This Real Life Story is loosely based on the real life experiences of your Uncle Ralph which he shares with other entrepreneurs in his book, "Don’t Do It the Hard Way.” Read the book.
Real Life Story: “You got to trust somebody.”
Business is built on trust.
You have no choice. You have to assume that you can trust the people you are working with. You can never be sure that 100% are trustworthy, of course, but it’s best to follow the advice of Earnest Hemingway, “The only way to find out if you can trust someone is to trust them.”
Maybe take limited risks until you are satisfied, but learn quickly who is not trustworthy and then avoid them like a fatal disease. “Once burnt, twice shy.”
Developing trust is the final step in building a sustainable long-term business relationship that will be valuable to both parties. It starts with awareness and knowledge, then progresses to liking someone and continues to respect and confidence and finally trust. Remember to build your relationships along that progression and give no one cause to doubt your trustworthiness.
It must be terrible to be so paranoid that you constantly watch, worry, and attempt to police and control everybody around you, because you trust nobody. Maybe you were raised to think that way.
There is that familiar old story of the shopkeeper who took his eldest son into the store one day and said, “Son, today is the day I teach you the most important lesson in business.” So he took his son to the store and said, “Now climb to the top of that ladder in the stock room, then jump down into my arms.”
“But Daddy, will you catch me?”
“Of course I’ll catch you. I’m your father. Trust me.”
So the boy jumped and his father stepped back to let him crash to the floor and said, “That’s the most important lesson in business. Don’t trust nobody!”
Recent surveys of trust among different generations demonstrate that we are at an all-time low in levels of trust. Millennials expect only 20% of the people around them are trustworthy, while most other generations are closer to 30%. Still a discouraging statistic. Driven by non-stop news of new scams, hackers, corporate fraud and universal sharing of every event that shakes our trust in our fellow human beings.
But that’s no way to live or to do business.
To badly paraphrase Bob Dylan, “You got to trust somebody.”
Your Uncle Ralph, Del Chatterson
Read more at:Learning Entrepreneurship Blogs.
Join our mailing list for more ideas, information and inspiration for entrepreneurs.
Click Here to check out Uncle Ralph’s books, "Don't Do It the Hard Way" and "The Complete Do-It-Yourself Guide to Business Plans" Both are available online or at your favourite bookstore in hard cover, paperback or e-book.
Comentarios