Juegos Trabajo Trabajar | Ethics - Would You Sleep With Your Customer If They Offered You $1M Order?

juegos Would you sleep with your customer if they offered you a million dollars to do it? That was the question that was asked in the blockbuster movie “Indecent Proposal” with Robert Redford, Demi Moore, and Woody Harrelson.

Sure Demi Moore wasn’t a product manager, but the situation was similar to the one that we often find ourselves in when we are dealing with a manipulative client. What should you do - take the money and feel dirty in the morning or refuse it and watch your product sales hit rock bottom?

trabajo It’s Really Not About Sex…
In the world of product management, (hopefully) we don’t spend a lot of time talking about sexual favors in order to boost the sales of our products. However, there are a lot of customers who will do almost anything to get their way. Couple this with product managers who have the inability to say no to a customer and you’ve got a recipe for a disaster.

I think that we all know what an angry customer looks like, but what is a manipulative customer? A little psychology textbook research shows that this type of customer is attempting to both mange and control another person (you!) , or a situation, in order to make things turn out the way that they want them to.

Before you blame the customer for manipulating you into doing something that you’ll regret tomorrow, hold on a minute. All too often we product managers not only allow, but in some cases even invite our customers to manipulate us.

How do we do this? Simple: we make two mistakes.

First we have a deep need to seek constant approval of both ourselves and our product from our customers. Second, our greatest fear is that the customer will tell us that they don’t like either us or our product and we’ll end up losing our product manger jobs. We can’t bear the thought of that happening. Shape up product manger!

trabajar • Move the cookie jar: Humans have been vulnerable to temptation since Adam and Eve, and that aspect of human nature will not change. By enacting reasonable controls that deter fraud, and by maintaining clear standards, your employees will more likely resist the temptation to cheat. However, most people struggle between the need to succeed and a desire to do good. And this conflict cannot be resolved merely by being told to do the right thing. Our power of rationalization is so powerful that we can convince ourselves that, for instance, taking just one more cookie won’t hurt anyone. Organizations must address this dilemma at the behavior level as well as at the prescriptive regulatory level. Organizations can help break down rationalization by acknowledging the specific issues that tend to get people into trouble. For example, discuss the specific reasons why individuals end up cutting corners or fudging reports. Public discussion often can be enough to deter many managers from engaging in that behavior.

If you dread meeting with a customer because of the bad experiences that you’ve had with them in the past, then you will probably be putting off that meeting for as long as you can and caving into his demands when you finally do meet with him. However, this just shows that you are suffering from low assertiveness - show some spine!

To solve this problem, you need to tackle the next meeting with that customer head on. Get it set up as soon as possible - don’t delay! Then, before you meet with the customer, picture a successful meeting in your mind. What would you say? What would the customer say? Having a picture of success in you head will allow you to keep steering the conversation towards that idea. You’re not assured of being successful, but this will certainly boost your chances.

Final Thoughts
In the end, you are not going to be able to get your customers to change their manipulative ways. Instead, you are going to have to change how you deal with them.

In the product manager job description we are told that we need to be empathetic with them and listen to their issues; however, just because they have issues does not mean that you need to make changes to your product or your pricing just to suit them.

Every time you deal with a manipulative customer, you need to keep a record of what they tried to do and how you dealt with it. As you have more and more successes, this record will serve to remind you that your own judgement is more than good enough to deal with customers who just want to have it their own way You can be published without charge. You can to republish this article in your website or blog. Please provide links Active.