How do you get sellers to share their what-went-wrong war stories with you?

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by a professional from University of Southern California
in North Palm Beach, FL, USA

7yrs ago

How do you get sellers to share their what-went-wrong war stories with you?

I encourage my buyer-clients to probe business owners and sellers for their war stories.

Listening to stories about what went wrong can be illuminating. And not hearing them can be a big error or omission for buyers.

Hearing war stories is better than being in a war, isn't it?

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reply by a searcher 7yrs ago
from University of Illinois at Urbana in Champaign, IL, USA

From my experience with people, when you are bonding with them, they like talking about stories that make them feel good. I would say a war story is a great example of talking about themselves and it makes them feel good about themselves. Definitely agree to this.

reply by a searcher 5yrs ago
from University of Oxford in Basel, Switzerland

Agree. Hearing war stories and difficult times is very valuable and part of a constructive learning process.
Being able to learn from those with humility is key.