“Whose Fault Is It?”
By Adam Radzik
Consultant to Professional Firms

“Can you imagine? The nerve!” The words came from Walter, a professional whom I was sales coaching. He was quite upset.

He explained, “Gary Graf, my oldest client of more than twenty-four years, says to me this morning, ‘Walter, you know a lot of people. I need your help finding an expert. I am looking at two potential acquisitions in the plastics business, and I need someone who really knows the mergers and acquisitions area. You know me, Walter, if anybody would find some quicksand to step into, it would be me! (ha-ha!) Can you make a recommendation for someone in that field?’ I looked at him in disbelief. ‘What’s wrong with using me?’ I blurted out. Gary smiled condescendingly, ‘Walter, don’t be upset, but what do you know about M&A work?’ I responded with ‘Everything you could possibly want to know!’ Gary looked at me, genuinely surprised. ‘Really! I had no idea! How long have you been doing that kind of work?’ I responded, ‘About thirty years!’ Then he said, ‘Wow, Walter, how come you never told me?’ I just threw my hands up in the air in disgust. He didn’t understand my reaction, but I was so aggravated I almost walked out on him.”

“Can you imagine, Adam? He’s been my client for more than twenty-four years and he still doesn’t know what kind of work I do! I am so angry with him! I gotta get out of this business!”

“Walter,” I said, calmly, “Let’s say that several years ago, you got together with Mr. Graf and reviewed a dozen services you could provide to him. At that time, your client believed he only needed one or two of those services. Would he have attempted to remember the other services you enumerated? Chances are he wouldn’t, because they wouldn’t have been relevant to him. For example, what if, ten years ago, you had raised concerns about business succession or retirement or buying the stock of his minority shareholders? Those issues would probably have been of little interest to a forty-year-old individual. Not wishing to clutter up his mind with useless trivia, he instructed his brain to toss all of that irrelevant stuff into the no-need-to-remember-this wastebasket.

“Well, now it is ten years later, and your client is fifty years old and all of a sudden those identical issues are of great interest to him. The problem is that he no longer remembers that you have any expertise in these areas. What does he do? He goes looking elsewhere. It is only natural.

“What’s the answer to this challenging problem? Every six months, at the very least, you need to present your clients with the entire list of services that they can benefit from at that particular time,” I concluded.

Embarrassed, Walter said, “I guess if I should be angry at anyone, I should be angry at myself for not reminding Gary of my services, specifically the merger and acquisition services.” He added, “I wonder how many of my other clients are not hiring me because they do not remember all the different things I can do for them! I also wonder how many of them have hired other professionals to do work I could and should be doing! Hmmm?”

Remember, Radzik’s Selling Rule No. 27 – Never assume your client remembers all of the ways in which you could help him or her

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Comedy Corner

The keynote speaker was gratified to see an audience of over 200 people as he began his talk. After twenty minutes, members of the audience began to quietly exit. As time went by, more people left and soon only half of the original group remained. The exodus did not stop, and the room eventually became sparsely populated. The speaker became nervous as whole rows got up and left, and at the very end of his speech only one person remained seated in the big hall. Unable to restrain himself, the keynote speaker felt compelled to thank the lone survivor for sticking it out till the very end. The audience person smiled and explained that he really didn’t merit that much praise, as the reason he stayed till the end was because he had to – he was the next speaker!

The Clemente brothers reflected on how New Yorkers love watermelon during the summer, so they decided to drive their truck down to Florida and fill it up with this great profit maker. Each hefty watermelon cost them $4.00, and they bought 100 of them. Happily, they drove back anticipating how they would charge $5.00 or maybe even $6.00 for each one. Upon their return, they quickly set up a roadside stand, but discovered to their dismay that pedestrians would not pay more than $3.00 per watermelon. At the end of the day, the Clemente brothers realized that they had less money than when they started out, not counting the gas and the lodging expenses. They were mystified as to how this misfortune had occurred. Finally, one brightened and said, “I got it! Our truck is too small. Next time we have to get a bigger truck, get five times as many watermelons. Then you’ll see how much money we’ll make!” (The old, We’ll make it up in the volume!)