“Underpromise and overdeliver.”
Have you ever heard this brief bit of business philosophy at work? It has to do with consciously managing the expectations of your clients and customers. The idea is that you set a comfortable scope and timeline for your service, and then “wow” them by delivering the results ahead of time and under budget.
The question is: Is it a good way to build relationships with your customers?
While the short-term results of “underpromising and overdelivering” look great, your clients might come to always expect super-fast, super-cheap work from you. Suddenly, the whole “managing expectations” idea backfires completely; your client has learned to set them very high, and raise them each time you exceed your own self-set expectations. You’re caught up in a mess that you created.
It’s not such a good idea to underpromise, overpromise, or – perhaps – make promises at all. To use another common work expression; maybe “honesty is the best policy.”
What do you think?
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I think it is a fine balance – from my personal experience exceeding your clients expectations leads to loyalty and a lot of further work.
I guess the key is to make sure that you give yourself sufficient scope in your original project plan and pricing to exceed expectations without leaving yourself over worked and under paid.
I agree – I have one client who I began working with during a slow time. That meant my turnaround time was really quick. She began to expect it, even though it wasn’t the standard or what I had quoted. Better to be realistic than over or under provide.
It depends on the client, the context and the situation. I think it could work if you use it with a not very convinced client and you want give him a surprise.
It isn’t a good idea if you use it in all situations because, as you said, the client will learn to expect more than you promised.
Good post!
I think it’s a question of degree and consistency. I think if you strive to build a reputation of turning things in a little early and a little under budget you will be in great shape overall. But if you turn things in super early and way under budget then yes, you do run the risk of clients expecting it all the time.
I have no experience regarding this matter.
Although, it was very interesting to read the post and the comments. But I still cannot decide which side to choose!
This is a fair point, and I’d never thought to question the original philosophy.
Honesty is the best policy. Sometimes a project is risky, since there are too many unknowns, and you should get that out up front. Other times it’s a regular job you day ion day out, and barring an emergency, you know how long it’s going to take.
I’ve recently been on the other side of the fence and work was delivered very early after a lot of um’ing and ah’ing about schedules. I might have actually felt happier if it had turned up when we planned, but that’s down to the pain in setting the original schedule.
I’m firmly on the side of underpromise. A promise is easy to make, and people are greedy for them. Of course, once you make a promise you are held to it by other people, irrespective of how realistic your promise was.
Whether you underpromise or overpromise, you will develop a reputation for how quickly or on budget or reliably (or whatever metric is important in your field) you deliver. If for whatever reason you mess up and it takes longer, then they will re-evaluate their expectations of you (and re-evaluate them after you come in again under budget or time or whatever with your next transaction). They may be disappointed.
However, if you have underpromised you are safe – “Look, did I promise to get it done earlier? No. All I can do is give a date and if you choose to rely on an earlier date that I did not agree to, then I can’t help you out there, I’m really sorry.”
If you have attempted to promise what you typically deliver: “Um, well, I’m very sorry your production line is sitting idle for several days now, but please try and overlook the tens of thousands of dollars it has cost you and consider me for future business.”
Which approach will have better long term business and get more business via referrals?