Quote:
Originally Posted by swampman46
I can't think of any other occupation that provides (sells) a service to customers...at the same time, is expected to show those customers the hows, whens, whys and wheres of that service he's providing. Strange.
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I dunno. When I hired consulting foresters, I walked around with them, asked lots of questions, and wanted to learn how they did what they did. Likewise when I hired an arborist, and an appraiser.
Since I am a consulting scientist, I often get the same request and offer the same service to my clients: I teach them how to do the same thing I am doing. Sure, there are times when they just want me to find the answer and put it in a report. But there are times when they want to roll up their sleeves and work with me in the lab every step of the way and see and learn what I am doing. I just estimate how much this may slow things down and communicate that. I'm not worried about future business, because they will never be as good as I am. But I am always eager to teach them what they are willing to learn, because an informed client is a better client.
Several years ago, we consulted on a historic legal case in ballistics. This was the first case in history where the law enforcement agency was penalized by the federal court for spoliation of evidence. But when we did our ballistic testing for the case (long before the penalty and multi-million dollar settlement), the attorneys and the plaintiff were right there in the lab with us discussing the design and execution of every test, taking pictures, trying to understand the implications of the results for trial, etc. It was fortuitous for the clients that the law enforcement agency destroyed the evidence and subsequently settled, because the forensic case was not as strong as the clients were hoping it would be. But knowing that first hand may be why they accepted the settlement rather than pressing for trial.
Now I don't tend to make the same request for car and boat repairs, because I'm not really trying to learn those skills. But I do tend to on home repairs and things I am trying to improve on. And especially the doctor. I don't just want the doctor to fix it, I want to know all the whats, wheres, whys, and hows of the diagnosis, medication, and improvement plan.
I also see guiding as being the fishing pro analogous to being a tennis pro or a golf pro.