Childish, Dishonest Or Unethical?
Posted by Mitch Mitchell on Feb 16, 2016
I was recently talking to a friend of mine who's also an independent consultant. I asked her how things were going and she said they were a bit slow to start the year. That happens as a consultant.
This also happens.
She said that someone we both worked with a couple of years ago called her out of the blue and said there was a possibility of a project opening up that she was easily qualified for. They went back and forth via email and set up a time to talk to each other on the phone. When that time came... nothing. The other person missed the call. My friend called a few times, sent an email... nothing; as if she dropped off the face of the earth.
She asked me what I thought about it. Unfortunately, I know the symptoms because I've personally dealt with the same thing over the years.
I had the same kind of thing happen to me last year. Someone called me and, after talking a brief bit of time said she could use someone like me for some projects her hospital needed. We set up a time when I could call her back because she said she had another meeting. I called her at that time and went straight to voicemail. I tried a couple more times that day, then a couple more times that week... I knew I would probably never hear from her, and I didn't.
At the time I didn't necessarily think it was strange because that's happened quite a few times over the years. People will call me out of the blue, ask some questions, say they'd like to talk to me further and I never hear from them again. It's happened to my wife and I at our house, where we've had people stop by to give us estimates on projects and we never hear from them again, or we've made appointments for them to stop by and they never come.
The thing is, in those cases you can't take it personal because you don't know those people. In the case of my friend, although she wasn't close friends they had worked together on previous projects, so it stung a bit more. Still, when all is said and done, you have to give it a name of some kind.
I've thought about this subject in the past. At first I called it childish because that's the kind of thing a child would do. Children are known to hide from things that scare them in an attempt to act like they never happened. In most cases I don't like ascribing childish feelings to adults so I threw that one out.
I next called it dishonest because most of the time those folks initiated the conversation, or agreed to the conversation, when they might never have had any intention to follow through in the first place. The problem with that line of thought is that it's hard to say someone is dishonest without knowing their motivation for not following through.
For me, that leaves only one thing, and it's the most egregious thing I can think of; lack of ethics, or unethical behavior. In essence, the initial contact or agreement was made with good intentions, something got in the way, and instead of owning up to it you decided to avoid it. That's intentionally playing with someone else's emotions and beliefs; that's unethical and shows a great lack of integrity.
This is something I've never done. I never tell anyone I can or will do something I either don't think I can or will. I won't commit to something I'm not totally sure of until I've thought about it for a while, and if I decide against it I'll always contact the person to tell them. I don't like to leave people hanging on a thread waiting for me; I feel it's the ethical thing to do in laying it on the line. It might hurt feelings but the other option seems more cruel long term.
The way I see it, the only legitimate reason for doing something like this is if the other person died; that's the one thing they have no control over so it's forgivable. In every other case, at least a phone call or email could have been sent at some point.
That's what I told my friend; it made her feel better. That's because it's easier to write off unethical people than those who act childish or are dishonest. The best thing is that you're probably never going to see those folks again; personally, I can live with that.
Are my thoughts too harsh? Let me know your thoughts.
Hi, Mitch
This kind of behavior is very common in business field. But we should discourage the continuation of that. I believe it is cruel because they were wasting your time which is very expensive commodity. Just like you said they could at least leave a message to you.
If I were you, I will at least leave a message for him that he could at least leave a message for you the deal could be continued in professional politeness.
Sorry that you had that experience!
Stella Chiu
Stella, my experience was this past summer, and I left multiple messages, the last one saying I wouldn’t call again and would wait for her to call. The other instance was my friend’s story, and she did the same thing after a while. At some point you just have to move on; you just don’t have to like it.
We’ve had many past instances in our small remodeling business that resulted in a good intentioned site visit, lots of information given out to prospective clients and promise of work to follow and then nothing. In that case, the potential client has gotten a lot of things from us for free, and usually a price quote, that can then be shopped around.
Since we have matured and value our time, we charge a $45.00 fee to come out, which can be applied to the work when the job is accepted and engaged. It may not work the same exactly for a writer, however, the caller, “unethical, yes” as our “prospects” in this case are , if they had to go through a webpage proposing a possible project first, and dedicated some information about themselves, rather than access you on the phone, it might separate the serious from the mere flirtations. Bottom line is, even when work is slow, the most reliable leads come from word of mouth, previous serious projects affiliates and direct contact at events.
Love your blog Mitch.
Diane Bostick
Hi Diane; welcome to the blog!
It’s interesting that you do that because I had just heard from a friend of mine in Virginia yesterday that it’s the norm where she lives but no one’s ever asked us for that here; wild! In this case I have to admit that we’ve had lots of these types of proposals but after the first few years we stopped “trying” to call folks back because our house felt like it had fallen into a black hole where folks made appointments to come here and never showed or said they’d send us a written proposal and never did, nor ever answered the phone again. Years of that and you start feeling jaded; still, it’s a point to consider.