The one thing I was taught early on was to answer questions BEFORE they are asked whenever it made sense to do so. For example, a supervisor of mine asked a question "Who can we ask about the operation of a Sewage Treatment Plant in that area?" , (he was asking an operator question that a design Engineer would not normally know the answer to). Keep in mind this was before the Internet was operational or even invented. An Engineer I worked with was able to find a yellow pages book for that area, get in touch with 2 operators in the area we were designing for and got the names and phone numbers for 2 different STP Operators. He went back to his supervisor with the names of the operators, their phone numbers, the name of the company's they worked for, and he even took it a step further. Knowing we were designing a clarifier I called a local construction company that had built Sewage Treatment Plants before and got the names fo the company's that actually made the clarifier equipment and he provided all that information to his supervisor. The Engineer went above further ahead and gathered information knowing our supervisor would need more information. If he didn't, it was wasted time, but the chances of it saving time while you're into it made sense and paid off.
Learning from the Engineer I worked with years ago, and now managing EngineerSupply, I see this with our ability to answer our customer service questions before they are asked. For example, someone contacts us asking if we have an interior laser level. We respond with not just a "yes we do", but an email stating yes, we have interior laser levels, and point them out, name the various brands of laser levels, and show prices. We mention that some are powered with alkaline batteries and some have rechargeable battery packs and that many times the various models will only do one or other other and not interchangeable between alkaline and rechargeable. Working this way by going a step further by answering questions before they are asked is extremely helpful and efficient. I always think of the worst case scenario where someone emails us asking if we have (for example) a T-Square for drafting. Our customer service replies with "yes we have those". Then the customer replies, "what do they cost?", then our customer service replies "they range from $12 to $30". Then the customer replies to that asking "what length are they?" and our person replies "we have various lengths" and the customer replies "do you have a 24" model?" and it goes on and on back and forth until someone either gives up or 2 days have passed. We train with this scenario as an example and try to always answer questions before they are asked. In this example the customer would ask "Do you have T-Square for Drafting?", our reply should be something like this; "Yes, we do have T-Squares for Drafting. We have various lengths to choose from. If you let me know the length of the one you're looking for I can email you a link to the product page. They vary in length and price and here is the link to our page that shows all the drafting t-squares we sell."
