Lesson learned: Not walking into a meeting with intelligence, you may be left at its conclusion saying to yourself, “Wha’ happened?”
Okay, we've all been there – an appointment you’ve confirmed that backs out at the last minute. The appointment you've confirmed who then doesn't tell you she has something more important to do, and therefore isn't available when you show up.
But this one hit me really hard, because it had (and still has) enormous potential. The one where the client has only a half hour to give you, the lowest person in the department’s totem pole is sent to “visit” with you and she arrives 10 minutes late to your designated meeting spot, which ends up being in the lobby.
Maybe because it had/has such potential that it hit me in the gut so hard. A major university marketing department had agreed to see me!
A little background. Um, I did not do a background check. No visiting its LinkedIn page to see who I may know or have contacts with. No looking at other sources – say the organization’s website – to see what’s what. My excuse? Didn't have time? Didn’t need to know? Truth was I was inexplicably slothful about the whole thing and I can't name a single reason why.
In fact, even before I packed my “bag” for the appointment, it had started poorly because I hadn't even prepared my “bag-o-stuff,” what I was going to focus on, or what I was even going to say until minutes before I had to leave my office. A bad omen already.
But into the car I hopped, along with the aforementioned “bag-o-stuff,” with visions of dollars floating in my head. Boy, was I in for a rude awakening!
During the ride I did get my mind into gear, jotting notes/questions on a piece of paper at every traffic light. What were some of the upcoming projects they were working on? (Should have learned some of that from the website.) Did they have a specific focus or upcoming initiatives for the year (staff, students, potential students, alumni, parents)? Upcoming events? (Whoops, another website gimme.) Where does it hurt, how can I make it better – and how can I make you, Mr./Ms. Marketing Department, look like a hero/heroine?
Although not at the top of my game, I was game, and into the building I strutted – after getting lost on campus because I had neglected to determine in which building the department was housed and where, on the sprawling campus, that building might be located. But I arrived on time.
And I presented myself professionally to the 80-is-the-new-60 woman sitting behind the lobby information desk to see where I was headed. Asked to take a seat in a small corner with a couple chairs and table, I waited. And waited. And when I checked again with the lovely woman who was to direct me towards my goal, I was quite pleasantly told that, yes, I was expected, and that Linda, the department’s administrative assistant, would be down shortly, although running 10 minutes late, for our half hour now 20-minute tête-à-tête – in the lobby.
I will be the first to admit that I had not personally spoken to anyone in the department; this was an appointment made by someone else for me. But, had I done my homework, I would have determined that Linda was not in a (literal) position to make any decisions and that, as planned, I wasn’t going to place one blessed foot into that office.
I have nothing against administrative assistants. In fact, when on my game, they often become my best friends and entrée into a marketing department when I make cold calls. But as you learned many paragraphs prior, I was off my game and had not an inkling of how this meeting was going to progress.
So I did the best with what I was presented and left her smiling. She had a few self-promotion gizmos that would work great with their upcoming marketing programs (about which I still had no idea), several marketing ideas that worked well at similar institutions of higher learning, and a couple company-branded catalogues that she and the staff could flip through to see what was new and exciting in the promotional products industry. And a promise that I would follow up with her. (Little did she know I would be “touching” her and her department seven more times.)
So what went wrong? If you take a red pen and made a check mark at every point where I erred, this entire article would be marked up in red. I took a terrific opportunity, didn't do any pre-meeting investigation, and was totally unprepared.
Looking back, if at the time at which I wrote the appointment in my calendar was the starting point, and my meeting with Linda in the lobby with bag o’stuff was the end, I see how many, many opportunities I squandered to change that end point to what I had envisioned – a meeting with someone -- or a group of someones -- who had decision-making authority, in their office, where I was primed and prepared and full of knowledge of where the organization was at this point and where they were heading – and how I was going to usher them, successfully, towards their goal.
Ah, hindsight. A lesson for me and one that I hope you all learned a long time ago. My apologies for bringing back bad memories. Have a good day!
Annette Kurman, an award-winning writer, holds bachelor degrees in journalism and nursing, an MBA, and Accreditation in Public Relations. She has been a newspaper reporter, director of public relations at several non-profits, a senior living administrator, and is a registered nurse. She recently joined Allstates Business Solutions and is learning - and living - the life of a distributor. She can be reached at akurman@allstatesbs.com.