Most of us have heard the old saying, “Never assume because…” (well, I’m assuming you can probably fill in the rest…)
Nevertheless, most of us still make assumptions so often every day that it boggles the mind. I catch myself quite frequently doing this, despite my constant efforts to quickly analyze situations before falling into the trap of making a potentially bad assumption.
In fact, I recently began consulting with someone named Steven, with whom I have exchanged many emails and texts. At some point, I began addressing his messages to “Steve” when I suddenly noticed that he was signing his messages as “Steven.”
Hmmm. Was this just because it was his automatic email signature? Or was his full, formal name listed there intentionally because this was how he preferred to be addressed? He had never corrected me, but I wasn’t sure, so I asked the question, “Which do you prefer?”
My bad! Turns out, he prefers Steven. I had made an assumption that caused me to begin referring to him with a nickname he preferred not to use. He was kind enough not to cause me any embarrassment by correcting me – but darn! I am a stickler when it comes to using someone’s preferred name. And yet, I had still fallen into the trap of making assumptions.
This is both a personal and professional trap we must constantly avoid. In this case, I had made a relatively common assumption that didn’t cause any harm. But what if you’re in a customer service, sales or other situation where you can inadvertently damage a valuable relationship?
For example, I recently worked with an electric utility company that has a customer service representative who made a brilliant move when confronted with what could have been a difficult conversation. She avoided any difficulty simply by refraining from assuming.
A customer had called to complain that his electric bill was too high. Upon hearing this complaint, what would most of us assume he would want the company to do? Right! Reduce his bill!
However, this representative was seasoned enough to know she didn’t need to cause any further problems by filling in the blanks with potentially wrong information. So, instead of assuming she knew what he would request (and beginning to defend the company or tell him that they couldn’t reduce his bill as a result), she simply asked, “What would you like us to do?” Brilliant!
The answer she received was both surprising and a relief! He said, “I’d like you to send someone out to check my meter to be sure it’s working correctly.”
WOW, they could certainly do that! And it was a perfectly reasonable request!
Too often, we assume people will be unreasonable and we work ourselves up prior to what we anticipate will be an unreasonable conversation or request; we assume they are going to ask for the moon so we prepare our “defense” to let them know why they can’t have it; and in the process, we sometimes create even more problems and hurt feelings by trying to solve the wrong problem.
This happens, even when we’re trying to do something nice for someone else – or trying to make up for a mistake we’ve made.
For example, I had ordered business cards from a company, asking for the front (but not the back) to be laminated. Unfortunately, the company experienced a problem that caused the cards to be so delayed that I missed having them available at an important conference. The company apologized, but then decided to do something “nice” for me to make up for it. They laminated the other side of the card, free of charge, and shipped them to me.
Well, it was a very nice thing to think of! The problem was that they assumed everyone would like both sides of their business card laminated (who wouldn’t?!); they also assumed that the reason I hadn’t laminated the second side was to save money.
In fact, this was not that at all. I didn’t want the other side laminated because I often like to write a small note on the back of my card before I hand it to someone. But you can’t write on a laminated card, so their nice gesture turned into an additional frustration for me every time I handed out a card and couldn’t write a note on it.
Are you making assumptions without even realizing it? Nicknames… customer service requests and complaints… sales calls… even favors and kind gestures for others. We must be vigilant to avoid falling into common traps, such as:
- Most people with that formal name go by that nickname, so he/she must, too!
- Everyone loves to do (or have) that, so they will, too!
- When is the baby due? Oops! You’re not pregnant?
- … and on and on. (I’m sure you can fill in the blanks here from your own experience.)
The point is that, even if we think we’re doing someone a favor, we should first double-check our assumptions to ensure that the kind gesture we intend to deliver actually turns out to be so.
Allow me to take you on a brief journey that demonstrates why communication is so important if you want to engage and keep loyal customers and employees.
A man calls a golf course to add one more player to a foursome scheduled for 8:12 a.m., asking if he can just add a 5th to the group, or does he need to break them up into two groups.
Back in the 1970s, a new concept called “flattening the organization” was introduced, which eliminates much organizational hierarchy and helps people at all levels collaborate and contribute on projects. It came about as a result of excessive levels of management that often got in the way of employee contribution and innovation.
Much of employee engagement depends upon leadership engagement; it’s a two-way street. In fact, it may be even more of a one-way street from leaders to team members than the other way around.
