We want to keep our customers happy—we want to provide great customer service and make sure that we have endeared ourselves to the customers and clients who make up our business market. However, we can only do so much and there are those days when as much as we want to be able to jump to our customer’s needs, we just don’t have the time. Instead of making promises we cannot keep, it is okay to let people know that we won’t be able to get to their request as soon as we both would like…
I have learned over the years that it is perfectly okay, and not the slightest bit unprofessional to tell people: “I don’t have time to do that today, I have other priorities and this one will have to wait.” It is even better if we can give them an approximation of when we will be able to get to their request, complaint or project so they will know that we are not really ignoring them or putting them off, but we are trying to organize our time and prioritize tasks.
So, rather than ignore customer or client requests, or make promises to accomplish something that we won’t be able to do well (which ends up making us look unprofessional and like poor time managers), it is far better to simply state the truth and let people know that our plates are full and we cannot take on another task. This way, they will know where we are at, and they can take the task to someone else if it absolutely needs to be done today—or, they will most likely be willing to wait for us to handle it when we can. Meanwhile, we are furthering our reputation for being honest and direct, not to mention conscientious.
See Also: Being Reliable Still Works
Doing Business Without Making Excuses
When Other Want and Expect You to be Perfect