How do you push back or say no to clients feedback without being labeled as difficult or hard to work with?

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- Listen first

- Pick your fights.

- Study the brief and the strategy, and use vocabulary straight from the approved strategy to back up your decision.

- Make other people see how passionate your about something.

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additionally, get people on the same boat as you. Power in numbers.

Enlist your strategist. I love taking pushback to account.

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Unless you plan on winning an award for the work, just do the feedback. If you think it’s award winning stuff, compromise, find a solution that works for you and them and is supported by the strategy.

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Yes, protect the work from the client in this case. What the client wants is different from what people hiring us want most of the time...

The goal is to do both, but it's increasingly harder when clients follow a best practices book that everyone else also does.

But of course this will not happen always and we need to be smart about what hill to die on.

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Listen first. It’s not you vs the client. The client and you, are on the same side. It’s you and the client vs the problem. Always make sure the client sees it this way too. If the client thinks you have their best interest in mind, they will listen. But only if you listen first.

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Love this perspective!

My last boss was notorious for doing so but his track record allowed him to. My current boss isn’t nearly as accomplished and we let the client walk all over us.

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Back it with a factual reason why you’re pushing back.

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Never underestimate the power of basic good listening, and basic people skills. Pushing back isn’t bad, and doesn’t get you automatically labeled as difficult. being contrarian or negative without sound reasoning gets you labeled as difficult, because that’s how it’s experienced. delivering push-back respectfully and personably because you paid attention, considered the full situation and believe it’s truly in the best interest of the work/client/team is good management and good client service.

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If you feel strongly, push back once gently so it's on the record, then do what they want.

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