Why you should say NO to your clients
My colleague Bastian (with whom I co-founded BeBanjo) often tells me that he learnt from me how to say No. Not sure I’m that good at it, to be honest, but I did learn from the best!
Many years ago him and I asked Javier Cañada (designer and teacher extraordinaire, now founder of Tramontana) to help us design our product “Sequence” at BeBanjo. He was the first Designer we ever hired (and the first one I personally ever had to manage) and his capacity to unequivocally say “No” blew me away.
It stung a bit at first every time he told me “No”. I suppose that, in my inexperience, I was expecting some level of abidance whenever I said “we should change this” or “this should work differently” (after all, I was paying!), but Javier had no problem saying things like “No, that makes no sense” if my suggestion was crap. He would even laugh out loud at my (very likely) stupid design/ux related suggestion and come back with a comically distorted version of it… the bastard!
He didn’t say no to everything, though: he accepted good suggestions and listened carefully to the business problems we were trying to solve.
But I realised something: every time he said “NO” and defended his position, he was cementing his place as the Design expert in the room and he was gaining my trust. It made me feel that I was in good hands, that I should follow his advice and that I could trust him because he had no reason to lie: he would just tell me things as they were.
Saying NO to your clients is an empowering tool. And anyone can do it; we are just not used to it after years of “the customer is always right” nonsense.
Experts can say NO. In fact, they are expected to say NO. Intelligent people often surround themselves with straight-shooters, with those that won’t be afraid to confront them or point out when they are wrong; as opposed to egotistical maniacs, who surround themselves with malleable people and sycophants who will agree with everything they say (and you can look at my LinkedIn and try to figure out who I’m talking about)
So if you consider yourself an Expert in any field and you want to work with intelligent people, don’t be a YES man, because saying YES to everything will only erode their perception of you as an Expert.
Beginners can also say NO… but it might require some bargaining. If you are a beginner, you may not yet have the track record or credentials to say NO, but that shouldn’t stop you! Argue your compelling reasons and, if need be, you can resort to things like “Please, trust me on this. Let me give it a try my way first, we can always go back to your way if it doesn’t work”
If your client or boss is worth their salt, they will know that letting you get away with what you want will motivate you incredibly to getting it right and that you will happily own the outcome (or fallout) of your decision.
Ok, But Why Say No?
After all, nobody likes naysayers…
Saying NO to your clients (and when I say clients, I mean anyone you work for — an actual client, a boss, a user, etc…) will get you three things you really want:
1.Trust and credibility
Your clients come to you for help. They have a problem or an idea for a project and they come to you. Helping them is not about saying yes to whatever they ask; helping them is about applying your skills and experience to steer them in the right direction, and your skills and experience will often tell you: “My client is wrong”.
If you only say YES, you are not helping them; but if you say NO and you show them a better way, you will earn their trust.
2. Happiness
Or at least, self-preservation.
If you say YES to things you should say NO to, you will be disappointed. And the more you fail to stand your ground by saying YES when you should say NO, the more disappointed you will be. You will lose motivation. You will loathe that project and day-dream of better projects and clients.
You can’t expect dream projects to fall on your lap, but you can try to make every project you work on a DREAM PROJECT. Learning to say NO will help with that.
3. Freedom to choose
Once you learn to say NO and realise how valuable it is, you will not be afraid of losing customers or prospects through saying NO. In fact, you will feel the opposite.
How to say NO
One thing is knowing you should say NO, another thing is to do it; and another entirely different thing is to do it in such a way that you actually reap the benefits.
Here are some tips:
- Say NO early
Early on the project, choose something important you disagree on and push back firmly on it. It will set the tone of your relationship and you will learn how your client breathes. - Offer a better alternative
You cannot say NO unless you have compelling reasons to do so; explain them calmly, try not to get excited… be cool. - Excel at delivering your alternative
Once you’ve fought back on something, you must absolutely rock at delivering the alternative. It will help build TRUST (“he was right!”) and it will make it easier to say NO again when you have to. - Don’t say NO as a general rule
Clients and bosses have little hearts too, you know… If you always say NO, they will be the ones that lose motivation and eventually, they won’t want to work with you. So if one of the times you are not sure about who is right (your client or you), go with the client’s option and earn some good will. - Be nice
NO can be a hard word, don’t be a jerk when you say it. There are many ways to say NO that are still firm and don’t burn bridges: “I don’t agree with that”, “That’s not the case”, “I’m thinking there is a better way…” - When you say YES, be enthusiastic
Whenever customers are right, don’t hold back on saying… “YOU ARE SO RIGHT!” This will put you and your customer at the same level. You will be a team working towards a common goal. And you will go on to rule the world together.
Some people don’t like to be told NO: they prefer being RIGHT rather than being EFFECTIVE, and you don’t want to work for them. Choose another client more worthy of your skills and time: they are out there.
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