How transparent are you with each other and your team about opportunities and problems?

Sometimes, being transparent allows you to grow beyond what you originally thought possible. As long as you’re open to learning, the strategy of being transparent will work in your favor. On today’s episode, Access EForms CEO Tim Elliott sits down with Cody Strate, VP of Strategic Initiatives and VP of Sales Mike Kelley. The executive team at Access talked through several concepts they’ve deployed with the strategy of being transparent. Starting with the CEO Tim Elliott being transparent about their ability to deliver solutions, they dig into how the results have shown themselves with their customers. See more from Access EForms below: SHOW NOTES: (1:22) VP of Strategic Initiatives Cody Strate helps outline the continuity between how your message on your website, interacts with media collateral, or come across information that helps them with context on your product or service the level of transparency will help your client decide to be apart of what you’re doing, or decide not to. (3:13) “Get to know quick” - this philosophy helps Mike Kelley as the VP of Sales, decide to determine a fit on the prospect side, as well as help to put the customers needs at the forefront of their software. (5:02) CEO Tim Elliott asks VP of Sales MIke Kelley, “What is the difference between telling how your service and product’s effectiveness is viewed by you and or the customer telling that story? (7:15) VP of Strategic Initiatives Cody Strate helps to bring into focus how important it is, when you do not know the direct answer the customer is looking for, to be honest and leading the customer to the answer they’re looking for in alignment with your questions. (8:43) When your understand the trust and desire your customers have to do what they are passionate about and your product can help them accomplish that, your interaction with them now becomes an alignment of interests, if you deploy transparency as a strategy. (10:18) CEO Tim Elliott summarizes what the net effect of using that strategy leads to, which is trust. That strategy of listening, even being equipped with the answers the industry is looking for, will lead to an environment where partnership is possible. The end result, with that environment, will lend itself to an innovative and effective solution. (11:27) Hear it once, I’ll take a note. Hear it twice, talk about it. Hear it three times, you begin to develop a solution for your customer. (13:13) If you truly decide that you know, before your customer’s voice has been heard, you will find yourself out of business. (14:10) CEO Tim Elliott talks about a time he spent with other entrepreneurs, where when the opportunity to chase money presented itself, being transparent with his team and his customers about their goals to help solve problems, leads to a unique alignment of interests and thus a much more robust customer/vendor/provider relationship that wouldn’t not have existed had the company simply chased money. (14:43) VP of Sales Mike Kelley talks through conversations he has with folks in the marketplace, talking about how 99 out of 100 providers have to deal with unmet expectations with the solutions they’ve purchased, which doesn’t create a great environment to have a solution oriented discussion. (15:45) VP of Strategic Initiatives Cody Strate talks about the importance of your reputation, controlling expectations, and understanding your customers perception of your capabilities. (16:25) CEO Tim Elliott talks about taking responsibility and ownership of not meeting expectations with their customers, but the power of being transparent allows you to improve your delivery, your product, and your service. This characteristic permeates throughout the organization and can lead folks to  (18:16) VP of Sales Mike Kelley fields questions from customers regarding a request for new features. Those requests sometimes lead to an unsuccessful outcome, or “failure”. “Failure” has lead to concept called “Gap and Gain” from CEO Tim Elliott as well as created a dynamic relationship for their customers to understand that the core product, when executed the right way, will deliver. Subscribe and Follow to Maintain the “Leadership Mindset” Facebook - https://www.facebook.com/AccessEFM/ Twitter - https://twitter.com/Access_eforms?s=20 Linkedin - https://www.linkedin.com/company/accessefm/ Tim Elliott, CEO, Access EForms - https://www.linkedin.com/in/tim-elliott-b84b39a/ Cody Strate, COO, VP of Strategic Initiatives - https://www.linkedin.com/in/cody-strate-26543412 Mike Kelley, VP of Sales, Access EForms