Hey everybody, Charlie Hauck, Fast Tip Friday time. Hey, look, this is a topic that I think a lot of people in the consulting business don't want to talk about, because it sounds like we're disparaging human being. And I want to make sure that's not what we're trying to do.
We're trying to talk about the opportunity, not the person. We want to talk about the actions, not the person. And it's really important that before I kind of dive into this conversation for this Fast Tip Friday segment, that we understand this is not about the person, it's about what they do and how they do it. And I'm going to step into this with a statement that seems to come in waves in our business, people asking us about how to get a deal done, how to make somebody want to do business with them, and they start sharing all these horror stories about being mistreated, or people saying yes and then doing no. And frankly, the real problem is that too many of us in business development don't have enough of an abundance mentality that we're often willing to minimize the requirements of what it takes for people to do business for us.
And so I'd like you all to remember this statement, and if you're really good, you'll write it down and put it on your dashboard or put it on your mirror or put it on your computer screen, but I want you to write it down, memorize it and look at it as often as possible. And frankly, it's this simple: a lousy prospect rarely, if ever, turns into a good client. The person that makes your life miserable as a prospect is probably going to make you more miserable once they think they've paid you for something. And I have to admit, in my career, from the roofing and contracting business to even some of my mistakes that I've made in my own consulting practice, when we get bad prospects, but our ego tells us that we can fix these guys, or we can show them why we're worth it, the win rate on those is way lower than I like to admit to people.
So, I'm not coaching you from a position of perfection, I'm coaching you from a position of personal experience. And I've just been talking to a lot of clients that trying to get the years started right, trying to build a good pipeline, and too many times, they're telling us these stories of people that agree to say yes and never show up, that cancel appointments that don't have checks when they're supposed to have checks that tell them they're going to give them orders for $15,000 and the orders for $2000 but they want the same bulk pricing. And I got to tell you, it's only happening when we let it happen.
These aren't bad people. They're people that think that's the way sales people are supposed to accept the behavior. And I want to recommend to all of you, that if you don't have the power to walk away, you're probably going to be eating a lot of poop sandwiches, if you get my drift. You've got to be willing to say I'm better than that, I don't have to work like that, and I don't have to accept these terms and this behavior. It may be a nice person who thinks lowly of business development people, the professional that you are, that becomes your biggest problem, and where it really happens is inside our head, in our hearts, where our ego says but I can do it. I can control this person. I can get what I want out of it and make them do what I want. I'm sorry, I've lived this lesson too many times, whether it was me personally or in coaching my clients, and I'll repeat it and let you go.
A lousy prospect never turns into a good customer or client. Don't let your optimism get in the way of the realism that you're going to end up dealing with when you give in and think, but I'm better than the other people that have worked with this guy. There's always another opportunity out there, and some of the best decisions I've ever collected have been to not do business with someone, no matter how much they were telling me they wanted me to do business with them. Let it go, get on to the next one, and if you don't have rules, you can't be ticked off when they don't follow them.
See you later, have a strong and powerful mindset weekend and be ready Monday to protect your value and not give in to the people that want a one sided agreement and they don't really care about your mutual success. It's up to you. Don't let it be up to them. Take care.