Have you ever heard the phrase “we judge ourselves by our intentions, and others by their behaviours”?
It’s a quote from the book The SPEED of Trust: The One Thing that Changes Everything by Stephen M.R. Covey.
When I first heard it, I found it fascinating and have thought about it often.
It’s so true, and it affects the way we interact with everyone we come into contact with… our children, partners, friends, colleagues, and those we do business with.
Let me give you an example.
My son comes home from school and leaves a trail of belongings between the front door and the bathroom. I judge him by his behaviour, I get cross that he hasn’t put things away and I’m always having to pick up after him.
He judges himself by his intentions. He’s been at school all day, is desperate for the loo (you’d think there are no toilets in the school building!) and so he puts everything down in his rush up the stairs. He didn’t mean to leave everything in the way on purpose, and he may come back down and tidy up after himself if I give him half a chance.
Keeping this in mind can be so helpful when reflecting on the way we run a business, as well as parenting our teenagers!
We know ourselves, our back story, our why. We know the circumstances that lead us to be who we are today. We know how we feel and the way we want to do things. We have a plan. We have intentions. And we judge ourselves by those intentions. When things maybe don’t go as planned, we give ourselves the benefit of the doubt because we know we what we wanted to happen.
Our customers on the other hand, don’t know our back story. They don’t know our why. They don’t know our plan, or the way we intend to show up each day. They can only see and know what we do. They can only judge us on our actions because they have nothing else to go on.
Some kind souls my give us the benefit of the doubt, and we love them for it. But hoping to get by on the kindness of your customer’s heart is not a good business model.
So how do we get around this mismatch?
Step 1 is to recognise it happening, both as a concept and in the moment.
Step 2. We have to put ourselves in our customers shoes. We have to meet ourselves afresh. Experience our customer journey as if we don’t know what’s meant to happen.
Step 3. Seek out honest feedback. It’ll feel uncomfortable but future you will thank you for it.
⭐ Ask a friend or family member to look at your online presence (website, google, social media), and to go through the booking process. Did they spot anything that felt confusing or difficult? Was it obvious who you are and what you do?
⭐ Have someone observe you interacting with customers. In the case of children’s development classes, get them to watch you run a class. How did it make them feel? Was anything unclear?
⭐ Ask for feedback from your customers. Be careful not to make promises you can’t keep, and know that you can’t please everyone. But hearing the voice of your customers is incredibly beneficial.
Step 4 is to create a regular practice of self-reflection, keeping in mind that you need to reflect on your behaviours, not your intentions. One way to help with this is to record yourself in action. Video yourself leading an activity or two. Then watch it back without sound, is your face and body doing enough without your voice? Then listen back without the visuals, is your voice pulling its weight too?
For my lucky franchisees steps 3 and 4 are already taken care off. At least twice a year I observe them in class. They are asked to spend time afterwards reflecting on their performance. Then we get together and compare notes.
This time I’ve added in the video and have recorded at least one activity, so they can see and hear themselves as their customers do. So far, they’ve said it was super helpful (once they’d got over the cringe-factor), and something they plan to do again for themselves.
And of course, step 5 is to take action! There’s no point going through the rest of the steps if you don’t actually make the necessary changes. Keep judging yourself as your customers do – by your actions.
