“You don’t get the chance to employ advisory skills untol you can get someone to trust you enough to share their problems with you.” (Maister et al., 2000, p.ix).
“the way to be a great advisor is to care about your client.” (Maister et al., 2000, p.13).
“The key point is that trust must be earned and deserved. You must do something to give to other people the evidence on which they can base their decision on whether to trust you. You must be willing to give in order to get.” (Maister et al., 2000, p.18). “building trust. First, it has to do with keeping one’s self interest in check.” (Maister et al., 2000, p.22).
“The potential of trust violation is always there in a trusting relationship. The choice on the par of the advisor not to violate trust is what makes the relationship special.” (Maister et al., 2000, p.24).“I will trust you if I believe that you’re in this for the long haul, that you are not just trying to maximize the short-term benefit to you in each of our interactions.” (Maister et al., 2000, p.26). “I will trust you if you exhibit some form of caring. If you provide some evidence that my interests are as important to you as your own interests are.” (Maister et al., 2000, p.26).
“It is not enough for a professional to be right: An advisor’s job is to be helpful.” (Maister et al., 2000, p.27).
“Suggestions on how to improve always carry the implied critique that all is not being done well at the moment. Yet it is the person hiring you who is often responsible for the current state of affairs.” (Maister et al., 2000, p.28).
“the client is untrained in the professional’s specialty, while the professional may have seen the client’s problem (or variant’s of it) many times before. There is thus an almost constant threat of coming across to the client as patronizing, pompous, and arrogant.” (Maister et al., 2000, p.30).
“In many ways, advisory skills are similar to those of great teaching. A teacher’s task is to help a student get from point A (what they know, understand, and believe now) to point B (an advanced state of deeper undersanding and knowledge). It is poor teaching for the professor to stand at the front of the class and say, “B is the right answer.” (Maister et al., 2000, p.33).
“To get what you want from someone, you must first focus on giving them what they want.” (Maister et al., 2000, p.51). “As Dale Carnegie said, “The only way to influence someone is to find out what they want, and show them how to get it.” (Maister et al., 2000, p.51).
“Then comes the crucial career transition, from technician to full professional, from content expert to advisor. (…) In contrast, our task as advisors is an “in-person,” “in contact” challenge to help the client see things anew or to make a decision.” (Maister et al., 2000, p.53). “The key to prior career success (technical excellence) can actually become an impediment at this level.” (Maister et al., 2000, p.53). “The kinds of people who typically in professional service firms are often driven, rational, and meritocratic, with a great need to achieve. It is the natural thing for such people (…) to look for confirmation that what they are doing is all right.” (Maister et al., 2000, p.54).
“The trick of earning trust is to avoid all tricks.” (Maister et al., 2000, p.61).
“Humility is not weakness. Serving others does not require us to be servile. Ego strength means not having to have our egos stroked continuously. Recognizing and respecting the strength in others does not diminish our respect or strength.” (Maister et al., 2000, p.139).
“To be professional, we must point out possibilities. Some call that selling. We call it contributing ideas.” (Maister et al., 2000, p.169).
“Following our initial courtship with a client, we begin to enter a very short honeymoon period, where the client feels relieved that someone competent is now at work solving his or her problem. There is a natural evolution to the relationship where those feelings of comfort will quickly transform into feelings of wondering whether their advisros is devoting the time necessary and whether the approach is really going to work.
Trust is built upon respect, and since respect comes from seeing some performance, it becomes imperative that we find the means to deliver small, fast result to evidence our efforts.” (Maister et al., 2000, p.175). “even compiling a status report can ensure our credibility.” (Maister et al., 2000, p.175).
“We need to be eternally alert for what comes next for the client. What should our client be doing as a result of our work?” (Maister et al., 2000, p.176).
“The relationship manager’s task is to make the team members want to participate actively in serving and nurturing the relationship (not the “account”). This can be done by providing what they often do not find in their regular work, such as challenge and meaning.” (Maister et al., 2000, p.183).
