Happy Sunday Everyone:
A few weeks back I was driving home from work and Jack (my 17 year old) called me. I picked up the call and it went something like this:
Me: “hey Buddy”
Jack: “hey Dad”
Me: “what’s up”
Jack: “Dad, I need you to coach me”
Me: “what do you mean you need me to coach you?”
Jack: “Well people pay you a bunch of money to help them with their confidence and I need more confidence”
Me: “what are you talking about?”
Jack: “well I just got a math test back and I did terrible on it and my confidence sucks, so I need you to coach me on how to be more confident so I can do better on my tests”
Me: “hmmm, okay, well lets discuss when I get home”.
Jack: “okay dad, thanks, love you”
Me: “love you too”
I hang up the phone and spend the next 15 minutes thinking about our conversation. I’m thinking “wow, well that’s pretty cool my kid calls me because he wants me to coach him”. Then I start thinking, this kid s a freaking genius! He knows what’s coming and he stops it head on. Here is what’s coming…our boys “might” suggest that our dinner conversations can occasionally go sour when I ask how school is going, then I ask about a grade or an assignment, and I get news that is less than optimal. Jack, in his infinite wisdom thought “crap, i know he’s going to ask about it so i’m going to be proactive and cut him off at the pass”, then the request for coaching, sure genius…build the old man up before dropping the bomb.
Okay-so that’s the funny version after a few weeks of letting it simmer but as it was happening, it was a smart move on Jack’s part and the whole point of this Sunday Thoughts, which is that proactive communication is better than reactive communication but negative proactive communication is always better than negative reactionary communication. The most recent example right now professionally is what’s happening with interest rates and the 1000’s of pre-approvals that are out there for people on this thread. If you’re not communicating to your clients, and they get to find out rates are .75% higher than when you pre-approved 45 days ago, you suck. Play this out, you’re a client, you finally get into contract after battling this market, you reach out to your lender, and they drop that bomb on you that rates are way up, not exactly creating a great client experience. Then take one from Jack’s playbook, you proactively reach out before they go into contract, let them know rates are up but it has no materially impact on their Pre-approval but you didn’t want to blind side them with the news when they go into contract, which one sits better? Or more importantly, it does have an impact on their ability to purchase. I’ll officially retire this example on Sunday Thoughts but it goes back to the financial advisor, if you call your advisor and ask if you should sell a stock or some other asset, and the answer is “yes we should” the only thing I’m thinking about is why did I have to call you vs. you call me?
We make things harder than they need to be by not delivering the news we need to deliver proactively, I’ve been guilty of it myself. Every single time I choose not to be proactive on negative information it comes back to bites me in butt, every single time.
As it relates to the Jack story. I played dumb a bit at first. I couldn’t help but to make a point with his request in coaching and made it clear, people don’t pay me to help them with confidence, they pay the organization to keep them accountable to be consistent with the activities that drive success. I told him if he chose to study consistently, he would understand the subject matter more, which would then help him with his confidence and if wanted me to hold him more accountable to study more, I’d be happy to be his coach….JEDI MIND TRICK FROM DAD:)
Bottom line-be proactive with the news you don’t want to deliver, it goes over 100X better than having to find out by asking.