“If you’re challenged again, don’t go small”

Creative Career Conundrums is a weekly advice column from If You Could Jobs. Each week their selected panel of professionals from the creative industry answers your burning career questions to help you navigate the creative journey.

This week’s question:

“I’m a pretty new addition to a group of creative units with a big client. I don’t think I impressed them well enough, so when I present they vocally quiz or reject it. I tried having other people present my ideas, and it was received better. I'm not the world’s best presenter but I’ve worked as an instructor and workshop leader.

How do you deal with a client that seems biased against you when you present anything? ”

Kat Wong, founder of career change platform Oh Yeah:

My first response is: What support are you getting from your own team and manager to understand the client and their expectations better, especially as a new addition?

As well as getting to know the culture of this new unit and overall on boarding, have they gone through the house style with clients? By that, I mean walking through each account and the clients’ expectations. That includes certain points they value and want to see in all of your pitches.

My first port of call would be to talk to your manager – share how you’d like to understand the client further and see what your manager has noticed too.

Because you don’t reveal in your question is what your team thinks of the clients – but instead, your assumptions. Can they share their experience and help you navigate what could be biases or repeat behaviour from this big client? For example, are they interrupting you more than other folks on your team, or do they do that to everyone? This could reveal a lot.

But essentially, this is about understanding your audience: who they are, what they like and don’t like, and what they actually value. Once you dig into those nuances, this is where you can course correct, iterate and rehearse multiple times with colleagues. Then go for it – present to the client. Don’t ever devalue your own skills by passing over the presenting duties to other people on your team. Your team and manager should back you up – that’s why they got you on board in the first place.

On the presentation, if you’re challenged again, don’t go small. Redirect and respond by saying “That’s a fair question. Can you share more about your concern so I can understand further?” Or, “We did consider those points”, and then share more context behind the decision-making. Sharing your thinking and the context behind all your decisions aids clarity to the client, and it also builds up trust.

Once you get to know this client more, with a better understanding of how to better to manage their expectations, it will help them re-see you. The shift will begin, as will the dynamics, and a more positive perception will soon follow. Be consistent with that, and it will grow from there.

In answering your creative career conundrums we realise that some issues need expert support, so we’ve collated a list of additional resources that can support you across things that might arise at work.

If You Could is the jobs board from It’s Nice That, the place to find jobs in the creative industries.

Want to stay on top of your job search? Or keep an ear out for when your dream job arrives on our site? Click here to set up tailored job alerts arriving straight into your inbox so you never miss an opportunity. See below for the latest opportunities: