Every tech has had this write-up. The outlet in his garage was cracked and gummed up. You told him it wasn’t safe, because it wasn’t. He said no.
Here is why. He has never been shocked out there. It has never tripped on him. So what you told him was a story about something that has never happened.
Now say it the other way. That outlet is broken. If it ever trips, it probably won’t reset. His bandsaw won’t run. Nothing he has plugged in out there will run.
Same problem. Different reason to care.
Chris Elmore puts three things in order on this one. Is it safe. Is it working the way the maker built it to work. And how the customer uses it and lives with it.
Techs rank it safe first. Customers put how they use it first. They can’t tell if it’s running right, so if they can use it the way they want, they figure it must be working, and if it’s working it must be safe. Chris says the logic is 180 degrees out.
He is not telling you to skip the safety talk. If something is unsafe, you have to address it. All three are presented. But lead with what he stands to lose.
People buy on emotion and justify it with logic. A danger he has never lived through isn’t emotional. Losing what he uses every day is.
-Service Excellence
Inside This Episode:
- The three things every customer is weighing: is it safe, is it working right, and can I use it the way I want
- Why you and the customer rank those three in opposite order, and what that costs you on every write-up
- Why “it still works” means “it must be safe” to a homeowner, and what’s hiding behind a switch that turns on fine
- What your customer can actually feel and what they can’t… they notice air and water, but nobody feels electricity
- How to lead with what they stand to lose without skipping the safety talk or the part about it running wrong
- Why selling something that might happen is harder than selling something that will, and how to tell the difference
- The worn-out outlet in the garage, and the one change that would have turned the no into a yes
- Where this matters most: the worn parts that are still running, not the ones that already quit
Episode Chapters & Summary
Rank These Three Things
Chris names the three things at the center of the episode and asks Alex to put them in order. Then he gives the pattern he’s seen from asking this question for years. Techs and homeowners do not answer the same way.
Key takeaways:
- Working right means working the way the maker built it to work. How they live with it means how the customer uses it day to day.
- Safe means damage to people or property, and it’s usually property first.
- Most techs rank it safe, working right, then how they use it.
- Most homeowners put how they use it first. The other two swap around behind it.
- Ask a homeowner straight out if safety matters and he’ll say yes. It still isn’t what he acts on.
What They Can Feel and What They Can’t
Chris splits the trades by whether the customer can sense what you’re working on. It explains why homeowners feel so sure about things they have no way to judge.
Key takeaways:
- With air and water, the customer feels it, smells it, and tastes it. With a sprinkler system, he can see it.
- Nobody touches electricity. He only knows whether his lights and his stuff turn on.
- You can walk in and tell in minutes whether a system is keeping up. It takes him days to notice it isn’t.
- He’s also judging things that aren’t about the system at all… can he be in the house on a hot day, can he be in the house at night.
Why “It Works” Means “It’s Safe” to Him
The assumption the whole episode rests on. Chris walks Alex through it with a light switch and a dimmer, then names what can be wrong behind a fixture that looks perfect.
Key takeaways:
- His thinking goes: I can use it how I want, so it’s working right, so it must be safe.
- “It’s been working fine until yesterday” is normal, and then you find it dirty, out of adjustment, or with a loose connection.
- The light comes on, so nobody asks about the wire size, the box the fan is hanging from, or whether the bulb belongs on a dimmer.
- Most of the time, when something isn’t running the way it was built to run, it also isn’t safe.
Your Thinking Runs the Other Direction
Chris turns to your side of it and names the trap. He’s clear that he isn’t telling anyone to stop talking about safety, only to stop opening with it.
Key takeaways:
- Your job is to make it safe and make it run right. That’s how you were taught.
- From where you stand, he shouldn’t be able to use it at all if it isn’t right. That’s why you skip past how he uses it.
- All three still get presented. If something is unsafe, you have to address it.
- Instead of “this makes it safer,” go with “this is so it works like it should” and “so it doesn’t quit on you.”
The Worn Parts That Are Still Running
Chris tests all of this against real findings, then points to exactly where the problem lives. It isn’t the broken stuff. It’s the stuff that’s failing but hasn’t failed yet.
Key takeaways:
- Dirt cuts down the air moving through the system, so everything works harder, runs hotter, and pulls more power.
- Is it unsafe? Maybe. Is it running right? No. Will it still cool the house? Probably, at least enough that he thinks so.
- Same story with high water pressure. A slow leak soaks the towels under the sink and ruins the cabinet floor, but water still comes out of the faucet.
- When something has fully quit, it sells itself, because he’s already living without it.
The Outlet in the Garage
The case study. An electrician found a cracked, gummed-up outlet in a garage full of equipment, opened with the shock risk, and the customer turned it down. The company sat down afterward and worked through it.
Key takeaways:
- The electrician wouldn’t even test it, because he didn’t believe it would turn back on if it tripped.
- Opening with shock risk meant selling something that might happen.
- He’d never been shocked out there, so it didn’t feel likely to him.
- Said the other way: if it trips, it won’t reset, and nothing in that garage runs.
- Chris gives the company credit for looking back at the call openly instead of letting it go.
Heart First, Then Head
The close. Chris explains why this works, runs the same test on a shutoff valve under a sink, and gives you the fallback for when there’s no feeling to hook into.
Key takeaways:
- People buy with their heart and explain it with their head. With no feeling behind it, there’s no reason to act.
- A danger he’s never lived through, or watched happen to someone close to him, isn’t a feeling.
- Losing something he uses every day is right now, and that is a feeling.
- Shutoff valves are out of sight and out of mind, so nobody has ever found out how they fail.
- If there’s no feeling to hook into, go to the facts. If there’s no relationship, it’s just a transaction.
- Your questions should find out whether anything like this has ever happened to him before.
- Keep telling him about safety. Keep telling him it isn’t running right. Lead with what he loses.
