You Listen But Do You Hear?

I just sat in a meeting that I KNEW before I went in was going to go well. Now how did I know that? Well this vendor, Tom Heller, has consistently LISTENED to what we have said, has tried to capture the FEELING of what we want and then has trusted himself to design something that captures the FEELING.

Notice, I did not say he asked us HOW we want to accomplish it and he did not ask us WHAT we want to see in the design. No instead he asks us what is the feeling we want to create and in return we give him the room to design as he chooses. Thus, we don’t infringe on his creative or work time nor do we try to micromanage him.

Matter-of-fact we believe so strong in his ability to LISTEN and HEAR what we need that we declined a meeting with him to show him concepts we had seen in the market. We were afraid that they would bias him away from his own creativity which we strongly believe in.

Ask yourself if you truly hear your clients? Do you listen beyond what they say to capture or hear the essence of the feeling or mood they are trying to convey? There is always more in the music beyond the lyrics and your ability to hear the fine sounds of all the instruments as they combine is what gets you the freedom you want and the paycheck you deserve!


Anne Warfield, www.impressionmanagement.com