August 7th, 2008
Financial Woes
I came by an excellent post by my friend Dr. Weber, of brain based business. The post was titled, “Financial Woes That Make You Smarter.” The article was of great interest and I left a comment. As follows is my comment.” It can be humbling, which is a good thing and make one more mature and determined. Also good things, the best thing may be to be more grateful for what you have.It may not make us smarter but we may be forced to use more of our smarts to deliver results. Thanks for something to think about”
Dr. Weber responded to my comment as follows; Hey JD — how goes? I am intrigued by your sense that “It can be humbling, which is a good thing and makes us more mature and determined.”
I’d love to hear a bit more about your notion that - “It may not make us smarter but we may be forced to use more of our smarts to deliver results.”
Can you elaborate a bit more, JD? Any examples
Ok Dr. Weber; here goes,I worked in a business where everything we touched turned to gold. We had the best products, best service, best delivery, best sales force. We were young, in our 20’s and 30’s. We worked hard and played hard and grew business 20 to 40% a year. Many of our competitors and customers thought we were arrongant. I will never forget one day when reviewing our financials, it was presented for the first time in many years our year over year growth was less than 10 %. There was shock in the room, it could not be true.
We discovered doing business the same old way would not work. We had to look at our pricing and profit by customer and product line. We had to market our more profitable products better, we had to treat our most profitable customers better. We had to realize our customers had options and we needed them as much and more than they needed us.
The words I used was mature and determined. The maturity came, because it was no longer about us but rather our customer,Total Customer Satisfaction became a mantra. We did business better and formed closer relationships with our customers. The determination was because, we were used to winning and refused to lose. We no longer took success for granted.
Smarter, no, we could have done business this way from day one. We had the smarts but learned to use what we had.
Dr. Weber, give us some of your examples that might be similar! Thanks for stimulating a post for me. You keep us all thinking. Readers stop by brainbased business, it is a compelling blog!
August 7th, 2008 at 4:50 pm
Wow - I post 2 bits, JD and you zapped it into gold with your amazing story. I loved it and it could easily become a book!! I’d be first in line to buy a copy!
As for my own example. I did less well in business when I focused on losses and missed the open windows and wonderful adventures that come through people like you JD.
When housing fell through the floor I remember to give thanks for the Center and because more caring about others who needed shelter.
Because I pay way to much health care for way to little real service, I have taken far more responsibility for staying healthy.
Because I would meritocratically, I try to stay current in my field and read daily updates on the human brain - so that I can try to inspire and transform workplaces to use more of it.
I’ve come to stop feeling that security is there for my later years, and take far more active care to help make some sense of financial security there because of decisions I make daily.
Wow — I had been impacted by each of the categories I listed at http://www.brainbasedbusiness.com/2008/08/financial_woes_that_make_you_s.html . It’s just that you took my 2 bits and gave back gold. Thanks JD. I look forward to see how others found that financial woes make us smarter! Thanks for your cool offering, friend!
August 7th, 2008 at 11:20 pm
JD, I have to admit that I often learn from the school of hard knocks. Fact is, we often learn much more from our mistakes than our successes… and no matter how mature I get, it doesn’t change!
Thanks for a really great answer to Ellen’s question.
August 8th, 2008 at 5:58 pm
hi Ellen, you have brought a lot of excellent life lessons to your answer.Thank you so much for your kind review of my post. I love your point about health, with out it, we have nothing.
August 8th, 2008 at 6:01 pm
Robyn, thanks for stopping by. If things come too easy, we may take it for granted and not grow but when struggle is involved, with out growth we lose.being mature gives me the cofidence to fight back and not quit.
August 8th, 2008 at 8:20 pm
AKA - GM,Ford,Chrysler and let’s not forget the most arrogant - Starbucks.
You can’t tell me they couldn’t see their market shares declining.
Thanks JD and Dr.Weber.
August 11th, 2008 at 2:04 pm
Morgan, we all know the scenario, all good things come to an end, we never expect it to happen to us! Thanks for the message
August 11th, 2008 at 5:05 pm
I believe every aspiring entrepreneur or business owner should read this post. It is a perfect example of how we learn to grow and manage are business through the mistakes we make along the way.
When growing my business, I made numerous mistakes and literally lost tens of thousands of dollars quickly due to some foolish moves on my part. But as crazy as it may sound, I do not regret any of my mistakes.
Each mistake I made helped me get closer to where I am right now.
August 11th, 2008 at 6:19 pm
How to get your ex back, your comment says it all, thanks for stopping
August 12th, 2008 at 12:45 pm
Thanks Jim for welcoming me to your blog. I’ve been reading this blog for the past few weeks, but I never submitted a comment. I truly believe that this blog has some excellent content…so keep up the good work.
August 12th, 2008 at 3:51 pm
How to, thanks for the kind comment
August 18th, 2008 at 8:15 am
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Thanks
August 19th, 2008 at 4:18 pm
Thanks Passion