BRX Pro Tip: Managing Expectations
Stone Payton: [00:00:00] Welcome back to Business RadioX Pro Tips. Lee Kantor and Stone Payton here with you. Lee, today’s topic, managing expectations.
Lee Kantor: [00:00:09] Yeah. I think this is super important. It’s an important way to turn a potentially negative situation into a positive if you manage the expectations better. This came up for me recently at a restaurant. I was told by the restaurant, I ordered some food, they said it would be ready in ten minutes. So, I get there in ten minutes and then I had to wait an additional ten minutes to get my food, so it took 20 minutes.
Lee Kantor: [00:00:34] So, as I’m sitting there for ten minutes waiting beyond the ten minutes that they had promised, all I’m doing is getting mad. I’m like, “I can’t believe they told me it would be ready in ten minutes, and now it’s been 15 minutes, and now it’s been 20 minutes.” All they had to do is tell me it would be ready in 20 minutes. If they would just said it’s going to be ready in 20 minutes and I would have showed up and they would have handed me the food, I’ve been like, “Oh, that’s great. I’ve been happy.”
Lee Kantor: [00:00:57] So, by them trying to overpromise something they couldn’t deliver, all it did was create frustration and a negative experience. So, it’s really important to understand what your limitations are and don’t overpromise if you can’t overdeliver. I would much rather have been told a longer period of time and then have gotten the food five minutes earlier, than promised a shorter period of time and gotten the food ten minutes later. That wasn’t good for anybody.
Lee Kantor: [00:01:30] So, the lesson is to give yourself the opportunity to surprise and delight your client. It’s great to under promise and overdeliver, but it’s better to overpromise and overdeliver. So, aim for that but remembering that that delivering part of this is what makes that come true. So, don’t promise something you can’t deliver on.
