Voice of the Customer....how do you speak to it?

Everyone knows that the voice of the customer must be heard in order for a requirement to be valid. But, how do we handle it when this voice is ....... all wrong.

All too often, we come up like cape crusaders, with noble intentions to solve a problem. And, we could, if left to our own devices. We use our metrics to demonstrate value for a solution that we know will work. We expect to win the enemy over to our side using hard facts and plain simple logic. When we are done, we expect they would be adopting our ways, success on hand, marching off to the sunset ....... as would a dream customer.

Little do we know, the customer engaged us with a bias, an expectation for a solution they have in their heads, that they use over and over, with repeated failure. (After all, wasn't this why we were called to the rescue?)

Not any of our metrics works to sway this customer. It does defy logic, but, this customer decides to go the opposite way from what the metrics say they should. I wonder. Would I have met with more acceptance if I probed my customer for this expectation and tailored my communication of my solution to that expectation (that is, instead of trying to push my agenda using my own communication style)? Maybe, I should have tailored the message to the way this customer wanted to hear it.