Mistakes happen. No one is perfect and we all make make them. When they happen, how do you handle it? If you are the one who made the mistake do you take responsibility and try to rectify it or do you play the blame game and try to push it on to someone else? When someone else makes mistakes – especially when it affects you – do you stay calm and try to work it out or do you “flip out” on the person who made it?
Years ago, when I was a licensed customer service rep for an insurance agency, I made a rather large error. It was a busy day with a lot of people in and out of the office. A particular client came in to make a payment which I stuck in the file “for a sec” to answer the phone. Unfortunately, due to several distractions, I forgot the payment was in there and put the file away. A couple of weeks later, I received a call from the insured informing me of a notice of cancellation of the policy. I pulled the file and there was the money. Oops!
Thankfully, with a call and explanation to the insurance company I was able to get the policy reinstated without penalty after sending copies of of the dated receipt (along with dated receipts from the day and after). The client wasn’t too happy, to say the least, to hear that I forgot to send the payment; however, the client was calm, somewhat understanding and appreciated the effort I made to rectify the situation. (Trust me, I NEVER made that mistake again!)
Fast forward several years. I was about a year or so into my Virtual Assistant business when I made a much smaller blunder. I was working on a project for a client that required a lot of researching, writing and editing. As I was compiling a list of sources for a bibliography, I accidentally left out one of the most quoted sources. Luckily, it wasn’t the final draft nor had the document been printed yet.
Too bad for me, the client found the mistake before I did and was livid. You would have thought I lost a million dollars. I 
answered the phone to hear this person screaming at the other end spewing out all sorts of profanities and calling me incompetent, etc. (In this person’s defense, the client was having a stressful week both professionally and personally.) The experience shook my confidence as a Virtual Assistant and was one of the deciding factors for ending our partnership.
How we react to a situation can strongly diffuse or escalate the problem. The first client remained calm and dealt with the situation as it was. The second blew a small thing into a huge event – even after it was rectified. A few months after the payment incident the first client wrote a letter to my boss commending my work and saying I was the best and most efficient service rep the client ever dealt with (still have that letter 
). A few months after the editing mistake, the second client and I parted ways.
Lessons learned and confirmed:
1. Take responsibility. If you make a mistake, own up to it, rectify it, and move on. No matter how the other person reacts, doing the right thing is the only thing.
2. Stay calm. Getting out of sorts and flipping out will not change the situation. As a matter of fact, it can make it worse.
3. Choose partnerships wisely. In the second example, I knew in my gut the client wasn’t ideal, but I didn’t listen. I’ve since learned my lesson and now have a discernment process in place for prospective clients – which includes discussing how we react to mistakes. (If you still don’t believe me, ask my current client, Anne -but that’s a whole other story!)
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