This week I lost a potential coaching client, and it was my fault. 

We were 29 minutes into my free 30-minute consultation, where I learned more about the person’s goals and struggles, and pitched my plan for how I could best help them.

She seemed totally into it. She loved what I had proposed, I had accurately pinpointed the cause of her struggles before she even told me, and she even asked if she could possibly book me for a longer term than I had proposed.

I have been booking a lot more clients lately and was getting really excited about this new part of my business. She asked me to send her an outline of my sessions and what to expect.

I felt like I had it in the bag.

Then, just as we were about to end the Zoom call, she said, “Um… I noticed you were recording this call. What do you plan on doing with it?”

I didn’t think much of the question at first, it was so second-nature to me.

“Oh, I record all my calls just to have them to refer back to if I need to. I don’t distribute them or post them or anything like that.” I replied.

I could tell it didn’t sit well with her.

“Okay, because honestly it makes me a little uncomfortable. I don’t want this posted publicly.”

Of course, that’s a totally fair sentiment. We are sharing personal details about why one isn’t as successful with their business as they’d like to be. I would never share that publicly, or even privately with anyone else. I tried to reassure her.

“Oh, absolutely not,” I said. “I just record these for myself and clients. In between sessions, I might go rewatch our conversations in case I forgot something. And I just had a client before our call ask me to send the video so she could watch it herself. So I do it for both reasons.”

“No, I understand why you’d record them for a client,” she responded. “But you didn’t ask my permission and didn’t tell me you were recording or what your plans were for the recording. I’d understand if we had a working relationship, but we haven’t agreed to that yet.”

She was right and I agreed. “You know, you’re 100% right and I will definitely make it a practice to ask people before I do that in the future. It hasn’t created a problem so far, but I understand why it caught you off guard. If you’d like, I can totally delete it after our call.”

“Yes, I would actually. Thank you for doing that.” she responded.

Our time was up so we ended the call, but the tone had completely changed.

Earlier we had both been excited because the alignment between us was becoming clear, but that issue took the wind out of our sails and we both felt it.

I emailed her later that day with my proposed plan she requested along with a quick acknowledgment and apology for the unannounced recording. I addressed it but didn’t harp on it and even thanked her for being comfortable enough to call me out on it. 

A week later, after I followed up, she told me she “decided to go another direction.”

I have no expectation of booking every person I consult. But I hate to ruin an opportunity when it’s clearly my fault.

So what do I do? 

Do I blame it on her and say she’s too picky and would be a hell-client if we did work together, so I’m actually better off not booking her? Do I beat myself up and allow this one miss to make me feel like a screw up and then dwell in the aftermath of negative energy?

No. 

I look inward. I see what I could change so this doesn’t happen again in the future (it’s very clear, in this case). And I move on.

And that is new for me. Because historically I would have bounced back and forth between blaming her and beating myself up and it would have disrupted the following weeks or months even, until I had a few “wins” that helped me get over it.

(photo via Rain Bennett)

But I’m learning and I’m growing each day and each time I step up to the proverbial plate.

Mistakes are a part of life and certainly a part of business.

You can expect to make them.

But dwelling on a mistake does nothing but disrupt your next attempt.

Face it, fix it, and focus on the next at-bat.

Rain Bennett is a two-time Emmy-nominated filmmaker, writer, and competitive storyteller with over a decade of experience producing documentary films that focus on health and wellness. His mission is simple: to make the world happier and healthier by sharing stories of change.

You can read the rest of “Right as Rain” here, and check back every Wednesday on Chapelboro for a new column! 

Chapelboro.com does not charge subscription fees. You can support local journalism and our mission to serve the community. Contribute today – every single dollar matters.
Related Stories
‹
Right as Rain: Trying New Things Is Scary
Confession time. I’m doing a lot of new things this year and they all scare me. I hate that feeling. But also… I LOVE IT. Because what I’ve learned along the way, through the struggles I’ve experienced while in “The Pit” — which I’ve talked about a lot in the Right as Rain column — […]
Right as Rain: You Don't Choose Your Core Values
About three years ago — coincidentally around the same time we launched the Right as Rain column here on Chapelboro.com — I was reading Brené Brown’s book “Dare to Lead.” If you are a reader of the Right as Rain column, you know how much I admire Brené’s work. I’ve read most of her books, […]
Right as Rain: An African-American Icon of North Carolina
Since I was a young kid, I’ve been fascinated with the stories and the history of the United States Lifesaving Service — the predecessor to the US Coast Guard. It’s not really a mystery why I was attracted to it. It’s my family’s history, too. My great-uncle Vic Williams, from Buxton, NC, was in the […]
Right as Rain: A Year of Firsts
This was a year of firsts for many of us. It might’ve been your first time working from home. Or it could be the first time you found yourself without a job. It was probably the first time you’d spent this much time away from family and friends. And it was most definitely the first […]
Right as Rain: Skills vs Tools
All the time in my business I am asked different versions of the same question: What’s the best camera for my budget? Which editing app should I use? Should I get a tripod? What about lighting? Which microphone is the best for podcasting? And what those questions are really asking is, “What is the tool […]
Right as Rain: Focus on the Followers That Count
Last Friday after Thanksgiving, my family and I were playing a card game called Phase 10. While waiting on someone to play their turn, I checked my phone and noticed one of my TikTok videos had jumped from 700 views to 1100 that day. It was a video where I talked about an experiment that […]
Right as Rain: Pace and Placement
When I was a kid, my soccer coach used to run a drill called “Power and Finesse.” Each player would line up single-file about 20 yards from the goal and the coach, standing to the right or left of the goal, would roll two soccer balls out for us to shoot. The first ball would […]
Right as Rain: Start With the Smallest Communities
Last weekend I went to Graham to film a march to the polls. My friend and colleague Anna Norwood is working on a new documentary about the current struggle surrounding a Confederate statue in front of the Alamance County courthouse. This issue is not unique to Graham, as we’ve seen cities all across the country […]
Right as Rain: Treatment vs Therapy
A couple of weeks ago I wrote about seeking a therapist and how my community quickly came to my aid with suggestions of great Triangle-based counselors.  I took one of those suggestions and have had two sessions now — the first one being more of a get-to-know-you session and the most recent starting to reveal […]
Right as Rain: Reconnecting With My Community, in Real Life
It took me a long time to find my people.  More specifically, it took me a long time to figure out who I wanted to serve, how I could serve them best, and (most importantly), why. If you read this column frequently, you know that the way I serve my audience is by helping them […]
›