I built my business the hard way. I started it from scratch over a decade ago, leaving a good-paying job and renting a couple of rooms in a downtown office building. About half my community was proud to see a young guy going after it and about half my community thought I made a big mistake. Believe me, I had moments when I was not sure which half of my community was right.
Experience is a harsh, but thorough, teacher. There were many hard lessons in the early days. Probably to a fault, I’ve done my best to be trustworthy and keep my word. I’ll never forget the first time that someone blatantly said they did not trust me in a business setting.
It was the middle of the Great Recession and I was calling on a local large retirement community. My primary contact was the IT director and he was pleased with my demo product. He sent me over to purchasing to negotiate the deal. I worked very hard to earn the account by following up on every request and making a custom order catalog. Eventually, the old purchasing guy rudely rejected my proposal and bought the identical equipment somewhere else. He flat out said that he did not trust that my business was going to be for long.
Looking back, I can smugly smile knowing that the company that he purchased from was bought and sold four times over the years, while my customers have had a steady experience. Turns out my business survived while every one of his concerns came true with the choice he made. The old purchasing guy trusted the wrong company. But that really doesn’t matter.
The experience taught me that trust is everything in business. Business begins when trust is established and it ends when trust is depleted. The bottom line is that I did not earn the purchasing agent’s trust. From that day on I realized it was not only my job to be trustworthy, but to help others trust.
I don’t put my trade secrets out on the Internet, but trust is one of the core values we train on at TechKnowledgey. We are experts at figuring out where the trust gaps are and filling them. Prospects reach out to us when they don’t trust their IT. Whether it’s a relational or technical issue, we help you get to a place where you trust your IT provider.
You don’t need to understand what’s going on or be embarrassed. We’ve seen it all. One recent new customer was convinced that their IT company was reading their email. Other customers have made the switch over to us because the company they once trusted was bought out. Of course, we see plenty of technology fails. We see a lot of smaller internal IT departments not keeping up and exposing their companies to unnecessary risk. Some of the worst trust violations come from big companies that blatantly don’t consider their customer’s needs.
If you don’t feel like you trust your IT provider, reach out. We’ll get you fixed up.
Give us a call or book an appointment if we can help.
Boyd Smith – President, TechKnowledgey, Inc.