If you’ve ever bumped into someone you’ve not met in ages, out of the blue, you may have got to thinking how many you may have just missed. The law of averages would seem to suggest that for everyone you suddenly run into, you must miss many more.
Last week, I skipped through our foyer not really noticing anyone in particular, when I heard a voice saying ‘Charlie Gunningham!’ I looked up and there was someone I’d not seen in 16 or 17 years (we figured it was the year 2000 or 2001). ‘Are you here now?‘ he asked. ‘Yes, I’m the CEO! Where are you now?‘. And so on. He hardly looked any different, and he said the same of me (obviously, our eyes were worse for wear).
This seems to happen to me all the time, almost everywhere I walk around this fair city. While it could be that everyone is linked by 6 degrees of separation, in Perth I reckon it could be 2.
Try this at your next business networking event. Go up to someone you do not know, and introduce yourself, asking them why they’re there. Once you start chatting, you will probably find that, unless they are totally new to Perth, you have a common acquaintance. It’s something I like about this place. While the population may have ticked over 2 million, it still has a ‘smallness’ about it. Almost everyone seems close.
Another important element to this is you simply cannot afford to burn any bridges. Ever. There’s no point (even if you never see them again) getting in a strop, or being rude, or getting flustered, with anyone, at anytime, no matter how unreasonable they are.
I’ve had people be extremely rude to me over the years, and have been subject to things in business that I would not wish on anyone, but it’s always better to raise your chin, let it run off you like water off a duck’s back. In the main, people are good, not greedy. People want to do the right thing. But there are exceptions. And I find it odd that they do not have the emotional intelligence or self awareness to understand what they are doing, and what others think of them.
Someone I’ve known for years thinks he’s God’s gift to business, and he’s had some success (to which he should be justifiably proud), yet the way he acts puts people off, even those who know him well. His reputation is poor, and people tend to steer clear, or do that eye roll thing when his name is mentioned. People who do not know I know him, tell me things about him. He has no idea people think of him this way.
Reputations are made very slowly, and can be ruined quickly.
Those that seek to take short cuts to grab a goal themselves will never get the long term prize. In Perth, or anywhere, it’s simply not worth behaving badly. Everyone knows someone who knows you. It’s 2 degrees. Tred carefully, do the right thing and more good things will be returned to you.
That guy I bumped into in the foyer? As it happens he was there to listen to a proposal from our sales team. How I behaved 16 or 17 years ago with him may just help get a deal over the line this month. What goes around, comes around.
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