I’m about to head into a vortex where collaboration is going to be really important. Unfortunately, the medical community doesn’t seem to do collaboration even as well as the financial advice industry does. And, this might be a real problem.
I’ve recently been diagnosed with cancer. For years, I’ve been using the medical community as a great example of diagnose before prescribing and for working in a collaborative manner to work with one on managing their health. It appears that the medical community struggles with this process at least as much as we do in the financial services business.
During the diagnosis period for my medical condition we would often tried things to see how they worked out. The diagnosis wasn’t especially thorough and the result was not great. I just happened to get lucky that my particular diagnosis was done relatively quickly. And, that may be how it works for all of us, we just get lucky in our diagnosis in both the medical and personal sense.
This leads me to wonder if that’s how it works with our Clients as well. Do they mostly get lucky that we help them do things that lead towards where they want to go? Or, do we tend to put our Clients in a box and make decisions about what’s important for them?
It seems to me, that we often put our Clients in a box and then decide what’s important for them. I’m not sure this is the most appropriate way for us to help our Clients reach their goals.
Just asking the question, if we were to get together three years from now, what has to happen for you to feel like you’ve been successful is powerful enough to help us all be on the same page. And, it’s all being on the same page that is important.
For example, it’s just as important for me to make sure my affairs are in order as it is to get medical treatment. Both are at a ten in importance and both must be addressed. Otherwise, I’ll not be able to put my full attention on the medical portion of this deal.
The medical community is likely to be only focused on the medical stuff and never find out about the other part of what’s important for me. It will become my responsibility to point this out. We often expect our Clients to tell us what’s important to them. The issue with this is our Clients often don’t know how to tell anyone, much less what’s important. And, isn’t that what our primary job is? We must find out what’s important for our Clients and we must be through in this activity. Doing so will allow us to all focus the appropriate amount of energy in getting the right outcome.
Josh Patrick
Filed under: Ethics, For Business Advisors, For Business Owners, Legacy, Value Creation | Tagged: cancer, collaboration, discovery, medical treatment
