When I first started out in business, if I lost an account that I had pitched I would spend a lot of time being upset with the client and obsessing over who had won the account and why. My competitive nature would not allow me to let it go. I continued this pattern of thinking for some time in my early career, until a conversation with a big player in the industry showed me a different perspective.
This highly-skilled broker had just lost a huge account, and he spent the entirety of our conversation rehashing every detail of the deal and all the reasons why the client had made the wrong choice in picking the firm they chose. As he continued to vent on and on about the lost deal, I marveled at the amount of emotion and thought he put into his rant. If that wasn’t enough, he also showed me a 10-page letter that he sent to the decision-maker at the company explaining what a terrible decision they had made and how they needed to change their minds and hire him right away. Needless to say, he still didn’t get the account.
It was after this experience that I realized expending all this emotion and effort on lost deals was a waste of my time and energy. All of the rehashing and over-thinking never won back a deal I had lost, and it didn’t help me win any new business either. Instead, I started putting all that emotion and energy to good use. Whenever I lose an account, I try to roll the frustration into looking for new opportunities.
There is value is reviewing what you could have done differently that might have helped you win the business. But give yourself a set time period to reflect on that question, and then move on. Focus your attention where it will actually do you some good. All of us lose accounts from time to time, even after decades of experience in the business. The most successful people are the ones who can bounce back after a loss and use that energy to refocus on getting a win.
Have a great weekend,
Ro