Althea Garner
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Karen, in all fairness to yourself, you cannot own up to a probelm that isn't yours. Telling your client that someone else dropped the ball would come across to them as a lame excuse, so you really are between a rock and a hard place.
The best that you can do is to check the references of your vendors prior to engaging them (but then hindsight is always 20/20 and you suggested this yourself). Which one of us really knows a vendors track record prior to doing business with them? Be fair to yourself, here.
Part of your problem with the vendor is the fact that you couldn't reach a technician for three days - this is inexcusable and there are many who would pull business from this vendor in a heartbeat. In this situation, I would have demanded that the vendor offer me some resitution ( a % off the service) which I would have passed onto the client.
The other part of your problem is your own conflict. You really care about your customers and want to offer a high standard of service, but you are at the mercy of your vendors.
Eric is better suited to helping you handle your inner conflict, but the light at the end of the tunnel that I can offer you is that when cluster networking becomes more widely used (see http://www.topspin.com), Internet lines will become more stable, because as one server goes down, the rest of the cluster will pick up, providing uniterrupted service to end users.
Take heart and be fair to yourself.
:)
A
> Karen Stafford wrote:
> I actually do own up to it and make restitutions, but it still makes me break into a cold sweat. No, I'm very honest when it comes to that. You had just asked what breaks us out into a sweat:-) I probably didn't phrase myself right.
>I value my business's reputation a lot, and have actually gotten customers from other businesses who were NOT honest, so I know that when something happens, that's the best policy.
>Actually,it has happened when it wasn't my fault,but I had to take the blame for it. I do hosting reselling, and when the "mother company" of the hosting service did a lousy job with the servers and THEIr customer service, I had to take the flack for it. I had many sleepless nights and stomach problems because of it, because at one point, the server would be down for three days, and I could never get thru to the technicians. It happened with two different companies, and I had to go thru all the hassle of moving. My mistake was not doing my research on the companies and getting referrals on them.
>So, I guess my original post wasn't very clear. Sorry about that.
>
>Karen Stafford
>Noteworthy CyberSolutions
>Moderator "You've Got the Customer/Now Keep 'Em!"
>
>> Althea Garner wrote:
>> Eric,
>>
>>One of my strengths (I would like to believe) is the ablility to take responsibility for my actions. I accept that I am totally responsible for what happens around me (barring the accident scenario) and therefore am at cause with my life.
>>
>>It is too easy to say "I couldn't do that because.... (and then blame someone or something else) and I am not insinuating that this is Karen's problem - you asked and I am relating my own experience. However, to be able to say, "I screwed up, but what I learned from this mistake, is....." is far more valuable.
>>
>>Bottom line is that none of us can learn without making mistakes, therefore mistakes can be regarded as a victory.
>>
>>:)
>>A
>>
>>
>>> Eric Sohn wrote:
>>> Has anyone else had Karen's experience? How did you deal with it?
>>>Karen -
>>>What kind of result would you like? For example, is it to prevent conflict, to "win" at conflicts more, to be more assertive... or ?
>>>Also, correct me if I'm wrong, but the owning up to mistakes is part of the conflict issue, isn't it? If you notice a mistake before being confronted, do you own up to it? If not, what do you do?
>>>Coach Eric
>>>
>>>> Karen Stafford wrote:
>>>> For me, it's handling conflict or owning up to a business mistake. Actually, I do own up to them, but I still have trouble doing it, and walking away thinking "What did I learn from this?" instead of "Oh, you stupid idiot, you're life's ruined":-)Part of that comes from working on organization. Sometimes, though, the conflict is through no fault of my own, and I had trouble being assertive enough to stand up for myself, so I'd like to improve on my documentation to back myself up. Private Reply to Althea Garner (new win) |
