Client sensitivity

While I would advise anyone in business to be sensitive to the needs of your clients, I've recently learnt that there are circumstances where you must remove sensitivity from the equation and put the needs of your company first.

This will mostly happen during times of change. Companies that have stability in their income, staff, and offerings will at some stage need to move the company forward so as not to be left behind. The objective is to reach the next level of stability without encountering too much turbulence within your staff, culture, and cash flow.

Staff, culture, and cash flow are all internally manageable, but your clients aren't that easy. In order for you to move forward you must realise that your clients will need to move forward and quite often they won't like it. As long as you can clearly communicate and demonstrate that the next level of stability will be worth the move you will be fine, but if clients are stubborn you may need to leave them behind - more often than not they will catch up at a later stage.

Putting your clients loyalty to the test is dangerous but can be worth it.