The Right Approach

Sheila Ward, a designer at Harrell Remodeling, in Mountain View, Calif., had as clients a couple doing a whole-house remodel. The wife was a perfectionist, Ward says. “She was conscientious and wanted the perfect design.” The husband was formal and traditional. Both husband and wife were very busy. They had already dismissed two designers from two other firms — “a red flag,” Ward says. A familiar scenario from which some companies would walk. Harrell Remodeling didn't. Three years ago, the company began using a profiling tool that has helped its staff understand and communicate with clients in a new way — in a way that the client wants to be communicated with.

Photo Credit: Martin O'Neill

It's not a new idea — Hippocrates characterized people as choleric, sanguine, phlegmatic, or melancholy — but understanding how to talk to a client in his or her own language can be difficult for business owners and salespeople used to the golden rule: “Do unto others as you would have them do unto you.” That paradigm no longer holds true. You want to do — in this case, to communicate — unto others in the way that they best communicate. “If you speak in a language that a person is used to hearing, it enhances communication, builds rapport, and makes them feel relaxed,” says Rebecca Morgan, a San Jose-based management consultant, speaker, and author who likens this form of communication to “learning how to say ‘hello' and ‘thank you' in a [foreign] language when you travel. It enhances the experience.”

Most people do informal profiling with everyone they meet. For a service company, that informal process begins with the initial phone call. At many remodeling companies, prospects are qualified right away by someone with a competent, warm voice developing a conversation while asking focused questions from a lead sheet. That's how it is at Harrell Remodeling.

“If someone has done a remodel before,” Ward says, “we ask, ‘How did it go?' Sometimes they didn't have a good experience. Those people may appreciate the products and services we provide.” With the lead sheet, Ward and owner Iris Harrell can determine whether a lead is a good fit. “If the [prospect] says, ‘I used a handyman service to rebuild my second story, and it was great,' they may not value [our] quality craftsmanship or high-level customer service.”

Once a prospect becomes a client, insightful strategies on communication become even more important. That's where profiling can really help.

Recently, Harrell Remodeling began using a particular type of DISC profile to gain insight into clients. Based on the 1928 work of psychologist William Moulton Marston, DISC — the letters stand for dominance, influence, steadiness, and conscientiousness — is a four-quadrant assessment tool that looks at behavioral styles and preferences. About a decade ago, a Finnish company brought its version, Extended DISC — a 12-question tool that helps a profiler perceive the profilee — to the U.S. “Clients use these tools to understand who they are, and [they] use that as a starting point to be more effective with other people,” says Markku Kauppinen, president and CEO of Extended DISC (www.extendeddisc.com/usa).

Once Ward began working with the couple who were embarking on the whole-house remodel, she and Harrell Remodeling's sales manager, Lisa Sten, answered the DISC profile questions. “We wanted [the wife] to be comfortable enough to get to the next step of the design process; she wasn't feeling like she could do that,” Ward says.

It was through Sandler Training (www.sandler.com), a sales and management training and consulting firm with many remodeling company clients, that Harrell Remodeling learned about Extended DISC. Accessed online, the respondent answers questions about another person, the responses are evaluated, and suggestions for communication techniques are offered. Dave Mattson, CEO of Sandler Training, says the profile “allows people to pre-plan how they can interact with a person. It's especially helpful in design/build between sessions one and two.”

Ward went to the Extended DISC Web site, entered a password, and proceeded to select answers to questions such as, “When speaking, this person: has a calm, friendly tone; speaks rapidly; cuts off small talk; tries to control the conversation.” She then submitted her answers online. Within 30 minutes she was e-mailed a three-page response that included a summary and a DISC profile graph detailing what characteristics the person does and does not exhibit. Also included was a page of tips on how best to communicate with this person.

Photo Credit: Martin O'Neill

In Ward's case, she was told to be patient and to let the client go through things carefully and see everything in writing, and not to force the client to state an opinion. Then the assessment suggested what not to do, how to manage next steps, and how to retain the relationship. Not surprisingly, this client was a high “C.”

“It's amazing how just a tiny bit of information helps,” says Ward, who adds that she's not the kind of designer who walks in and says, “You should paint this wall red!” But, Ward says, “it turned out that that's exactly what this [highly conscientious] client wanted. She wanted me to take charge.” Because Ward has years of experience, she might have eventually discovered these responses herself, but profiling helped get her to that point more quickly. Ward foresees a day when the system at Harrell Remodeling might be sophisticated enough that it can be used before a person becomes a client. “But we wouldn't want people to feel like we're profiling them,” she says. Getting the information would have to be a seamless part of a conversation.

That's possible, says consultant Morgan, who is a distributor for Inscape Publishing's eight-question assessment (for more information contact her at rebecca@rebeccamorgan.com), which can be used with prospects on the phone or in person. After a conversation, you reflect on what you heard, such as whether the person spoke quickly or slowly and what types of questions they asked, she says, and then you use the assessment to determine how best to communicate with the prospect. Once you've done it a few times, you become more conscious of how people are speaking and the kinds of questions they're asking.

It's pretty much a given that those who use DISC for profiling clients use it on themselves and their staff. “We know that a high ‘C' is a tough customer for us,” says Liz Wilder, president of Anthony Wilder Design/Build, in Cabin John, Md., whose company has used DISC with employees for seven years but which only began profiling clients three years ago. “We communicate better with clients because we understand them better,” Wilder says. “[Completing] the [profile] takes out some of the emotion and gets us back to the basics of how they receive information rather than how we like to deliver it.” For example, she says, “an ‘S' or ‘supportive' person, will want a stable process and more security. A ‘D'-type personality wants to know the bottom line.”

Wilder matches staff with clients based on the profiling. “Anthony [Wilder] is an ‘I'; he shoots from the hip,” says Wilder of her co-owner husband. “If we have a couple where one's a ‘D' and the other is an ‘I,' we know Anthony will get along with them. Both usually have a higher energy level and faster pace, so I have him follow through. On the other hand, JP [Ward, a designer] likes things spelled out, so he works better with ‘C' and ‘S' [types].” The client profiling process is part of AWDB's checklist and is used for interactions with every client.

Neither the staff at Harrell Remodeling nor at AWDB did any particular training for putting profiling into practice. Staff just need to be familiar with the DISC tool and be willing to make adjustments in communication style if necessary. As Mattson points out, profiling is helpful because “it's more difficult to adjust if you don't know that you should adjust or what [you should] adjust to. You might intuitively know that something is not working, but you can't figure out why a person isn't making a decision. Remodelers get paid to make people feel comfortable. The conversation you have with homeowners differentiates you.”

Stacey Freed is a senior editor for REMODELING.