You HAVE to buy my product!!!

Last week, I ran into a friend of mine at the airport.  He was just returning from one of our manufacturing sites and he looked angry and tired.  He told me that his contacts at the site wasn't listening to him.  He felt that they would get better results and would be rewarded for it if they followed his recommendations.

He's probably right.  He's a fine engineer, and his theories have been proven correct many times.  I understand his frustration.  I see this frustration every week when central resources have ideas that they KNOW are right, that they KNOW will make the sites run better, but they don't get cooperation.  I've felt this frustration myself many times for many years.

But central staff people like me are setting ourselves up for frustration if we forget that we are SUPPORT staff, and that we are always SELLING what we have to offer.  Our functional leadership may tell us that we don't need to sell anything.  They tell us that, in many cases, the decision has been made from the Top and that all we have to do is tell the plants to get moving.  But this is rarely the case.  Unless our project involves a safety, legal, quality issue or a new product we need to get to market, the plants can almost always tell us no. 

All too often, we take this personally.  We need to recognize, instead, that we are always selling.  If you want to make a sale, you never tell your customer that they HAVE to buy.  Instead, you focus on what the customer needs and you are thrilled if they just TRY your product.  You work to ensure that their trial is a success so that they come back for more.  Whenever possible, improve your product using their ideas.  This is the attitude that we central resources need to take because it breeds humility, patience, a focus on relationships and service, taking the time to communicate potential benefits and actual results, and respect for the autonomy of the customer.   This is the attitude that I'm taking lately and I seem to be making inroads in more places and with tougher "customers" than I have in the past.