My successes in business appear to be like bottles blown about by the wind, scattered randomly to areas of the garden with no apparent purpose of why they have landed where they landed.
My first corporate clients were not a result of conscious and active networking. The contract came from my lecturer who observed me doing a presentation and coaching practice for my Masters degree in Management Coaching. I had put a lot of effort into the preparation of my presentation and coaching session; there was a lot of me in there; my style; my thoughts. I never thought she would recommend me to a fellow coach to work with a corporate client. And yet she did. My learning from this is that preparation is important and that I should always give of my best irrespective of the situation; whether consciously networking or not.
My sales leads have come when I have least expected them and not in the way I expected. I regularly write articles for my website and took up the opportunity to write an article for a freelance platform. And out of this, an online SME magazine contacted me to write monthly coaching articles. Again, unexpected.
I enquired one day about an introductory course I was interested in and I was invited to send through my CV and business profile to be placed on a database for future work. It seemed so random. My intent was not to solicit business. My learning from this? I don’t know…perhaps just to continue pursuing things I enjoy without expecting anything in return…?
I have also found that doing things, for example connecting with people to show an interest in who they are and seeing them, really seeing them has had a positive spin-off for me, in that I am just glad I could make somebody’s day a bit brighter. And I never used to be that way. I was always task-driven, motivated to achieve the purpose I had set out to complete, but now I take the time to “see people”. Has this led to the sales leads I have experienced? Do random acts of kindness with no expectation of reciprocation lead to successes?
I try and “say yes” to a variety of things even though it takes me out of my comfort zone. I do it just to get the experience, to learn. I often don’t do it to consciously to network but rather to learn from the experience. I find that if I think too hard or try too hard I am less successful in generating sales leads than if I just connect with a person or activity. So now I often just relax my networking attempts and let the chips fall where they want.
I think the scattered bottles suggest to me that as business people we can plan for what we want to achieve and how we want to achieve it but we need to be open to the random opportunities that present themselves. Sometimes when we relax the business mind we open our hearts and connect better with people. And sometimes… we need to prepare well and then just let it be.