A friend shared this story:

I serve on the board of a small nonprofit, currently serving as board president. I’ve been in that role a short time, just learning my way. We work with a local bank – a few branches, strong reputation for service. We have certificates of deposit with them and a small line of credit. Small stuff, we’re not a big organization. One of our staff is the primary contact with the bank.

The bank holds an annual reception for clients and prospects; they invited me to participate. Happy to do it – a good opportunity to meet our relationship manager (whom I’d not yet met), connect with some other non-profit folk and, perhaps, chat-up some potential donors. Show up, have a drink, meet whoever is there.

The reception was in a fancy hotel, beautiful room, lots of space, about 100 people there. One of the bank’s lenders greeted me when I arrived. I’d never met the guy before. After we’d spoken for a bit, I started to circulate in the room to see who was who.

As I walked past a cluster of people in blue suits standing near the bar, a sharply dressed, bespectacled gentleman with neatly cropped white hair turned, extended his hand toward me to shake hands, and said, “Hello, I’m Joe Goodwin, president of the bank. And you’re architect Fred Smith. Thank you for coming tonight. We appreciate your business and I enjoyed reading about your work on your website, particularly the Meadows project.“

“I was flabbergasted,” said my friend. “I’d never met the man. My first thought was, ‘how great to be recognized like this.’ The guy’s a bank PRESIDENT! We are a tiny client.  My name tag included only my name and the name of my non-profit. How would he know about my architect practice? My second thought was, ‘He has seriously out-prepared me for this meeting’.”

Nick Miller is President of Clarity Advantage based in Concord, MA. He assists banks and credit unions to generate more and more profitable relationships, faster, with business clients, their owners, and their employees through better sales strategies and execution. Additional articles on Clarity’s web site.