What’s the matter with ME?
We all remember that scene from When Harry met Sally, right?
No, not THAT scene in the diner, of course we remember THAT one!
I mean the one where Sally learns that her ex-boyfriend, Joe, is getting married, and she calls Harry in the middle of the night for a shoulder to cry on.
What was she so upset about exactly? Cant quite remember? I’ll remind you.
All this time, she had thought that she & Joe had broken up because Joe didn’t want to get married and start a family, when really it wasn’t that he didn’t want to get married, he just didn’t want to marry her.
And what stings for Sally is this haunting question:
The news of his engagement caused her to reflect on what it was about her that caused him to decide that he didn’t want to spend the rest of his life with her. It made her feel rejected, flawed & lonely and filled her with self doubt.
I’m sure most of us can relate to Sally in this scene. But I want to approach this not from a ‘love life’ level, but from a ‘business life’ level.
Have you ever worked with a client & thought everything went really well, only to find that they decide to find someone new? It’s not a nice feeling, right? So I wanted to address this today because I feel like there are a few really important things to acknowledge & point out here:
Acknowledge that when you find out that your client has started working with someone else, it stings. There is nothing wrong with having emotions! We are human beings, not robots & it is totally unrealistic to expect to keep emotion out of your business.
Understand that part of what is hard for you is that your client chose someone else over you and YOU DON’T KNOW WHY! So now your brain is busy doing a Sally and making up all the reasons why (“I’m difficult”, “I’m too structured, I’m completely closed off”, “I drove him away”)
You have every right to ask “WHY”! But this is the part where you do have to leave emotions out of the equation. You can either message the client directly and ask the question flat out in a professional manner, or you can compose a general survey, using a service like Typeform and ask them to fill it out. Either way, the aim of asking the question is so that a. you can have peace of mind in knowing the answer b. if it really was because of something you did that they didn’t like (as opposed to them just looking for a cheaper option), you can use that information to your advantage & work on improving for next time.
If you take yourself through this process, you can use the situation as an opportunity to learn and help your business keep growing!
PS: I’ll be your Harry if you ever need a shoulder to cry on! I’ve been there!