Good client relationships need a bit of friction
I love the initial workshop that we run with clients. Full of first date energy, it’s a chance to get to know the heart of the client’s problem - and just as importantly, to get to know the client too.
There’s a lot to discover about a client, such as their ways of working, their company norms, the wider stakeholder network, and expectations for the project. I want to learn their preferences, so that I can use my skills in a way that works best for them. The back and forth of learning about them and me explaining about us really is a lot like getting to know someone on a date.
NYU Social Psychology professor Tessa West actually likens dating to job interviews. I can't help but feel that her words apply to our client workshops or meetings as well. She says it "...shouldn’t be frictionless… You want to learn things like a person’s beliefs.... asking can be awkward, but when it becomes a two-way street, the awkwardness will subside, and intimacy will take its place.”
Don’t get me wrong, I don’t need to know levels of personal detail in a work situation!
But I'm not afraid of the friction, and I do often push back with challenging questions and dig further into any assumptions made about the problem.
Is this truly relevant for your audience?
Do they really need to know this?
The answer well might be “Yes” and “Yes”, but the questions are worth asking.
Digging into the weeds
Take this example from a colleague of mine who avoided a huge issue because she wasn’t too nervous to question the source material she was given.
While working on a project about anti-bribery and corruption, my colleague was designing an intervention that explains how to use a Gift Register; something that employees could use to register gifts they were given by clients. However, when noticing that this content didn’t really fit with the rest of the material she was given, as well as what she had discovered in the design workshop, she raised it with the client and did a bit more digging.
She found out that the company had a good uptake of people already using the Gift Register, but that they needed more detail on the nuance of what a gift is and when to question its purpose.
There was an existing assumption that how to report a gift was the main need which was clearly wrong in this case.
Instead, employees needed support in understanding when to use the Gift Register and the types of conflict that can arise when deciding what to do next.
When given the original source material, she could easily have accepted it and worked it straight into the intervention. But after developing such a good relationship with the client, she felt comfortable enough to raise questions and concerns.
Building relationships with end-users
The end-user is at the heart of everything we design - which is why we love to bring them into the design process as early as possible. A relationship with end-users brings valuable information and can test the client project team’s core assumptions, ultimately de-risking the eventual solution.
On another recent client project, the client provided us with some user research they had already undertaken - but we noticed something peculiar in their results. The research team had only spoken to people from upper management. We saw this as an opportunity.
After agreeing with the client to interview end-users ourselves, we discovered that upper management had not really understood the full extent of the business issue. There were more challenges that our solution design needed to answer, in order for the client’s need to be fixed. Having learned this, we were able to pivot our solution early on, and build our intervention with confidence.
There’s nothing wrong with relying on the words of upper management, but it assumes that their knowledge is total - which adds risk. To make the best solution possible, we prefer to also use our tried and tested interviewing methods.
The Trust Triangle
As a basis for working with others, I like to build trust by using The Trust Triangle. To put it simply, it explains that trust is built through three drivers:
· Authenticity – I experience the real you
· Logic – I know you can do it; your reasoning and judgement are sound
· Empathy – I believe you care about me and my success
By challenging ideas, I like to believe that I’m building trust by showing my true self, showing the logic behind my ideas, and expressing my investment in the client's success.
At BAD, we like to be a true strategic partner by always keeping the client’s interests at heart. Our work is focused using behavioural science insights alongside great design to help organisations to grow the potential of their employees.
