Author: Kaitlyn Miller Added: May 13, 2008
Details. Who has time for them? And, who’s going to notice? Your customers, that’s who. If you pay attention to details and plan ahead, many a crisis can you avert. Details are what separate the professional from the amateur.
Holly Stihl, a customer service expert, has said, "You never get bitten by an elephant. It's the mosquitoes that eat you alive." You have to be alert to everything that’s going on around you when you are running a business.
Paying Attention Amidst Chaos
The difference between a professional and an amateur is that the professional knows what details to hone in on when there is a crisis. The professional already knows the details of what’s happened before the crisis, so she’s in a better position than the amateur to fix the crisis.
The first thing a professional does during a busy time or a crisis is to pick out the first thing that needs to be done. Professionals have the ability to think ahead to how to solve a problem, by thinking back – what happened that led up to this mess? What are the details that led to the mess? Professionals also act. Once they’ve decided on a first thing that needs to be done, they do it. They don’t sit around thinking about it, mulling it over.
Knowing What’s Important
Not only do pros know the first thing that needs to be done, they know what does not need to be done. They can weed through all the little tasks and decide what is important.
A good professional knows what to do first, but a better professional knows what to do first, last and what would be a waste of time. They will let the time-wasters die while they attend to things that really matter.
And Another Thing
Another characteristic that marks a pro as different from the amateur: the ability to figure out more "first things." A professional knows what steps need to be taken and in what order. Some of this is from experience, but some of it is just sweating the small stuff. Knowing what happened and what should have happened (by knowing all the details) gives the professional instant insight on how to fix things. The professional knows that if she doesn’t do the basics right, her customers won’t think she can do anything right. Pay attention to the details of the basics can pay off: if a dry cleaner cleans wedding gowns, but can’t clean street clothes who’s going to trust that the dry cleaner can do an important piece like a wedding gown when he can’t even clean basic clothes?
Let’s say you’re designing marketing materials and decide to some brochure printing. You have multiple brochures for different products. You have your photos picked out and just need to import them into your design program. What happens if you have one product’s name as Zoom 11 and another as Zoom 1? If you don’t pay attention to details and import the wrong photo, you’ve just cost yourself hundreds of dollars in printing costs. Not paying attention to the details can cost you.
So what will keep you in business? The small details. The basics. Make sure you are paying attention to these things so that you can head off or prevent any problems that may come your way. For more information, you can visit this page on brochure printing
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