During my first few days of work, I offered free consulting to some companies. These were small businesses, and needed some direction but couldnt afford full time agencies. I thought the experience would me as well help a newbie like me pick up the nuances of the online medium much faster than otherwise.
They get free consulting, I get free experience. Win-win. So we thought.
What happened? There werent any business disasters or ruined friendships. But changes refused to happen. Most companies just wouldnt accept recommendations to change stuff that obviously needed change.
Why did this happen? The companies were the founders' babies. What happened was that I showed up, offered unsolicited advice for free, and went about telling them their baby was flawed. It's understandable that they wanted a company that they built, not one I built.
The two companies for whom the unsolicited-advice arrangement did work showed what was missing elsewhere.
With these two companies, I wasnt very clear about what they wanted. I asked them to set a context, ask the questions. Only then would I work on what *they* defined. More importantly, I set boundaries about what I was *not* going to do. I got myself to shut my mouth when anything outside the agreed-upon-area came up.
That made sure I wasnt trying to bring up their baby - I was only buying her a gift.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
No comments:
Post a Comment