How to respond to negative client feedback

 If a client criticizes your IT consulting work, your first reaction might be to get defensive. Brad Egeland offers suggestions on how to handle the situation.

When a client commends your work, you should accept the compliment, acknowledge the efforts of others who helped make success possible, and ask for a reference.

Unfortunately, you might also have to deal with negative feedback from clients. When you get an unfavorable performance review of your IT consulting work, you definitely don’t want to be defensive, get angry, or lie. As difficult as it may be, you should try to think of the criticism as a learning experience and possibly a way to resolve any lingering issues about the project. You want to end the consulting engagement feeling that you handled the situation as professionally and tactfully as possible.

These are my tips for responding to criticisms from clients. Please share your recommended techniques for dealing with these usually unpleasant situations.

Take a deep breath

Rather than pop off the first thing that comes to your mind, you should take a deep breath and count to 10. This is often easier to do if you receive the complaint via email then if you’re caught off-guard face-to-face with the client.

Resolve to investigate their complaintsYou should ask the client to give you some time to look into the issues they’ve raised so you can formulate a well-informed response.

Ask for clarificationIf you receive feedback that is inaccurate, be tactful in how you respond — it will never serve you well to try to make the client feel stupid. If you don’t understand the criticism, you shouldn’t let the dialogue stop there. After gathering all of the necessary information, you should ask detailed questions about the client’s criticisms. You might be able to shed new light on the issue at hand and change the client’s perception. If that doesn’t help, you should at least consider it a learning experience.

Admit any wrongdoing

You should be upfront about any mistakes that were made on the project. If you’re caught in a lie, it can ruin your reputation and will likely end the current consulting engagement. You must remain above reproach.

Accept the blameIf the complaint is about an action or a decision that was definitely your fault, that’s a no-brainer — own up to it. But if the criticism pertains to something you were leading and not directly attributable to you, it’s still best to accept responsibility. Go down with the ship — your team will respect you for it.