For my next lesson: Don't let the technology options overwhelm you. Take time to think about how you would meet a client's needs before speaking if necessary.
This lesson may require a little explanation before my example. Sometimes potential clients ask us how we would accomplish a specific task. The knee jerk reaction is to blurt out how we think it would be done. Suggestion: Take the potential client's name and number and tell him/her you will get back to him/her on this. Then, take some time and think about it. Is it feasible at all? Is it feasible with your current setup? What would you have to buy? Do some research and have a great answer in a day or two.
Now for the example. My first job, I worked as a US Navy equipment logistics analyst for a US Navy ship in Arlington, VA. This was in 1989, I'm dating myself for a reason. I had created a database in Filemaker and was presenting it to my Navy client. While he was reviewing it, he received a call from a ship that was at sea. They needed a number of an equipment that just happened to be on my listing. He gave the number to the sailor to order his part and then promised to send out the entire listing to the ship for them to use. The only thing is that the ships only had PC's not Mac's. At that time Filemaker was only available for the Mac. The PC had only DBaseIV. My client promised the sailor that I would have the database translated into DBase IV and back to him in 1 week. He then hung up with the sailor and looked at me.
"Well," he said "Can you do that?"
Again, the lesson is: Take your time identifying the technology options before you promise the world.
Take care everyone!
Gretchen Koehler-Swaney
Prairie Business Partners LLC
http://www.prairiebusinesspartners.com/
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