Tag: Client relationships

Partnership – Great goal; Insufficient word

Posted on by Jeff Evans

As we work and live with others, the word partnership seems to be a common goal. We want to partner better. We want to build business partnerships. We want others to partner with us. Partnership is a good word, and a worthy goal. The questions I ask myself are:

  • What does partnership look like?
  • Who do I want to partner with?
  • How do I achieve partnership?
  • What can I specifically do to build partnerships?

These questions seem easy to answer on the surface, but I find that the goal of partnership eludes me more often than I want. I have conversations with others, and we seem to want a partnership together, but most often I don’t invest the time to understand and act on what partnership could look like.

For example, one of my former bosses asked me to help her organization build “strategic business partnerships” with their internal business partners. I loved the idea and started changing the way I interfaced with other leaders. I asked more questions. I delayed my recommendations until I knew more about the issue they were facing. I worked to co-create possible solutions with them instead of quickly implementing their solutions or mine. It didn’t take long for one of these leaders to call my boss to complain that I wasn’t being cooperative and that I was delaying decisions. My boss came to me and asked what I was doing. When I said I was trying to build “strategic business partnerships,” she said, “That is what we want, but don’t upset the clients. Just do what they ask you to do”. It’s clear my boss and I had different ideas on what these partnerships would look like.

Building partnerships is not complex. In fact, it can be simple to understand. We create a common understanding of what we are going to do together (short-term or long-term) and we share what we want from each other and negotiate an agreement.

The challenge in building partnerships comes when I actually have the conversation. I may even avoid the conversation all together. I get in my own way. My desire to be right, to minimize my risk, to be safe, and to gain a predictable outcome get in the way. There is also a sense of urgency to get things done and act. Unfortunately, nothing about partnerships is predictable or risk free, and urgency is the enemy of quality – quality of the outcome and quality of the relationship.

So, what do we do?

There are many aspects to building partnerships. I have found the easiest and most beneficial is to minimize assumptions and vagueness in our language. When we ask for something we want, we need to be specific. I had a mentor years ago who told me to avoid “goodness” words. That statement itself is vague, so I asked, “What’s a goodness word?”. He said, “Goodness words describe things we want, and they are good (things like support, buy-in, partnership, respect, etc.), but they are not sufficient for a meaningful agreement.” The antidote for the goodness word is to ask myself, and share with you, “What does it look like?”. If you are giving me support, this is what you would be doing. If we are going to have a partnership, this is how we will treat each other. This is what respect looks like to me.

Asking these next level questions takes time. I need to pause and get specific with myself and others. I assume you know what I mean, and I think I know what you mean. These assumptions are recipes for poor agreements. I am learning to share with others the behaviors I am looking for and to ask them what behaviors they want from me. Having this next level of conversation is a small investment in time, that pays big dividends with agreements that last and partnerships that thrive.

Developing Flawless Clients

Posted on by Beverly Crowell

Flawless Consulting is the popular workshop and book by Peter Block, which are designed to develop skills that increase an internal consultant’s ability to have a strong and positive impact on their client’s business results. Individuals in staff positions such as human resources, training, organizational development, information systems, finance, safety, purchasing, and engineering have all benefited from Flawless Consulting over the years.

Recently, I was delivering a workshop to one such group: Human Resources. Near the end of the second day and after much exploration of the Flawless Consulting process and skills, a participant asked, “I love all this content for myself as a consultant. It would be great if my client could hear it as well. Do you have a class for them . . . on how to be a flawless client?”

After some laughter and agreement in the room, we talked about this idea of the flawless client. Who are they? What do they do or not do that makes them flawless? How can we as consultants help?

In his book Flawless Consulting, Block asserts that a consultant is a person in a position to have some influence over an individual, group, or organization, but with no power to make changes or implement programs. Most people in staff or support roles are really consultants, even if they don’t call themselves one. And if we take that thinking further, many of our clients may find themselves in the consultant role, too.

Most professionals are working in cross-functional, cross-business groups and other work models that do not maintain strict vertical business units grouped by function and geography. So, a client today may be a consultant tomorrow.

 

If we agree that any client may also be a consultant, the answer to how we help them becomes a whole lot simpler. Here are some ideas.

  • While we don’t have a workshop called Flawless Clients, we do have Flawless Consulting. Anyone inside your organization who is in a position to influence without the power to make the changes would be an excellent candidate. Invite them to attend—and if they do, get together to talk about what they learned and how it can help your own relationship moving forward. Many leaders/clients have attended the workshop and found great value in the experience.

  • Remember, we learn from each other—directly or indirectly. By being a Flawless Consultant, you are inviting your clients to learn from you through what you say and what you do. Have a discussion about the consulting process—specifically, as part of your conversations to lay the groundwork for how you will work together, not just what work you will do. Encourage questions and be intentional in sharing what you are doing and why. Throughout the process, ask the question, “What did we learn from that?” Push the pause button to reflect before moving on to the next task or step.

  • In any consulting agreement, maximum client involvement will occur to the extent that you involve them. Our goal as Flawless Consultants is to be collaborative, where the engagement is a 50/50 partnership with our client to solve a given problem. When collaborative, the client must be actively involved in data gathering and analysis, setting goals and developing action plans, and finally, sharing responsibility for success or failure. When we are collaborative, problem-solving becomes a joint undertaking: the better the odds for success after the consultant has left and the more that is learned.

When we are being authentic with our clients and completing the business of consulting in each phase, we are being Flawless. Even so, it won’t always mean our clients become flawless too. According to Block, “Your job, as a consultant, is to present information as simply, directly, and assertively as possible, and to complete the tasks of each phase of the consultation. That’s all there is to do, and it’s within each of us to do that perfectly.” Do that perfectly, and perhaps your clients will follow.

Beverly Crowell is an experienced facilitator, speaker, thought leader, and author specializing in the areas of business operations, organization, employee and human resources development.

A Short Version of My Misunderstanding of Gestalt

Posted on by Peter Block

In October 2019, Designed Learning marked the 40th anniversary of its founding with a webinar where Peter shared some thoughts on the origins of the company. It all began with a workshop, he said, that was grounded in a simple belief: relationships are decisive. What hasn’t changed over the years is this basic belief that relationships are decisive, not convenient, not rewarded, not comforting. And so it turns out that your ability to engage in honest, authentic relationships has everything to do with business performance.

In this blog post, Peter reflects farther back, into the origins of that simple belief that gave Designed Learning its footing.

My affection for Gestalt began sixty years ago. It took me to a weekend workshop in a barn in New Hope, Pennsylvania. It took me to Esalen Institute at Big Sur, California. Of all the different therapies I explored, it was the most efficient. Brutal, to the point, and absent of analyzing the world, one of my continuing resistances to living.

So it began as a long and personal journey to make sense of my life.

Then it became the foundation of my consulting work in organization development. Whenever I was lost and had no idea what was happening, I would go around the room and ask, “How do you feel? What do you want?” I did it often enough that I wrote a book on consulting that was mostly organized around these questions.

I once told a friend that I felt guilty making a living off of two questions. He said, “What else is there?”

The value of the questions is their power to value experience over intellect. The argument between science and religion is incomplete. What completes the conversation is experience. The existence of God, the empiricism of Science: interesting but inconclusive. What is interesting and conclusive is that if you aspire to act on what you know, this can be found in your own body. This is the ultimate challenge of any therapy, intervention, strategic planning: will you act on what you know? Gestalt is unrelenting on this question.

This is the essence of freedom, of relationship, of a fully lived life. These are central to changing organizational culture. The dominant narrative of system living is that predictability, consistency, and control produce high performance. A childish myth. Mostly they produce fear, isolation, and compliance.

Asking how you feel and what you want, collectively, in a context of support, is the essence of transformation. We learn and shift our thinking and our relationships with others at the citadel of our own experience, put into words in the presence of others.

If you care about transformation, or learning, or creating an organization that delivers on its promise, put best practices aside. Pay no attention to learning from history. Pay no attention to learning from your elders. Or what your precious children taught you. Pay no attention to what gives you bliss, or joy, or letting the ocean remind you of what a small and lucky being you are. These are fine comforts. So are a pillow and socks that fit.

This is not cynicism. It is the expression of faith. Existential faith.

Gestalt for me is an unsentimental version of a life. It demands we accept our own human landscape. That freedom occurs when you understand that no one is watching. That understanding and judgment are the booby prizes. It ends the need for violence in its more subtle forms of self-improvement and trying hard.

Two years ago, at the end of a workshop that I ran which went well, I declared to a participant that this experience was so different, more powerful, than other groups I had led in the company. I said that I wondered why. He said, “Peter, can’t you just enjoy this experience, and stop trying to analyze everything?”

Evidently not.

 

Excerpt by Peter Block from Gestalt Practice: Living and Working in Pursuit of wHolism,” Mary Ann Rainey and Brenda B. Jones, eds. (Faringdon, UK: Libri Publishing, 2019).

Peter Block is an author, consultant and citizen of Cincinnati, Ohio. His work is about empowerment, stewardship, chosen accountability and the reconciliation of community.

Be the Consultant Your Clients Want to Mirror

Posted on by Carolon Donnally

Over the last several years buzz words like authenticity, compassion, courage, empathy, and kindness have all made their way into thought leadership blogs and articles. The premise is that leaders who demonstrate these characteristics are more likely to be successful and have better team and organizational outcomes. At the foundation of these ideas is the fact that none of us want to work for or with people who do not demonstrate these and other basic characteristics for effective human interaction. There is something that draws us to others who engage with us in the same way that we would want to ideally engage with others. This is one of the underlying components of Flawless Consulting. As an internal or external consultant, we have to engage with our clients in an authentic, courageous, wholehearted way. This, in turn, creates the environment for our clients to engage with us in that same way.

I love neuroscience, and when I saw that there was actually a scientific term for this, I was intrigued. It is called mirror neuron activation. Mirror neurons are cells in our brains that react to external stimuli that promote mirroring behavior or emotions. A familiar example of mirror neuron activation is when we smile at others, who in turn smile back at us.

Our behaviors and emotions are contagious.

As internal and external consultants, we set the tone for the interaction. It is our willingness to be authentic, speak to the truth, and hold ourselves and others accountable for executing promises that set the tone for what is expected in the consulting relationship. We cannot ask for what we ourselves are not willing to give. As consultants, we have to be mindful of what we bring to the consulting table for our clients to mirror. Are we bringing authenticity, courage, and trust—and thus mirroring these behaviors in our interactions with our clients? Or are we bringing our hidden agendas, self-interest, and airs of cleverness to the conversation?  As internal and external consultants, we set the tone for the interaction. It is our willingness to be authentic, speak to the truth, and hold ourselves and others accountable for executing promises that set the tone for what is expected in the consulting relationship. We cannot ask for what we ourselves are not willing to give. As consultants, we have to be mindful of what we bring to the consulting table for our clients to mirror. Are we bringing authenticity, courage, and trust—and thus mirroring these behaviors in our interactions with our clients? Or are we bringing our hidden agendas, self-interest, and airs of cleverness to the conversation?

Before your next engagement with a client, take a movement to check your mirror. Ask yourself the following questions to see what you might be mirroring:

  • How am I feeling about this meeting, this client, and this interaction?

  • What is my purpose for engaging with this client? Is it to be helpful, or to push my agenda?

  • What underlying thoughts or emotions might get in the way of us having a successful meeting?

  • What do I need to do in order to help me to build trust with my client and show up authentically?

  • What do I need to put aside or acknowledge mentally or emotionally in order to be fully present for this meeting?

The No-Judgment Zone

Posted on by Beverly Crowell

Jiddu Krishnamurti, an Indian philosopher, speaker, and writer said, “The ability to observe without evaluating is the highest form of intelligence.” It’s an ability we talk about often in Flawless Consulting when learning how to deal with resistance in our client relationships.

Observation is the action or process of observing something or someone carefully in order to gain information. It is a statement based on something one has seen, heard, or noticed. Evaluation is altogether different. It is the making of a judgment about the amount, number, or value of something—an assessment. The time between observation and evaluation is seconds but the impact can be monumental.

At any point in our consulting process with a client, resistance is likely to happen. Dealing with such resistance may not be easy, but we’ve learned it can be simple. The key is leveraging the difference between observation and evaluation.

First, let’s talk about what resistance may look like in a client.

Some examples may include silence, interrupting, changing the topic, asking excessive questions, checking the time, stone-walling, arriving late, leaving early or even proclaiming, “We’ve always done it this way.” When hit with these various forms of resistance, it can be very easy to jump immediately into our own evaluation of what we believe their resistance must really mean. Flawless Consultants learn to come to a full-stop of our innate jump to judgment.

We do this by understanding what is behind the resistance and seek to get to the heart of what’s really going on.

Resistance in clients is often a sneak peek into their own harsh realities of the challenge they are trying to overcome.

There may be a real fear of being vulnerable to the consulting process, making a commitment, or even the fear of losing control. Resistance then is an open door to discovering critical aspects of what could be an underlying problem that should be addressed sooner rather than later. There may be a real fear of being vulnerable to the consulting process, making a commitment, or even the fear of losing control. Resistance then is an open door to discovering critical aspects of what could be an underlying problem that should be addressed sooner rather than later.

We use five skills to help navigate these murky waters.

1. Give two good-faith responses. In other words, give a “resisting” behavior a pass for the first two times. If you see your client take a quick look at their watch, don’t automatically read too much into it. If the behavior doesn’t continue, it wasn’t signaling resistance.

2. If the behavior does continue after at least two good-faith responses, name the behavior simply and directly. Here is where the difference between observation and evaluation becomes critical. Simply state the observed behavior and come to a full stop before moving to evaluation.

For instance, a client continues to look at their watch. A Flawless Consultant would say, “You keep looking at the clock.” If you say, “You look distracted,” you’ve moved pass observation, into evaluation and well into judgment which can quickly derail a conversation and make navigating the resistance even more difficult.

3. Once you’ve named the behavior, be quiet. Let the tension rise and allow the client to explain what the behavior means.

4. Give support to the underlying concerns by listening curiously, asking questions and seeking to understand.

5. Return to the business of the meeting or something new, depending on the underlying concerns. Let it go and move on.

Ultimately, resistance gets in the way of dealing with issues that affect the work. If we, as consultants, don’t manage the resistance, we may never really get to the deeper issues. We can help clients be more direct by showing them what they are doing by being clear and direct about our observations. It’s with this “look in the mirror” that we hope clients will say “why” they are doing it. No evaluation. No judgment. After all, it’s their “why” to tell.

Beverly Crowell is an experienced facilitator, speaker, thought leader, and author specializing in the areas of business operations, organization, employee and human resources development.

Why We Say Yes When We May Want to Say No

Posted on by Beverly Crowell

The phone rings on a Friday afternoon. It’s a key internal client and he’s got a problem. The urgency in his voice rings as someone who wants help, wants it now and wants it from you as a trusted and respected consultant in the organization. Recognizing the need to move fast, you set up a meeting for first-thing Monday morning.

You arrive at the meeting ready to explore how your client sees the problem and understand more about his expectations of you. What you learn is concerning. The client is ready to jump to a solution and wants to jump fast. Why? He’s already figured out how to fix the problem and wants you to do it for him …now.

At Designed Learning, we know this story is the real deal and a real issue.  It’s especially true for internal consultants who feel challenged with telling a client “no” when you know they want to hear “yes.” In working with our consultants around the globe, we’ve asked them, “Why do you say ‘yes’ to your client, when maybe you should say ‘no?’”

Here’s what we’ve heard:

  • I need the project in order to survive or get ahead, I have quota to fill.

  • My boss has high expectations of me.

  • I feel an obligation to my internal clients to help and do what they want.

  • It’s a great opportunity to get my foot in the door and establish my reputation.

  • It’s the way consulting has always been done.

  • It’s my job.

Saying “yes” when we should say “no” creates the opportunity for hurried contracting and a shotgun diagnosis of your client’s problem at hand.

Should you make it to the implementation of your solution, it’s the breeding ground for even more problems and less than desirable results. While saying “no” is never easy, it may be the only way to solve the client’s problem so that it stays solved and enables them to solve similar problems in the future.

So, how do you say “no” when you know your client wants you to say “yes?”

At the heart of Flawless Consulting is the mindset of authenticity and compassion. When we are authentic as consultants, we are direct and put into words what we are experiencing, and we do so compassionately by considering the client’s point of view. We strive to be a model for the way we want the organization to be and, as such, we commit to not rushing to get it done. Instead, we challenge ourselves and our clients to complete the various phases of consulting and deal with resistance as it comes along.

At the foundation of Flawless Consulting is the preliminary phase of Entry and Contracting. It is here where the consulting relationship is established and consultants have the best leverage for establishing a collaborative partnership with the client so that a “no” does not have to become a “yes” if it’s not in the best interest of the client, the consultant, or the organization. As part of their initial contracting meeting with clients, Flawless Consultants explore how their clients see the problem, whether they are the right person to work on the issues, how the client’s expectations are aligned with their own, and discuss how best to get started.

If expectations are not aligned, we may experience the harsh reality of a client fearing the loss of control, making a commitment, or being vulnerable to something new that does not represent their initial ideas. Instead of taking it personally or caving in with a “yes,” Flawless Consultants want resistance disclosed, exposed, understood and supported. If our clients are direct about their concerns and take responsibility for the difficulties they are having, our belief is that we, the consultants, can more easily support them in their struggle and help them find ways to improve their situation.

Unfortunately, even the best efforts can and will be derailed from time to time. For internal consultants, the boss may have expectations of you that you cannot fill. You may feel like you never can say no or that it’s your job to convert very difficult clients. If this is you, try having a contracting meeting with your boss. Consider what you think your boss wants from you and detail what you want from your boss. Then, schedule some time to discuss your stated or unstated wants, assumptions and expectations. The clarity of understanding and agreement with your boss will directly affect your ability to be flawless with your clients.

“Working in organizations means we are constantly bombarded by pressure to be clever and indirect and to ignore what we are feeling in the moment,” explains Peter Block, author of Flawless Consulting. “Flawless consulting offers the possibility of letting our behavior be consistent with our beliefs and feelings and also to be successful in working with our clients.”