Ask to Correct Your Mistake before Losing a Deal

Have you ever walked out of a sales call, jumped in your car, and entered the freeway on your way back to the office only to realize that you left the client’s office without asking them something crucial to what comes next in the sales conversation?

Worse, have you left your client’s office without even acquiring the next step at all, being struck by the idea that you have lost control of the process and worrying that you are going to have start chasing them on voice mail and email to get something scheduled?

If you haven’t had a meeting not go the way you wanted—or needed it to go—only to realize that you ended up with a more significant conflict on the other end of the meeting instead of a resolution to the challenge you were trying resolve, at some point, you will.

It’s possible to get your solution wrong and have to make major adjustments after believing you had captured your client’s needs perfectly.

If you make a mistake, miss something, lose control of the process or mishandled a conversation, ask for the opportunity to correct that mistake rather than allowing it to cause you to lose a deal. There are many reasons outside of winning (which is a good enough reason on its own) to ask for a do-over, including:

• demonstrating that you care about getting things right,
• that you are the kind of person that recognizes their mistakes and does something about them, and
• that you will do what is right instead of what is easy when there are challenges in your relationship or execution.

If you make a mistake, ask for the chance to correct it.