Never Ignore the Spouse

One of my clients shared with me an experience, he and his wife had, with a home improvement company, that has a powerful lesson for every business owner.
Just recently, he and his wife had some of their skylights in their condominium replaced due to some leaking. The company that they hired to do the work, finished on time, and delivered what they said they were going to do and did an excellent job. However, my client and his wife have decided never to use this contractor again.

Here is what happened that led to this decision. Throughout the course of the project, his wife would email questions to the owner of the company. He would in turn, call or email the husband with the response. Each time this happened it bothered my client’s wife. I must add, my client and his wife are both professionals, with excellent paying jobs, and they both equally share their household financial responsibilities.

The Final Straw
Finally the straw that broke the camel’s back, came when his wife emailed this contractor for a copy of the invoice. In response the owner emailed the copy of the invoice back to the husband and thanked “him” for his business. The husband forwarded it to his wife to file into their records. His wife then replied to her husband, extremely angry, that she felt as if she had been ignored by this company owner. His refusal to acknowledge her in her requests for information throughout the project, communicated that he did not recognize her as an equal in this transaction.

Clarify Your Communication
Despite the fact that this company did an outstanding job in completing the work, they failed to communicate properly to both husband and the wife. Unfortunately, whether it was due to carelessness, ignorance or pure bias, this contractor lost any chance of being hired, or any referrals, by this couple again. This could have been avoided had the contractor in the beginning, clarified which person (or both) needed to be communicated with throughout the project, and followed through in that manner.


Tom Borg is president of Tom Borg Consulting, LLC. He is a business consultant, speaker, coach and author. He helps companies and organization become more profitable by showing them how to attract and retain their clients.