I am fortunate to meet awesome people all the time, and typically I enjoy talking with people who are successful in their fields and interests. I have three mentors. I know that to some three is alot, but for me, I need direction in many areas and I am fortunate enough to have awesome people who are leaders in their fields and wonderful enough to be my mentors and friends. The one I am speaking of in this instance I will reference as "Mr. A". Mr. A is very influential in his community and has been super successful over 60 years as an entrepreneur. I often ask him questions and lean on his for advice because he has been where I am going and his insights are genius. It amazes me that he is always 10 steps ahead and I find that he gets better with age. One day I asked him, "Mr. A, what is your personal business philosophy for true success?". He took a second, then stated..."In business you have to be FAIR, FIRM, and FLEXIBLE".
Now at first I thought hmmm, ok I get it, but really it was not until two years after he told me this that I really understood what he was saying. I had attempted to start a business and I did not realize what working with clients was going to entail. Many people say, "Get your money first", or "Send them a paypal link before you say anything"! The funny thing to me was that although I had received advice from many people who owned businesses, I found that they were not what I considered to be a success. You see, Mr. A's philosophy works and is so simple because when I learned to first be fair, I realized that I have to first be fair to myself, and then my client. One thing I found was that I was always meeting people who needed my help, but they really could not afford to hire me. Now being that I wanted the business I often agreed to do the work, and it would often end up being for free because the people would talk a good game upfront, I would produce all of these ideas and work, but they knew they weren't able to pay and would essentially create a negative atmosphere in order to avoid the invoice. I would chalk it up to experience and simply move on. I have found that being fair to me is sometimes saying NO to people even if I see the potential in their product regardless of how much money they may or may not have. So a quick interview rather than a consultation tends to help me weed out any potential time wasters.
This brings me to the being FIRM, aspect. The funny thing about my life is that I am usually put in situations that require me to be super honest, give my personal opinion(which can sometimes be a bit critical), and I have to always approach what I say to a potential client with finesse while offering an honest assessment. I find that when you are in a position where you have to give your opinion regarding someone else's business, you must be firm in your position, otherwise you may end up taking a client and allowing their fears to blur your abilities specifically when they have come to you for advice on how to help them improve.
Which brings me to his final piece of advice, be FLEXIBLE. If I had a dollar for every time I have had to make changes, or redirect, I would be a multi-millionaire. Flexibility requires that you are able to not only go with the flow, but move strategically so that you are able to accomplish the overall goal without losing focus. For some, being flexible is a task because you can become easily distracted if you are not keeping the entire picture in mind. I often will listen to ideas and strategies knowing that the suggestions may be good, but the question is whether or not the idea or suggestion is relevant in accomplishing the overall goal.
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