up, gratis, as I figured it might be a good fit — they sat on it until past the deadline. I also had reservations because it seems that, from a spiritual and a realist standpoint, I was not likely to see eye-to-eye with this person.

I spoke to a colleague who I thought might both be interested in this person/business and helping on this project, and I thought she might also have some good ideas on how to approach things. We were on the same page from the start – that we needed more detail about goals, expectations, budget, what had been done in the past, what worked, what did not.

I have a standard “creative brief” that I use with new clients/prospects to both bring me up to speed on them, and to incite them to think in detail about where they’ve been, where they are, where they want to go.

I sent this over to this person seeking my help. I thought this might be a good starting point, and communicated that this is not a hard and fast tool, it is just a beginning. I figured, since one of the four different things they were offering was coaching services, that this might be a familiar conversation. I offered that she could fill it out, or we could find a time to meet or do a call and talk through it together. When I’ve coached people and teams, this approach has been a standard and useful way to begin. I’m not a mind reader, and you might remember some important things as part of the process.

I heard nothing.

Today, I checked back in with an email — and got back a message that was a bit of a surprise.

It seems that I was expected to do the “work” (her word, not mine, but accurately described) of going through her website and figuring out all that background stuff myself, which kept her from doing all that work again.

Now, that’s fine, but to me shows very little respect or value for my time, or the time of whoever it is (the sucker) who it now seems “gets” to work for her. And, in fact, I HAD gone through her mess of an unfocused website and social media sites, and learned some things, but had a number of other questions and concerns. And part of the “getting up to speed” process is comparing what I might see as an outsider, and what a client/prospect thinks I or some other outside observer should see/learn/think based on this type of examination.

In the end, as I told my colleague, I think we dodged a bullet. I see it as not getting involved with an unfocused, perhaps lazy client who seems not willing to do the foundational work necessary; and better, I avoided trying to help someone who seems to want to be all things to all people. While I wish her no ill will, and success, along with her new marketing/writing lackey, it was a frustrating experience. I’m glad we both concluded that it was not a fit, and I’m glad I did not waste any more time on her than the small amount that I did.

Have you had bad/lazy client experiences? How do you stay away from potential clients who are a bad fit?

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