Being Different Can Earn Big Rewards

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There are so many things that cause us to feel uncomfortable or even embarrassed. But in business the big rewards go to people who are willing to be different.

There were a dozen places to eat at the food court and the crowd was thin. Behind the counter at the Flaming Wok, a middle aged Oriental woman passionately took action to improve her odds of success. In thickly accented English, she crowed at every potential customer within ten feet, “Hi! Want try some?” as she tempted people with morsels of steaming spicy chicken skewered by neon colored toothpicks. Half deliberately looked away and pretended not to hear. If they looked, she flashed a proud smile. Nearly all of the lookers accepted their reward and about half of them bought something from her.

At the other places people waited on customers, cleaned, or leaned on the counter and watched the mall world drift by. No one offered samples nor asked customers to buy. In the 20 minutes I watched, her eatery earned as much business — including mine — as all of the competition combined. She alone was passionately willing to do what they would not.

I looked at the 15 year old boy behind the counter with her and thought, “I hope you realize how lucky you are to learn early what your Mama knows. Some adults take many years to figure out the way to get ahead is simply to do what other people can’t or won’t do.”

This is Doug Smart with Smarter by the Minute. Make today a great day!

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This entry was posted on Tuesday, February 7th, 2006 at 11:14 am and is filed under Podcast. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

Being Different Can Earn Big Rewards

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