At the dawn of the year 2000 just after the dizziness of prolonged working hours a couple of months before to avoid the much-publicised New Year “catastrophe”, I drove to a British automaker’s dealership in Sandton in a 1996 Japanese car. That was after I had spent almost a year in 1999 waiting for the German automaker’s dealership to deliver on my order of their imported sedan. Having endured many revisions of the delivery date and the lack of enthusiasm from their sales agents, I took a drive in my short pants, sandals and a golf-shirt to this British carmaker’s dealership. Though I was willing to consider the British carmaker’s offerings, I was not convicted then about buying their car.
Nevertheless, as I stepped into the dealership casually, younger sales agents took one glance at me and continued to ignore me. I proceeded to look at new cars on the floor. Mind you, their lowest or bottom of the range model then was an equivalent of a BMW 5 Series or Mercedes Benz E-Class. Nothing in the BMW 3-series class. To those youngster, I was just another time-waster not worth spending time talking to.
On seeing younger sales agent positioned closer to the entrance unmoved by my arrival, the older looking salesman, probably in his mid 60s, left his desk at the far end of the dealership floor, and with a broad smile on his face, greeted me and shook my hand.
I politely and quickly quibbled that I was there just to “look” at their beautiful cars, to which he reassured me that he was also not there to pressure me, but to make himself available in need to explain the car’s features, technology and capabilities.
Fair enough, he went on to fetch keys of one of the cars on the floor, started it and began to show me around and explained many other interesting features about the car. He even offered to take me on a test drive right away, but I politely declined. I reminded him that I was not buying but just looking and that I was driving a cheaper Japanese car. Deep in my heart I knew I was in the market for something serious and that the marque wasn’t too far off what I could consider buying. Nevertheless, he again told me he just wanted me to know more about what I was looking at. He proceeded to give me his business card.
Though I tried hard pretending to be indifferent and the car being way “above my tax bracket” as today’s social media snobs would say, I was moved by the salesman’s humility, patience and respect he showed me that I decided that evening to return the next morning to give him an “Offer To Purchase” deal. The rest as they say, is history. By Nimroth Gwetsa, 30 May 2018.
This story shows the power of humility, respect for people regardless of their circumstances or appearance and diligence at one’s work and how that can make a huge difference in securing, not only a deal, but a lifelong “fruitful” relationship.
I went on to become his regular customer, buying a couple more cars afterwards, until the day he retired about seven years from our first encounter. Those youngish sales agents who initially ignored me, were suddenly trying to “steal” me away from him, secretly giving me deals, hoping I’ll “betray” my old man for them. I wondered how they could ever think I would want to do business with them when they took me for granted initially.
I have also seen the opposite behaviour and its consequences. This time involving entrepreneurs stretching themselves beyond their capacity and “burning” trying to please people. They did this to appear humble and win over clients or new deals, but all they got in return were people taking advantage of them, to their detriment.
Indeed, there is a fine line between acceptable humility that secures deals and arrogance or snobbery that definitely loses an entrepreneur deals and also excessive humility that borders on naivety or indecisiveness resulting in loss of money, time and resources. Ours is to avoid being trapped in any of these behaviours.
How then could we know what the right approach should be in any situation?
You can’t please everyone but can be at peace with everyone. The trick is to avoid writing off anyone. One’s current status is no permanent mark of one’s lot or ending in life.
I have seen both sides of the extremes: others having risen to powerful positions and “lording it over” junior colleagues, making them feel they were done a favour working for those bosses, and others afraid of making anyone absurd by trying to please everyone. None of these character examples are good for any entrepreneur.
Some entrepreneurs end up agreeing to doing things they would ordinarily not do because they are concerned about “what-ifs”. They worry about “what if I will lose or this may turn out great and I rejected it?”
While doing good and taking precautions are good, you can’t be following every noise or trying to appease everyone lest they succeed materially and you regret having rejected them before. Our general approach in life should be to actively do good where we can with whatever we can to and for everyone. But we cannot let our lives be ruled by fear. We cannot also try to please everyone, for there will always be those we can never please even if we tried.
If we are not unkind or evil towards others, we should worry less about “what-ifs”. The real “what if” is if you cannot learn to say “no” decisively, you will be easily distracted. And even if you believe saying “yes” would enable you one day to benefit from their improved economic status, you cannot live expecting your success to hinge on others’ contribution. This will make you lose focus on what you need to do, but spend time looking for people to help you.
Help is like a credit facility, often goes to people who don’t need it, at least at the time it was offered. You attract it by not expecting it. And when you go out looking for it, it’s like you’re actively looking for an albatross.
Key is to treat everyone with respect and honourably. Do not cheat anyone and do not take advantage of anyone. You may not think you will have to account for your behaviour one day, but time will come, unexpectedly, where you will be in so much need, you will have few choices to help you out of the predicament. Besides, peace comes when your conscience is clear. Such clarity, not brought about by killing any sense of morality or ethical behaviour in you but from your good deeds, will come from knowing you are right with everyone and have no reason to look (back) over your shoulder.
We take advantage of others by actively doing so, or by ignoring them or their plight, or by delaying doing the good they deserve of us. We should never be too busy to act quickly on doing good that can enable someone else. The next time you are tempted to postpone because you feel a little lazy, think of the adverse effect and setback you are causing others to endure, at their cost, let alone losses you could incur.
Difficult times should reveal your true self and not “transform” you into a bad person willing to ignore all things simply to pursue your (selfish) goals. Goodness follows those “sailing against the wind” of popular behaviour of bending rules during hard times. Understandably, difficult times means the situation is not easy and success seeming elusive. The delusion is that it seems easier to remedy pain by opting for easier way out even if it’s unethical so long as you perceive chances of getting caught being slim.
Ironically, smaller problems appear bigger than they really are considering how others in worse off situation seem to adapt to their circumstances. Even with hunger pangs being greater when one is on diet, the body eventually adjusts to low food intake, and hunger pangs become scarcer thereafter. Some experiences of difficulties are a test of one’s resolve.
They say you can overcome one bad addiction by replacing it with a good addiction. It follows then that to overcome any challenges, we must find good things we could turn our attention and energy to so their accomplishment can lead us to desired outcomes and achievement of goals we have been yearning for.
As we go about our endeavours and “minding our businesses”, we should always remember to be kind to those we encounter and actively do good, yet be decisive to say “no” without losing our humility.
We are interdependent, even if we do not agree or want to separate ourselves from others. We will never realise our potential if we suppress others and are reluctant to doing good, not just in all we do, but for others too.