Tame That Ego

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When you’re working with someone else, there will come a time when you’ll wonder why the heck you ever decided to work for yourself in the first place.

I’ve heard it from fellow entrepreneurs who’s ego got beaten by constant criticisms and demands placed on them by unsatisfied customers.

I’ve went through it myself.

Time. And time again. The thing is…

You can’t buy perfect. You can’t bottle it up and serve it on a fancy shiny silver platter.

It just doesn’t exist.

But sometimes you’re placed in a situation where a client believes that in exchange for his hard earned cash, you will deliver it to him.

And when he doesn’t get it?

Imagine a 2 year old when you take his toy away from him.

Okay maybe it’s not that bad.

But there are often lots of emotions involved. They might feel hurt, disappointed, and understandably angry especially when they invested money in your services.

On your end, you don’t get it. You spend all your time working on your baby-your project that took you through evenings and weekends. You gave it your all. And now that it’s done, your proud of it. You expect the client will be kissing you with compliments. But instead of gratitude, you get heart-wrenching feedback.

What do you do?

Well you can throw a fit yourself. Or you can begin to pick up the pieces of your ego and learn to receive the lesson from the situation.

Here’s what I learned:

Most of the time situations like this stem from a) miscommunication b) wrong fit. Let’s take A first.

Miscommunication – Maybe you didn’t spend enough time in the beginning of the relationship to discuss expectations. Maybe you assumed your client would anticipate the level of work involved in the process. Maybe they didn’t communicate what their expectations were. Whatever it is, oftentimes there is a disconnect between what you expect and what your client expects.

The best remedy for the situation? Confront the issue. Apologize for misunderstandings. Clear up anything that isn’t clear. Tame that ego. Hold yourself back from blaming yourself or others. This is your business. Be professional about it.

Bad Fit – This could also stem from a lack of time spent interviewing your client. Maybe you didn’t give yourself enough time to decide whether this is a good fit or not. In retrospect, you may have seen the signs, but maybe you ignored them because you really needed the money or the experience. Maybe now you see that this client was a perfectionist all along and that nothing you could have done could have appeased them.

The Remedy? Take note. Remember exactly how you’re feeling now so that you never ever neglect the initial getting-to-know one another phase. If you realized this isn’t the best fit, be honest with your client about how you’re feeling. Agree to work on whatever job or project you promised to work on and then decide to part ways. Offer him a few resources to help, explain that you don’t think this is the best fit and then send him on his way.

Now it’s your turn.

What do you do to remedy a situation like this?