What it means to listen

“Do you know why we chose your company? Because you listened to us.”

I really didn’t know if we would win this project. It was a big one. The competition was talented and experienced. The project was to be a new children’s interactive space in one of the largest fine art museums in the southeast. I thought our team did everything well. We meet with the customer on several occasions and seemed to have good rapport. Our initial designs were sharp and included the elements the museum staff had specifically asked for. We delivered a good presentation. For us it would all come down to which concept they preferred and maybe a little luck.

In the end we didn’t need luck. We had prepared well, but ultimately we did one thing differently than the other design firms that had also presented proposals for the project. According to the museum’s education director, the only proposal that addressed her staff’s input was ours. Instead of trying to impress with our superior design skill and overall creativity we had shown the respect of acknowledging their ideas and their vision and helped to make it a reality.

At the end of the day it didn’t matter as much what we did as what we didn’t do. We didn’t try to lecture them on design or sell them on ideas that were out of scope. In the end we kept our traps shut, took good notes, and applied what we learned to the project, delighting the customer.