Business Ghosting: People Deserve Better

Ghosting has moved its way into business, and it's not okay. If you don't want to work with someone anymore, don't be a coward. Have the decency to let them know. -- Connect with me through your favorite platform: https://pods.link/aardvarkgirl -- I think we’re all familiar with the concept of “ghosting” as it applies to the dating world. The gist of it is that two people are having some kind of relationship and then one of them disappears – no more communication, no explanation of what went wrong – just gone. The person on the receiving end typically feels confused, hurt, betrayed, and a whole slew of other emotions. Sure, breakups can be difficult and uncomfortable, but ghosting draws out the whole process because one person doesn’t know the relationship is over. I personally have no respect for ghosters. I think it’s selfish, cowardly and cruel. I’ve heard some people justify it by saying it spares everyone the awkwardness of a nonmutual breakup. But just stopping communication with no warning robs the other person of the closure they need. It’s become a huge downfall with technology and how people communicate, or don’t, with each other. Somehow it’s become common, sometimes even acceptable, to ignore people. I don’t think I will ever agree with it. I think we need to remember that, even though we’re mostly interacting via typed messages on various platforms, that doesn’t negate the need for compassion, empathy, and general human decency. Not surprisingly, ghosting has spread from dating to all kinds of relationships, including professional ones. I hear from people, or see posts in business groups, almost daily now with a new story about a client who ghosted them in the middle of a project. It seems to be happening all the time, in different ways. Sometimes it’s in the initial discussion before a contract is signed, which can be frustrating because, as many of you know, it takes a decent amount of time to prepare proposals and quotes. We often spend time talking to the client to get the information so we can build the budget for a project, agree upon terms, and all that fun stuff in between – work that’s essentially done for free before the job is even awarded. Other times work starts and then the client disappears. You have questions that haven’t been answered and you’re left in limbo wondering if you should keep reaching out or call it a day and abandon the project on your end as well. The worst stories I hear are when jobs are completed and the client goes into invisible mode before making the final payment. Those are the times when, all too often a hard lesson is learned about the importance of having detailed contracts signed before work starts, collecting deposits, and not delivering final materials before the account is paid in full. It’s a mistake that usually only gets made once, but it can have a huge affect on a person – mentally and financially. I have only been business ghosted once. It was a few years ago and a new client, but someone I’d known for many years, hired me to get a year’s worth of bookkeeping in order so he could do his taxes for his new company. There was a rush, obviously, so I agreed to a one-month package where I would set up the system and get everything entered myself and then train his team how to maintain it moving forward. Along with the contract, I sent the schedule with all of the deadlines they would need to maintain in order to get it all done in the allotted time. There was also a clause that if the work extended past the month, or if they wanted to keep me on retainer to manage it myself, it would be x amount per month. Standard stuff. I gave them two payment options – pay the full amount with 50% due up front and 50% due before the final training, or 100% due up front at a discounted price. They paid up front, so we were good to go. They missed their deadlines, of course, but we were still able to make progress. I got everything caught up, 1099s mailed out, and everythi