EP9: Communicating With Your Clients

Let's do it. A lot of the stuff that we do in our own business comes from a book written by Chris Voss called Never Split the Difference. If you haven't read that, I highly recommend picking that up. But he talks about in there calibrated questions. And that's the first thing that we want to talk about is calibrated questions. Eric, why don't you give us kind of an overview of what that is?

But why? I mean, why do we need to do that?

Yeah. So I was kind of setting you up whenever I asked you why. How did you feel whenever I asked you that question? When I said, why is this important? How did that make you feel?

Why is a threatening statement. It makes people be on the defensive. Why? Why are you wanting to get this done now?

So that's why the calibrated questions is they're purpose-built questions. I like to say purpose-built, meaning we're not just saying things that come out of our mouth. They're questions that we've actually pre-planned. whenever we're talking to customers on how to get information that we want. It's kind of a, if I could simplify this, it's kind of a, what's the word I'm looking for? What's that called, Eric, whenever they have like hidden messages inside of a message?

yeah. What's that called?

My mind escapes me, but it's like a hidden way of getting information. I don't want to say manipulative because we're not trying to manipulate people, but it is a way, it's a tactical way of getting information purposefully. I think, you know, prior to reading that book and understanding this concept, I, you know, it was just like, I didn't even know how to talk to people. I thought I knew how to talk to people, but I really didn't know until I read that book and started implementing the stuff that he talks about.

So if we're using how and what, maybe a better way of saying instead of saying when are you wanting to get it done, it would be something like how soon are you wanting to get this done?

To form it in a how question. So a lot of it is the same question. It's just the power of how and what and how is a great beginning to a question. And here's what's crazy about this. And I know you know this, Eric, but you can use this on your wife, your spouse, your husband, your kids, anybody. This isn't like just communicating with customers. This is communicating 101 with anybody.

Yeah, it's all open-ended questions. It's not... Are you wanting to get this done pretty soon?

Okay. If I could do it next week, is that soon enough?

Well, I think I'm sure everyone listens, knows somebody and everyone and maybe even some that are listening that are, but like they don't even want to talk to customers. If they could somehow figure it out to where they could do the work without actually talking to customers, that's what they would prefer to do.

Yeah, I agree with that. But it's also like, do you want to have a successful business or not? Like, that's what it boils down to. Or do you just want to be like, no, I don't want to talk to people. That's my way or the highway. I'm busy. If you don't, you know, if you can't wait six months too bad, that's just your problem.

Why are you dogging on D's D personalities right now?

I want to translate this into marriage counseling real quick. Not too long. I don't want to stay here too long, but I just want to show how this can apply to your marriage and how you can use how and what questions. You know, if your spouse, let's just say that because I'm a man, obviously I'm married to a woman. So if my wife came up to me and said, why do you leave your underwear on the floor every night? She just attacked you. What am I going to do?

I'm going to get defensive and get pissed off.

I'll say, shut up, woman. No, I wouldn't. I would never do that. She'd probably punch me right in my, you know what? Instead, what she could do is if she was trying to find out information and bring awareness to it without putting me on the defensive, she could have said like, how can I help you, you know, make sure you put your underwear. Away every night.

First of all, I put my underwear away every night. I put them in the, I put my clothes away. I'm just using that as an example.

Yep. My dirty underwear, I fold them and put them away. No, but I'm just using that as an example because that's a, dude, like every person has arguments. Every couple has arguments about putting clothes on the floor. Like, that's the most common argument.

Probably.

So how and what, right? How can I help you? How can I remind you to put your clothes away? Right. That's a question of her trying to help me solve a problem. It's not why do you do it? Why do you leave your clothes out? Or it could be what? Like, what's the reason? behind you doing this every day because she's trying to understand, like trying to understand my perspective. And it could be, you know, well, I just forget. I throw it down there. I'm going to, when I get out of the shower, I'm going to pick it up and I forget and go to bed. But it's a way of asking a question that could be confrontational without being confrontational. You're speechless again. Yeah. All right. Back to contracting.

Why does it matter to you when I want to get it done? I just want to get it done. Yeah. And it's not always the case, but it's just you should avoid using why. Why is an accusatory question.

Before you do that, oh, you went there. Dang it, I was trying to cut you off. No, I want to show also how this applies to the job site because you're on a job site, you sold the job, you're working for the customer and you come across a problem. And you go to the customer and say, you know, customer, here's the issue. We ran into this. And so you may offer up a couple different solutions, right? We can do this or we can do that or we can do this. And if you're trying to work through this, one of the questions you can ask a what question it could be, what is the most important thing to you? You know, what is most important about is it most important that it looks good or that or is it more important that it's. you know, more functional, like what's most important to you. So you can use these calibrated questions throughout the whole process of talking to your customer.

Yeah, that's another way. Yeah.

Yeah. Can I tell you what I think?

No, that's, you know, I've been thinking about what I want to say the whole time you've been talking. I don't even know what you said, Eric. I just was waiting for you to shut up. So it's my turn to talk. Yeah, that's what people do.

Yeah. I mean, that's what we do. We, you know, you're, they go off on a tangent. I mean, I do this with you all the time because you'll start talking. I'm like, crap, that's going to be a 20 minute tangent. I'll just start taking a crap or. doing something else because I know you're going to be talking for a long time.

No, that's, uh, but that's what we do is like, we're again, especially if we're in a, in a, um, high stress situation. Yeah. Yeah. You know, where you have a problem on the job and it's going to cost. the customer thousands of dollars and it could be your fault. It could have been their fault, whatever, you know, it's a high stress situation, right? So as a contractor, we need to be able to listen and understand what's the phrases seek first to understand and then be understood. Right. So you should always listen first and you have to be actively listening to what they're saying. So I'm not, I shouldn't be thinking about my response to what you say. I should be listening to what you're saying, internalizing that, thinking about it, and then replying. Right. And sometimes you're going to have a pause. Like if you get done talking, I may just be like staring off into space for 30 seconds because I'm just thinking about it. And then, and then I'm going to reply.

Well, then this is funny you said that because that's exactly what happens with my guys. You know, I come in and my communication style is I give them an overview of everything that we're going to do. Right. Just a general overview. And then we come back to the first thing and then go into detail. So if I'm talking to my guys, I may say, OK, here's what we're doing today. You know, first thing we're going to do is demo and then we're going to we're going to set up, you know. protection, dust protection, and then we're going to do demo, and then we're going to do framing, and then we're going to do dry, blah, blah, blah, blah. Well, they're still thinking about, okay, how are we going to put up dust protection? We got to put up holes here, and we got to tape this, and we got to get plastic, put a door here. Like they're going in their head about just the first step, and they don't hear anything that I say past the first step. And that's what we do as people whenever we're communicating. So when you're talking to your customer, they're going to hear the first thing you say, And then they're going to hear the last thing you say, and they're pretty much going to remember the last thing that you said. True.

Yeah, yeah, for sure. And if, you know, if a customer is upset and they say something that, you know, maybe they're accusing you of doing something, then you're going to get fired up and you're not going to listen to anything else they say. So we hadn't really talked about this, but all of these two things are super important is that you can't really do this like over text or email. Like if you're trying to communicate important things or sensitive things. You should never do that over text, written text or email. It should always be over the phone. I mean, that's because everything is taken out of context.

Well, and people will read your text in the mood that they're in.

Whenever a customer sends me a text and says, I love it so much. I'm like, why are you so freaking mad at me? But they're going to read the text in the mood they're in. So if their spouse just made them mad and then they get an email from you and it's like, hey. we need to talk about money. They're going to read it like, hey, we need to talk about money. Why haven't you paid me yet?

Shut your mouth, Eric.

No, that was the next thing, shutting your mouth. Yeah, be quiet. Be quiet. This is a tactic that we use a lot in sales, but it also works in every... Here's what's crazy about this. And I used to do the exact same thing. So I'm just as guilty. But a lot of us think of silence. as bad right like we have to fill the silence we have to fill the void and so if we're silent it's awkward and we just you know so somebody's got to say something they got to fill the void like i've seen you know speeches where the guy walks out on the stage and they introduce him and he comes out and he just stands there and he kind of you know he just kind of looks off and he's looking weird and then you know 30 seconds later you start hearing some seats people moving in their seats and You know, and then about another 30 seconds and people are kind of grumbling around and saying things. And after like a full minute, minute and a half, two minutes of not saying anything, audience will start saying stuff like, you can do it. Come on, you can, you know, like, yeah, they just can't stand and not having saying. And then the guy's like, OK, I just did that as an experiment. Then you got all of you are uncomfortable. I wasn't uncomfortable. Yeah.

Exactly. And you may need to shut your mouth because you need to think about what was just said. And our natural reaction is to feel it. You know, if Eric says something that's challenging or may come across offensive to me or puts me on the defensive, then, you know, instead of saying, well, you're stupid, I don't believe, you know, I could just stop for a second and then internalize that, think about it, try to understand and then respond. Right. So silence can be a tactical or it is a tactical way of one. It could be a tactical way of selling, but it could also be a positive way of actively listening to the calibrated questions that you ask the calibrated question. You actively listen to what they say. Then you basically when they're done talking, now you keep your mouth shut while you internalize what they say and then you can give a response. Yeah. You know, if someone asked me a question. I think it was Simon Sinek said, I don't remember how he said it, but it was about thinking about it. If someone says something to him and he didn't know the answer, he would just say, that's a great question. I've never been asked that before. Can I take a moment to think about it? Right. Who's going to say, no, I need you to answer right now. You got 10 seconds to answer me. Nobody's going to say that.

So, I mean, what I'm saying is you can use that to your advantage.

Affirmations, affirming. Not the kind of affirmations you say in the mirror every morning.

say in the mirror? Eric,

You're tall. Yeah, you're tall. I hate you right now. You are tall. You are the tallest person I know.

Yeah, I mean, it's this drives me nuts because communication is so important. My philosophy is you can never over communicate. Sure, it might be annoying to some people, but over communicating will never hurt you. under communicating can hurt you severely. So I like to get, for example, you know, if I'm putting up crown molding or something, or if my guys are putting up or whatever, if we're working, I always like to have them repeat the number I give them. So if one of my guys is cutting trim and I yell out a number, you know,78 and 7 16ths, I always like to have them yell it back 78 and 7 16ths or repeat it back. That way I know it's right because maybe he heard. you know,78 and 9 16ths is what he thought he heard. And he just goes out there and cuts it. And then it's, you know, that in that case would be too long. But if it's the other way and it's too short, then you're screwed. So I'm always about repeating that. So that's what this is. It's affirming what they said. If the customer says, I'd really like to see the trim come all the way down to the bottom of the stairs, you know, and then turn down at the bottom. Okay. So bring it on down like this and then turn it down till it meets the floor. Yeah, that's exactly what I want. Boom. Now there's no confusion as to what we're doing.

Eric, I've been doing this for 37 years. I mean, I've done this in my sleep. I mean, I know what I'm doing. I don't need you to tell me what to do.

Yeah, I know how it's supposed to look. I'm not going to do it the way you want it.

And I will throw in a, I'll tell a quick little story because it's funny, but it kind of contradicts what we're saying here, but there's a reason why it does. And that's because I built a great rapport with my customer. And I'm kind of a, you know, I'm a straight shooter, no BS. You know, I'll give you the honest truth. And my customers appreciate that. Most people will appreciate that. They know that what I'm telling them is what I believe to be true. So I have one of my best customers I ever had. They end up moving away. But I was had done multiple projects. I mean, basement remodel, all kinds of stuff, thousands and thousands, tens of thousands of dollars worth of work. And she would call me about once a month. Okay, Brad, I got another list of stuff for you to do. So I was over there looking at her thing and it was, I forget what it was, about stairs. And her next door neighbor was over there, which I happened to know her from previous years. And I was talking to Lynn was her name. And she said, I want to do this, this and this. I said, no, Lynn, I'm not doing that. And then she's like, why? And I said, because it's not going to work. Like what I know what you're wanting to do. But what you're saying is not going to produce the outcome that you're wanting. So we're not going to do that. And then she told me later on after I left, her neighbor's like, you let your contractor talk to you like that?

Yeah. Yeah. I mean, that's what I mean. We had a great relationship. And so I would not tell my customer, but if it was somebody that was new, I would still say the same thing. the way I said it would be a lot, would be much more tactful, right? I would still say, you know, that's probably not a good idea, you know, because of X, Y, Z. But that's just a funny story I wanted to share. So as far as affirmations go, there's a reason why, you know, like the military, when you're on the radios, they always confirm what was said.

Yeah. Roger, I copy, you know, grid coordinates, whatever. Or when you get done, how copy over, Roger, I copy, blah, blah, blah. So it's because stuff gets lost in translation, right? Again, the customer comes and says, hey, I have these three things that need to be fixed. They tell you the first thing. You start daydreaming about the first thing, about how you got to fix the first thing. You don't hear the second two. So you're like, okay, great. And then they leave and then you fix the first thing, maybe the second thing, but you didn't hear the third thing. So you pack everything up. You're done. Hey. Hey, Eric, we're all done. You want to come check it out? They come in. Well, what about the third thing I mentioned? Huh? I didn't even hear you say that. Yeah, I wanted you to do that. Oh, okay. So now I got to get all my tools back out, you know, redo all this. Now I just effectively cost myself another hours worth of work because I wasn't listening.

Yeah. Yeah. I mean, that's why would you not want to? What is the downfall of doing that? Like of me saying. Oh, okay. So just to make sure I'm on the same page with you, you want X, Y, Z. Like, what could possibly be the downfall of doing that?

Well, I was going to say, you know, the conversely to that is what could happen if you don't confirm? I mean, a lot could happen, right? Like I said, if you're not confirming what they want. Oh, you said you wanted four eight-footers. I thought you said you wanted 48-footers.

Right. And it's a simple, it could be a simple missed text. It could be a simple slip of words. Your phone may have cut out at that exact moment. And, you know what I mean? Like there's a thousand things that could have caused that. But not confirming that to me is just silly. Like, why would you never want to do that? Why are you staring at me weird into the camera?

Eric's making faces at me. We can see each other on the camera and he's making faces at me while I'm doing the opening statement.

Nah, I'm professional. Geez. All right, let's tidy it up. Put a bow on it. Wrap it up. Put a bow on it. All right. Well.

I'm listening. All right.