Everyone knows that in order to be a successful professional, you need to provide value to your clients (yes, an old cliche, but still true). One of the best ways I can think of doing that is by moving beyond your usual way of thinking.
Here’s an example of what I mean, taken from a legal context. While completing my training, I worked at an HIV Legal Clinic where I wrote a last will & testament for a poor, single mother with end-stage AIDS. This young woman was primarily concerned with who would take care of her children after she died, and we spent a lot of time coming up with a detailed plan. But I also kept steering the conversation back to wanting to find out what particular belongings and how much money she wanted to designate to each of her kids. I realized too late that she didn’t have anything to pass on, let alone any savings to help them get vocational training or go to school. From a legal perspective I had covered all the bases, but from an interpersonal one I failed because I made her feel uncomfortable by inadvertently drawing attention to her impoverished state. My big mistake was approaching her life and her problems from my own experiences.
After that I worked very hard to really listen to my clients — what they told me, what they left out, and how they shared their information.
So what does this have to do with your career? Everything. Make sure you’re clear about what your clients want, don’t make assumptions and, more importantly, find out exactly what they need.
Their needs — if you drill down far enough — will sometimes determine how you help them achieve what they claim they want. In which case it may be up to you to point out, delicately and carefully, how they’d be better served through a different goal, approach, or strategy.
Sounds simple and even trite, but in my mind it’s the difference between just “doing your job” and being a successful and skilled professional in the truest sense.
