Would an investment manager gaurantee results!?
I thought that was the point of getting the CFA!?
Men’s Wearhouse offers a guarantee.
^ Would that be an ethics violation?
“You’ll like the way your returns look. I guarantee it.”
sure you can. tutors guarantee certain grades/scores for their students
any sort of guarantee based on opinion like “if you arent satisfied with your haircut, it’s free” is something out of your control as well.
I’ll make this easy for everyone since as interesting as this discussion has been, it has also taken a lot of bandwidth. I just want to say that while I make no presumptions that Vandelay Industries had any interest in enrolling me for my advisory, I also have no plans to accept such a client. VD, I understand you have some pretty deep rooted ideas about how I should be running my coaching practice, and you’re entitled to your opinion. However, perhaps there is another coach out there that is more amenable to your particular personality and need for ‘guarantees’. I hope you find the help you need in your job search, and wish you all the best.
You are of course welcome to run your practice however you would like. Im not telling you how to, and if it came off that way, I apologize. All I did was ask if you had considered offering a guarantee and then I was lambasted for it and simply had to try to defend why I asked the question. Thanks for the well wishes. I hope I do too.
Guarantees are the worst idea for the following reasons:
-
Satisfaction and utility differs from individual to individual. As a result, you are operating within a realm of relativism. This would require a coach to understand and anticipate all possible permutations of outcomes related to the services he/she provides.
-
Coaches are finite individuals with only a certain degree of influence and control. In turn, there are numerous circumstances and scenarios that could inhibit a desired outcome from occurring. Meaning, coaches do not have control over your application of the tools provided to you, the managers interviewing you, the application process, the HR departments, etc.
-
Failure is inevitable. All individuals are imperfect, flawed beings thus consistently promising perfection (i.e. “guarantees”) is impossible. The premise of guarantees is based upon an assumption that an imperfect being can never and will never obtain anything lower than perfect standards.
Guarantees used by most businesses aren’t “true” guarantees. It’s a pscyhological ploy to take your money and keep you coming back. There’s a reason why fund managers don’t guarantee XX% ROI…it’s impossible!
Good coaches are defined by their results. Professional coaching is analogous to athletic coaching. Do NBA/NFL/Lacrosse/Soccer/Track/NHL coaches guarantee medals, trophies, and titles? No, it’s not possible (as a caveat, you may hear a rare coach make a “guarantee” but we all know what happens after they offer up those type of statements…he/she gets fired!).
I understand all of those points, but in anonymous online coaching, the situation is a little different. Not saying he would, but Numi, or any career coach could take the money and provide poor services that the customer does not find helpful and does not feel he got his money’s worth for.-And there is no real recourse for the customer. They are simply out 2 grand and no better off than when they started. A guarantee certainly doesnt waive all this risk, of course. Online coaching is just an implicitly risky purchase, especially considering the price.
in real life, coaching payments are typically installment based, and so in order to receive full payment, satisfactory services must be provided. Numi takes his upfront
^dp103 said, "Guarantees are the worst idea for the following reasons:…"
Moreover, according to Jochen Wirtz , who did extensive research on service guarantee using a before‐after experimental design (see references here) have observed the following (emphasis mine) : “ The impact of an explicit guarantee on purchase intent was strong for the good quality provider, but there was no change in the purchase intent for the outstanding provider. There are two plausible reasons for this. First, purchase intent was already high for the outstanding provider; hence it might have been difficult to boost the ratings much further. Second, the outstanding provider might have already captured the high-end of the market, even when it did not offer an explicit guarantee. Thus, the impact of providing an explicit guarantee would be minimal and it would be difficult for, for example, a highly rated hotel to attract new customers by signalling higher quality. For service providers whose reputations have been strongly established, guarantees may not be necessary since they might be incongruent with their image and might create confusion in the market. ”
So if Numi considers himself an “outstanding provider” having captured a part of the “high-end market”, he rightly thinks providing any guarantee is simply not an essential requirement for him to increase the ‘purchase intent’ of his potential customer.
In addition, as pointed above by someone, service guarantees are not necessary for companies whose quality is beyond control in the presence of external factors. When realizing that there was a lack of control over its railroad infrastructure, Amtrak decided to drop a service guarantee that included the reimbursement of train fares in the event of unpunctual service.
Once again, Im not telling him how to run his business. He clearly is successful and doesnt need any help. All I was doing was justiifying my question from earlier where I asked if he offered one and explaining how it would make me personally feel better
dp013 and mygos are exactly right. I run my coaching practice as it is, and have my policies on payments and guarantees for a reason. All high end coaches can and should do the same thing, because it makes total sense from a business perspective. Specifically, we want to ensure quality control not only in the services we provide, but also in the clients or customers we deal with. There is a certain type of client that is essentially a cancer to running a smooth business. Even a company as diversified and client-centric as Amazon has blacklists for bad apples. Vandelay Industries, notwithstanding the fact that you are still a MBA student with little practical work experience by your own admission, I do recognize that you are totally free to express your opinions. However, in reality you don’t need to justify your opinions to me or really anyone else here. I know you’re not looking for my services, but I am also not interested in your clientele either now or in the future. Therefore, this discussion on many levels is moot. I know deep down inside you probably feel the need to explain or justify something based on what I’ve just said. I encourage you to fight that urge and move on. Just a word of general advice, as so many other here have already explained, when you need help in so many ways with your job ssearch or in life, just try not to be do argumentative. It will serve you well. Thank you.
Vandelay- you are killing the quality of these boards by inundating it with garbage.
I don’t get what it takes for you to get this through your skull but move on.
The point of a message board is for discussion and debate. None of the topics on here really “matter”. We are all here to discuss and go back and forth with each other and have an interesting and entertaining time. Why should I move on and not say anything? Why is it ok for you and other posters to say things, but not me? Just because my opinion doesnt agree with everyone elses?
If he did this, he would be out of business very quickly. Reputation is everything in personal services.
Doubtfu imo. If someone posted a thread tomorrow about a bad experience with numi, it’s doubful anyone would care or do anything. There would be no proof or anything. It would just be Numi’s word versus the other guy
Also, guys, when I have mentioned guarantees before, im talking about a guarantee of a certain level of effort and time, not a specifc performance neccessarily. Working anonymously over the internet, and receiving pay prior to starting is not exactly a big incentive to put your blood, sweat, and tears into the work
Judging by the quality of Numi’s posts here, I would give him the benefit of the doubt. Numi isn’t only a handle name on a message board, it has become a brand.
AFusername1234, geo and former trader, thanks for the thoughts. You guys are awesome. I do also have to thank Vandelay Industries. The irony was that all the comments he had made about my coaching practice led to a significant increase in my client work over the last week. In fact, multiple clients cited the extra attention from Vandelay Industries as a key reason for enlisting my services. I guess these people did their research and came to a vastly different conclusion from Vandelay Industries, which should not be surprising to anyone. Thanks again!