I try to stay away from work topics but as I was clearing out some old folders today, I came across an old client that taught me a huge lesson in communication, people and relationships that I thought I would share. I have changed the names out of courtesy.
I was in Seattle at the time and had a number of clients, too many as usual as I tend to say “yes” too much (getting better, but still over commit myself once and a while). However, I was fortunate to be working for some really great people, in particular, one partner who was an incredible technical resource. We worked well together as he was somewhat shy and I am somewhat outgoing, so as a team I thought we were pretty good.
We were working with one particular client, a small company trying to raise money and develop its business plan. It was a really, really small shop as clients for us go. Probably about 10 employees (some of my clients have had over 30,000). As such, people wear many hats in a company that size, and our main contact was Terry, the Chief Financial Officer, who also wore the Controller hat, the accounts payable hat and did some time at reception every once and a while if needed.
I was in Seattle at the time and had a number of clients, too many as usual as I tend to say “yes” too much (getting better, but still over commit myself once and a while). However, I was fortunate to be working for some really great people, in particular, one partner who was an incredible technical resource. We worked well together as he was somewhat shy and I am somewhat outgoing, so as a team I thought we were pretty good.
We were working with one particular client, a small company trying to raise money and develop its business plan. It was a really, really small shop as clients for us go. Probably about 10 employees (some of my clients have had over 30,000). As such, people wear many hats in a company that size, and our main contact was Terry, the Chief Financial Officer, who also wore the Controller hat, the accounts payable hat and did some time at reception every once and a while if needed.
Terry was a personality to say the least. I really liked working with him. He wore his emotions on his sleeve, and had a very broad view of the company’s finances, given his background as a corporate controller for a fairly large publicly traded company prior to his stint with my client. He had a big picture view of the books (which any CFO should) but because of the size of the company, had to keep the detailed records. A natural result of this is that he had a lot of detail work to do based on the nature of the Company’s operations, which resulted in pretty technical accounting which he didn’t care for. This eventually culminated in his disgust for my boss, who would provide feedback on the technical accounting which he didn’t appreciate.
I never totally understood it, but Terry didn’t like my boss. As a result, Terry called me whenever he needed anything, and I would call him whenever our firm had questions or feedback for him and that was how things worked. Many of these conversations would involve a considerable amount of yelling at me, which I interpreted as boisterous venting and left it at that (in retrospect I was right about this, Terry and I ended up being friends). Those of you who know me well know that I grew up in a family that argued out loud, made our point and got over it, so these conversations never bothered me. I did recall one particular conversation specifically. I was on my speaker phone in my office talking to Terry. I passed on our viewpoint on a certain accounting treatment that I didn’t think he would appreciate, and his response was a long scream (think captain Kirk in Star Trek II screaming “Kaaaaaaaaahn!”). I was surprised to say the least. After the scream he mumbled something then said goodbye. People came by my office afterwards to make sure everything was ok as they had heard a strange scream come from my office.
As time passed these incidents would occur from time to time, none of them a big deal. In the meantime, I would get e-mails from Terry all the time, many of them having words that changed to capital letters. Given Terry’s nature, I always thought that he was upset and just venting via e-mail and caps are a GOOD WAY TO DO THIS. This went on for a year or so, capital letters, angry Terry hates my boss. So when Terry would send an e-mail saying “WE NEED TO DO THIS NOW” I would interpret it as him yelling this at me as if he were in the room.
I had been working with Terry for about a year and a half when it happened. I was in his office one late fall afternoon and he told me he was resigning for health reasons. He went on to say that he had been battling brain cancer for almost 20 years. He and his wife had gone through years of worry about having kids because they didn’t know if his brain cancer was hereditary. They eventually did have two girls, who were almost teenagers by this time. He told me of his struggles through the years and the cancer came and went, along with the various treatments. He said that it had progressed to the point where it was just too difficult for him to work. I’ll never forget what he said next, “…the worst part of it is, my left hand won’t stop shaking, and I hit the caps lock key constantly. I can’t stop doing it so my e-mails and memos all have this issue where they jump back and forth…its driving me crazy.” All this time I thought the guy was yelling at me, and he was fighting a deadly disease. He let loose with one last barb at my boss and we parted ways. I shook my head as I walked out of his building, trying to absorb what he had just told me. Aside from the fact that someone I liked had a terrible terminal disease, I had completely understood his demeanor and daily approach to his work (and life). He was a fighter for sure.
It was the last time I saw Terry, he passed away in December that year. However, he left an impression on me I’ll never forget and he taught me a huge lesson in communication. There have been many studies which try to quantify the amount of non-verbal communication that goes on when communicating. It’s hard enough to try and understand what my wife is telling me sometimes, and I know her really well. So next time you read an e-mail that seems like someone is angry, is insulting you, is too short or just plain rude, give yourself some time to give them the benefit of the doubt. If you can’t do that, try calling them or meeting face-to-face before coming back at them. You might be as surprised as I was.
Be excellent to each other!!!
