#askTracy: Put out or get out.
Clienting with curiosity and appropriate self-protection.
In a word: No
This week’s #AskTracy questions is:
How do you find the inspiration to turn the questions into others?
How are you less about "me" and more about the "we" and "you" of clienting?
Are there books I can read?
I want to be less selfish and more curious about others in relation to doing better work in my business.
It is a funny thing - disarming defense and learning to answer the question that is sought vs how it is asked. We seek this in interviews - a/k/a when we are given those age-old and useless questions such as:
Tell us a time when…
● …. you learned from a mistake?
● …. went above and beyond?
● … experienced a challenge or point of growth?
How do you deal with…?
● …. conflict?
● …. feedback?
● … leadership???
(You feel me.)
This translates to where our question-asker this week is coming from - the clienting space. As clients come with their own questions and demands and complaints:
● My back hurts.
● I have laugh lines.
● I get no traction on social media.
● I need more sign ups or customers or sales!
● A new website.
● Etc …
And there you are, sitting and standing before them, and perhaps they are looking at you with just the kind of eyes that get your client services and customer assistance blood boiling, pushing you to the edge of your want (need, really!) to help and so you jump in. And so, just maybe, in the excitement and ability to take off the water-wings of assistance and dive into the deep end of the supportive swimming pool (BUT that you are swimming in and in an attempt to instill empathy you so hear yourself just doing the EXACT THING you DON’T WANT TO) a/k/a talking about yourself. And so you pause, stop, self check and then, in an attempt to correct, ask questions that don’t get the proper answers to give you the intel to FUCKING HELP!
And that’s when you get to the question you are asking (which I find so flattering you think I do well) - asking the questions that return our clients and customers back to themselves vs us leaning onto ourselves and our own stories and frameworks.
For those of you whom work with me you know all too well the go-tos I use. Try on:
● I’m curious...
● Question:...
● What if...
● Tell me...
● Stop, let me tell you my understanding and you tell me how that lands on your end, cool?
● Play the editor with me for a second...
● Tell me what you hate.
● Yeah, I don’t buy it.
Oh - and I do a lot of smiling.
All of these things are ways (and again thank you for thinking they are of value in our work, dear question asker…) I do something that I term, well, a couple of things:
Leaving the room and entering from another direction
Stepping out to step in
Taking the stage to refocus the light
A/k/a: All these are friendly approaches to recenter or calibrate the Universe unto the actual end for which we are gathered - yes to the client (in my case ‘coach’) vs what might waylay us. Not only can the client themselves be reminded that we are here for them, but that you, as the support provider, will take control of getting them what they need vs their having to be in the uncomfortable position of ordering off of some sort of “service menu” where they need to self-diagnose. Clients are working with you (us) because they wish to be cared for - the ‘it’ to be taken care of by you, not just the pain point but the finding of that tricky nip, too!
That is a lot, huh? How can we do that? I mean, fuck, I have a lot of training and a strong as hell resume of doing impressive things - but when a person is freaking out and strapped for cash and choosing to pay me some precious amount to help out of this panic spot feels like this - fail. A MASSIVE and great opportunity fail for, don’t know about you, but for me - of opportunity - like HANDS FUCKING DOWN!
And do you know what all humans do when we are anxious and unsure? We turn things back to ourselves. But, what if we used the very normal self-focus to everyone’s best end? Thus, reframing the shake up where we turn things back onto “us” but actually back onto the client by asking them to give the thing we all love doing most of all - their opinions.
Thus - I ask questions that throw my own understanding out into traffic and thereby under the bus, sharing with the client why I think we are here and then they can edit me - correct if they like to think of it like that, and so we are on the same page and starting from the proper point and I know - no mystery there - exactly what they want help with or at.
If the client thinks I am dumb, so be it. It will only be for a minute, for once they have articulated what they want - I can dive in and, like you in your space of expertise, do “my thing”.
No, in all of that - there is more, of course. What we have just discussed is a technique called ‘reflective listening’ where we speak back our understandings to the person to whom we are dialoguing as we explicitly and implicitly understand them. That is a super-informative learning for any and all communications and relationships in our lives - rigorous, too. But what we do by doing so, or so achieve, is a lot of insight as to how we are heard by individuals and within space and how the person to whom we are speaking is able to listen. The baseline of all client service and assistance and support is to enhance and expand the thinking of those with whom we work.
Very, very straightforward - not my style - the takeaway here is to start with this exactly:
“OK, let me share my understanding of what brought you here today and you tell me if that hits you as accurate ….”
And go!
Also:
● Use examples, and it is OK if they are about yourself, as long as the examples make you look silly, so they thereby disarm and allow you to be human and demonstrate that you are also on a weird and awkward journey.
● Directly ask - what might we do to make this easier for you?
● If your understanding is ‘off’ say something like: Huh, tell me why you think I might have thought those were some of your needs or interests?
● Smile a lot, more so when things get deep or intense or hard.
● Nod when you talk - trust me.
Addressing the question of whether I have read any business books or do, podcasts and the like to aid in earnest self-presentation with clients and reflective client focused service - No. I hate that shit. I cannot think of anything more boring nor bothersome than doing so. Jesus - if it has bullet points and digraphs and pithy chapters of how-to … DEATH to my EVERYTHING. Really. I get better by working with real flesh and blood persons and doing good and screwing up and trying again. Earned my stripes in listening and getting to the ‘real’ asks and points of prickliness came from doula work and an adage I so end with here (though this conversation can do go on and I have A LOT more ways to assist to share - #hitmeup).
The problem cited is not necessarily the problem that actually is.
Rather it is a signal of general openness and specific need. Hear it. Validate its reality. And start poking about - beginning with (again restating this because IT FUCKING MATTERS!)
● OK, I am hearing …. And
● What if …...? Or
● OK, so I am curious, and roll with me here, if …?
