Volume XXII, Number 53 (Issue 1109) | December 30, 2024
Failure Is Always a Possibility
It is all but guaranteed if one never tries. I first went into business for myself in 1980. At the time I had three years as a financial analyst and manager of a team plus three years as a consultant under my belt. Thanks to those six years I had developed what seemed to be an uncommon set of skills centered around financial modeling and decision-support systems. Thus, I thought if I built it, they would come. Little did I realize how much of my success, let alone feeding my family, would require me to sell.
Were I an extrovert, or if my personality profile revealed a predilection for sales, making that first consulting firm successful would have been a breeze. But that is not who I am. I have taken a variety of personality assessments – some of them multiple times – throughout my career and not one of them says I have an outgoing personality, an ability to sell, patience, empathy, a competitive spirit, or am innately self-motivated. Instead, they uniformly say I am introverted, creative, strategic, love to learn, relationship-oriented, analytical, and take ownership of a task (figure out a way to get things done). Great gifts, just not the collection of traits someone in sales would typically want.
Thus, had someone asked me in those early years if I were in sales, my immediate answer would have been “no!” Never mind that like everyone else on the planet, I had spent my entire life – from birth on – selling. At first, my aim was to convince someone to feed, change, hold, and comfort me. As I got a little older, I was determined to persuade my parents to buy me a certain toy or cereal, let me drive, trust me to live on my own, etc. Along the way I worked hard to motivate members of the opposite sex to go out with me while simultaneously seeking to get employers to take a chance on me. As a wet-behind-the-ears consultant I tried my best to get clients to listen to me as well as accept my recommendations. During those formative years, the list of personal sales successes, errors, missteps, and unmitigated fails is lengthy. But a professional salesperson? Not me! Until, with my back against the wall in 1980, I took a risk – actually a couple – such that with trial, numerous errors, some persistence, and a bit of luck,
I found my footing in an approach that worked for me. Fast forward forty-four years and I can say I have enjoyed a respectable measure of success when it comes to selling our services. So much so in fact that on three separate occasions I have been asked to take on the role of rainmaker for larger firms. But in 1980 no one expected me to be successful in sales, least of all me. Yet here I stand.
My point in sharing this bit of personal history is two-fold. First, you never know what you can accomplish if you do not try. Second, the New Year is less than two days away. Between now and then countless resolutions will be made and a fair number of those will have been broken and abandoned within a month. Yet it need not be so. Especially if we remember to adhere to the second sentence in this paragraph. In other words, let us rise to the occasion.
Soli Deo Gloria
“For God has not given us a spirit of fear and timidity, but of power, love, and self-discipline.” 2 Timothy 1:7
J. Keith Hughey
Mobile: (210)260-0955
E-mail: keith@jkeithhughey.com
Website: www.jkeithhughey.com
Transforming Potential into Unmatched Performance
Copyright 2024 by J. Keith Hughey. All rights reserved. Permission is hereby granted for reproduction and redistribution of this essay as provided under the copyright laws of the United States of America. Recent issues of Musings may be found at www.jkeithhughey.com. Your comments are always welcome.