By John Alan Turner

I had a call with a prospective client last week. And I knew, almost immediately after, that I’d missed it.

Heck, I knew it while it was happening.

Nothing dramatic happened. No one got upset. No one hung up abruptly. If you listened in, you might even think it went fine.

But I knew.

I whiffed.

I went in expecting one kind of conversation — business coaching. Within a few minutes it turned into something else. Intellectual property. Books. A different lane.

That usually doesn’t bother me. I can move between those worlds pretty easily. But this time, for whatever reason, something in me tightened.

And when it did, I reached for authority.

My voice got a little more certain. My sentences got a little more polished. I started sounding like someone who had this all figured out instead of someone who was actually paying attention.

It’s subtle, but I can feel the shift when it happens.

I also had an outcome in mind. Not a vague one. A very specific one. In my head I had already spent the money. I knew where I was going to dinner to celebrate and everything. 

That’s usually the tell.

When I’m already living in the outcome, I’m not in the conversation anymore. I’m in the result.

And when I’m in the result, I stop listening.

Not completely. Just enough. Enough to miss what’s actually happening underneath what the other person is saying.

I gave him good information.

That’s not the point.

Information is everywhere.

What he needed was someone to stay with him long enough to understand what was actually happening.

And I moved too soon.

There’s a version of me in those conversations that’s very steady. No rush. No performance. No need to prove anything. Just listening. Asking the next honest question. Letting the conversation take its own shape — almost like a dance.

That’s where the work actually happens.

This wasn’t that version.

This was the slightly tighter version. The one that sounds competent but feels a little…manufactured. Still helpful. Just not connected. And connection is the whole thing.

Not the framework.

Not the insight.

The feeling that someone is with them…instead of working on them.

There was a moment on the call where I could feel myself trying to steer it. Not aggressively. Just enough to nudge it toward where I want it to go. Like trying to guide the conversation into a lane it hadn’t chosen.

I’m sure he felt that — even if he couldn’t name it.

I’m not going to beat myself up about it. That doesn’t help anything.

But I am going to pay attention to it.

Because this is the kind of moment that tells the truth about how I work.

When I’m off, I try to control the direction.

When I’m on, I pay attention to what’s already there.

I didn’t close the sale. That part stings a little. But that’s not the part I’m interested in.

The moment I’m paying attention to is when I stopped listening to help him and started listening to prove myself. My worth. My value. My expertise.

That’s where the whiff happened.

That’s also where the correction starts.

Next time I feel that tightening, I want to notice it sooner.

Take a breath.

Let go of the outcome.

Come back to the person in front of me.

That’s the work.

Not closing.

Not performing.

Not proving anything.

Just staying present long enough for something real to happen, because, if I do that, the rest tends to take care of itself.

Slowly.

Which, I’m learning, is how most things that matter actually happen.