Posted by Sundi Hayes in Have you met a person in casual passing who said something which stuck with you the rest of the day? Or even longer? It is still early in the day but something said at a breakfast networking event I attended has been going through my mind every time I change tasks.
Dale works for a training firm in the Kansas City area and he was telling us about his company and the services they provide.
“Many people are cutting their training budget in today’s economy. Training and development is the easiest area to trim back and I can tell you why. Most people can’t tie their T&D budget to their bottom line…they don’t see the return on investment. Many people simply provide training and hope it does some good. At my company we take out the hope!”
What? Who, in their right business mind, would say they take out hope? What a daring thing to say! It caught your attention though, didn’t it?
Having been a virtual assistant to coaches and trainers for a while now I found myself relating with his obvious statement of the fact “Many people simply provide training and hope it does some good.” Isn’t that true? I’m sure many of you have at least a handful of examples of how this thinking has affected your business.
Do you counter client statements like that with ways YOU can remove hope? Do you connect your service to your clients’ bottom line? Maybe you’ve never thought about it in that context before! Now is the time to start.
If you haven’t figured out how to connect your services to ROI with the top 10 or 20% of your client base then find the time to do it. If you don’t you might discover the budget line item you represent has been significantly decreased or written out all together.
“Finding the time is the trick!” you say? If you cut even a portion of your administrative tasks and used that time toward connecting with your top clients’ ROI the results would show not only on your clients’ bottom line but yours as well! The real question isn’t can you afford the time to do this? It is can you afford not to?
Nibbling away -
Sundi