Recently I chatted with a recruitment specialist for one of the nation’s largest industrial organizations. Four months each year she visits college campuses to recruit graduating seniors for her company’s junior executive training program. The tenor of her remarks indicated that she was discouraged about the attitudes of many people she talked with.
“Most days I interview between eight and twelve college seniors, all in the upper third of their class, all at least mildly interested in coming with us. One of the main things we want to determine in the screening interview is the individual’s motivation. We want to find out if he or she is the kind of person who can, in a few years, direct major projects, manage a branch office or plant, or in some other way make a really substantial contribution to the company.
“I must say I’m not too pleased with the personal objectives of most of those I talk with. You’d be surprised,” she went on, “how many twenty-two-year-olds are more interested in our retirement plan than in anything else we have to offer. A second favorite question is ‘Will I move around a lot?’ Most of them seem to define the word success as synonymous with security. Can we risk turning our company over to people like that?
“The thing I can’t understand is why should young people these days be so ultraconservative, so narrow in their view of the future? Every day there are more signs of expanding opportunity. This country is making record progress in scientific and industrial development. Our population is gaining rapidly. If there ever was a time to be bullish about America, it’s now.”
The tendency for so many people to think small means there is much less competition than you think for a very rewarding career.
Where success is concerned, people are not measured in inches or pounds or college degrees, or family background; they are measured by the size of their thinking. How big we think determines the size of our accomplishments. Now let’s see how we can enlarge our thinking.
Ever ask yourself, “What is my greatest weakness?” Probably the greatest human weakness is self-deprecation—that is, selling oneself short. Self-deprecation shows through in countless ways. John sees a job advertisement in the paper; it’s exactly what he would like. But he does nothing about it because he thinks, “I’m not good enough for that job, so why bother?” Or Jim wants a date with Joan, but he doesn’t call her because he thinks he wouldn’t rate with her.
Tom feels Mr. Richards would be a very good prospect for his product, but Tom doesn’t call. He feels Mr. Richards is too big to see him. Pete is filling out a job application form. One question asks, “What beginning salary do you expect?” Pete puts down a modest figure because he feels he really isn’t worth the bigger sum that he would like to earn.
Philosophers for thousands of years have issued good advice: Know thyself. But most people, it seems, interpret this suggestion to mean Know only thy negative self. Most self-evaluation consists of making long mental lists of one’s faults, shortcomings, inadequacies.
It’s well to know our inabilities, for this shows us areas in which we can improve. But if we know only our negative characteristics, we’re in a mess. Our value is small.
Here is an exercise to help you measure your true size. I’ve used it in training programs for executives and sales personnel. It works.
1. Determine your five chief assets. Invite some objective friend to help—possibly your wife, your superior, a professor—some intelligent person who will give you an honest opinion. (Examples of assets frequently listed are education, experience, technical skills, appearance, well-adjusted home life, attitudes, personality, initiative.)
2. Next, under each asset, write the names of three persons you know who have achieved large success but who do not have this asset to as great a degree as you.
When you’ve completed this exercise, you will find you outrank many successful people on at least one asset.
There is only one conclusion you can honestly reach: You’re bigger than you think. So fit your thinking to your true size. Think as big as you really are! Never, never, never sell yourself short!
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The person who says “adamantine” when in plain talk he means “immovable” or says “coquette” when we would understand him better if he said “flirt” may have a big vocabulary. But does he have a big thinker’s vocabulary? Probably not. People who use difficult, high-sounding words and phrases that most folks have to strain themselves to understand are inclined to be overbearing and stuffed shirts. And stuffed shirts are usually small thinkers.
The important measure of a person’s vocabulary is not the size or the number of words he uses. Rather, the thing that counts, the only thing that counts about one’s vocabulary, is the effect his words and phrases have on his own and others’ thinking.
Here is something very basic: We do not think in words and phrases. We think only in pictures and/or images. Words are the raw materials of thought. When spoken or read, that amazing instrument, the mind, automatically converts words and phrases into mind pictures. Each word, each phrase, creates a slightly different mind picture. If someone tells you, “Jim bought a new split-level,” you see one picture. But if you’re told, “Jim bought a new ranch house,” you see another picture. The mind pictures we see are modified by the kinds of words we use to name things and describe things.
Look at it this way. When you speak or write, you are, in a sense, a projector showing movies in the minds of others. And the pictures you create determine how you and others react.
Suppose you tell a group of people, “I’m sorry to report we’ve failed.” What do these people see? They see defeat and all the disappointment and grief the word “failed” conveys. Now suppose you said instead, “Here’s a new approach that I think will work.” They would feel encouraged, ready to try again.
Suppose you say, “We face a problem.” You have created a picture in the minds of others of something difficult, unpleasant to solve. Instead say, “We face a challenge,” and you create a mind picture of fun, sport, something pleasant to do.
Or tell a group, “We incurred a big expense,” and people see money spent that will never return. Indeed, this is unpleasant. Instead say, “We made a big investment,” and people see a picture of something that will return profits later on, a very pleasant sight.
The point is this: Big thinkers are specialists in creating positive, forward-looking, optimistic pictures in their own minds and in the minds of others. To think big, we must use words and phrases that produce big, positive mental images.
In the left-hand column below are examples of phrases that create small, negative, depressing thoughts. In the right-hand column the same situation is discussed but in a big, positive way.
As you read these, ask yourself: “What mind pictures do I see?”
| PHRASES THAT CREATE SMALL, NEGATIVE MIND IMAGES | PHRASES THAT CREATE BIG, POSITIVE MIND IMAGES |
| 1. It’s no use, we’re whipped. | We’re not whipped yet. Let’s keep trying. Here’s a new angle. |
| 2. I was in that business once and failed. Never again. | I went broke but it was my own fault. I’m going to try again. |
| 3. I’ve tried but the product won’t sell. People don’t want it. | So far I’ve not been able to sell this product. But I know it is good and I’m going to find the formula that will put it over. |
| 4. The market is saturated. Imagine, 75 percent of the potential has already been sold. Better get out. | Imagine, 25 percent of the market is still not sold. Count me in. This looks big! |
| 5. Their orders have been small. Cut them off. | Their orders have been small. Let’s map out a plan for selling them more of their needs. |
| 6. Five years is too long a time to spend before I’ll get into the top ranks in your company. Count me out. | Five years is not really a long time. Just think, that leaves me thirty years to serve at a high level. |
| 7. The competition has all the advantage. How do you expect me to sell against them? | Competition is strong. There’s no denying that, but no one ever has all the advantages. Let’s put our heads together and figure out a way to beat them at their own game. |
| 8. Nobody will ever want that product. | In its present form, it may not be salable, but let’s consider some modifications. |
| 9. Let’s wait until a recession comes along, then buy stocks. | Let’s invest now. Bet on prosperity, not depression. |
| 10. I’m too young (old) for the job. | Being young (old) is a distinct advantage. |
| 11. It won’t work, let me prove it. The image: dark, gloom, disappointment, grief, failure. | It will work, let me prove it. The image: bright, hope, success, fun, victory. |
Here are four ways to help you develop a big thinker’s vocabulary.
1. Use big, positive, cheerful words and phrases to describe how you feel. When someone asks, “How do you feel today?” and you respond with an “I’m tired (I have a headache, I wish it were Saturday, I don’t feel so good),” you actually make yourself feel worse. Practice this: it’s a very simple point, but it has tremendous power. Every time someone asks you, “How are you?” or “How are you feeling today?” respond with a “Just wonderful! thanks, and you?” or say “Great” or “Fine.” Say you feel wonderful at every possible opportunity, and you will begin to feel wonderful—and bigger, too. Become known as a person who always feels great. It wins friends.
2. Use bright, cheerful, favorable words and phrases to describe other people. Make it a rule to have a big, positive word for all your friends and associates. When you and someone else are discussing an absent third party, be sure you compliment him with big words and phrases like “He’s really a fine fellow.” “They tell me he’s working out wonderfully well.” Be extremely careful to avoid the petty cut-him-down language. Sooner or later third parties hear what’s been said, and then such talk only cuts you down.
3. Use positive language to encourage others. Compliment people personally at every opportunity. Everyone you know craves praise. Have a special good word for your wife or husband every day. Notice and compliment the people who work with you. Praise, sincerely administered, is a success tool. Use it! Use it again and again and again. Compliment people on their appearance, their work, their achievements, their families.
4. Use positive words to outline plans to others. When people hear something like this: “Here is some good news. We face a genuine opportunity . . .” their minds start to sparkle. But when they hear something like “Whether we like it or not, we’ve got a job to do,” the mind movie is dull and boring, and they react accordingly. Promise victory and watch eyes light up. Promise victory and win support. Build castles, don’t dig graves!
Big thinkers train themselves to see not just what is but what can be. Here are four examples to illustrate this point.
1. What gives real estate value? A highly successful Realtor who specializes in rural property shows what can be done if we train ourselves to see something where little or nothing presently exists.
“Most of the rural property around here,” my friend began, “is run-down and not very attractive. I’m successful because I don’t try to sell my prospects a farm as it is.
“I develop my entire sales plan around what the farm can be. Simply telling the prospect, ‘The farm has XX acres of bottom land and XX acres of woods and is XX miles from town,’ doesn’t stir him up and make him want to buy it. But when you show him a concrete plan for doing something with the farm, he’s just about sold. Here, let me show you what I mean.”
He opened his briefcase and pulled out a file. “This farm,” he said, “is a new listing with us. It’s like a lot of them. It’s forty-three miles from the center of the metropolitan area, the house is run-down, and the place hasn’t been farmed in five years. Now, here’s what I’ve done. I spent two full days on the place last week, just studying it. I walked over the place several times. I looked at neighboring farms. I studied the location of the farm with respect to existing and planned highways. I asked myself, ‘What’s this farm good for?’
“I came up with three possibilities. Here they are.” He showed them to me. Each plan was neatly typed and looked quite comprehensive. One plan suggested converting the farm into a riding stable. The plan showed why the idea was sound: a growing city, more love for the outdoors, more money for recreation, good roads. The plan also showed how the farm could support a sizable number of horses so that the revenue from the rides would be largely clear. The whole riding stable idea was very thorough, very convincing. The plan was so clear and convincing, I could “see” a dozen couples riding horseback through the trees.
In similar fashion this enterprising salesman developed a second thorough plan for a tree farm and a third plan for a combination tree and poultry farm.
“Now when I talk with my prospects, I won’t have to convince them that the farm is a good buy as it is. I help them to see a picture of the farm changed into a moneymaking proposition.
“Besides selling more farms and selling them faster, my method of selling the property for what it can be pays off in another way: I can sell a farm at a higher price than my competitors. People naturally pay more for acreage and an idea than they do for just acreage. Because of this, more people want to list their farms with me and my commission on each sale is larger.”
The moral is this: Look at things not as they are, but as they can be. Visualization adds value to everything. A big thinker always visualizes what can be done in the future. He isn’t stuck with the present.
2. How much is a customer worth? A department store executive was addressing a conference of merchandise managers. She was saying, “I may be a little old-fashioned, but I belong to the school that believes the best way to get customers to come back is to give them friendly, courteous service. One day I was walking through our store when I overheard a salesperson arguing with a customer. The customer left in quite a huff.
“Afterwards, the salesperson said to another, ‘I’m not going to let a $1.98 customer take up all my time and make me take the store apart trying to find him what he wants. He’s simply not worth it.’
“I walked away,” the executive continued, “but I couldn’t get that remark out of my mind. It is pretty serious, I thought, when our salespeople think of customers as being in the $1.98 category. I decided right then that this concept must be changed. When I got back to my office, I called our research director and asked him to find out how much the average customer spent in our store last year. The figure he came up with surprised even me. According to our research director’s careful calculation, the typical customer spent $362 in our establishment.
“The next thing I did was call a meeting of all supervisory personnel and explain the incident to them. Then I showed them what a customer is really worth. Once I got these people to see that a customer is not to be valued on a single sale but rather on an annual basis, customer service definitely improved.”
The point made by the retailing executive applies to any kind of business. It’s repeat business that makes the profit. Often, there’s no profit at all on the first several sales. Look at the potential expenditures of the customers, not just what they buy today.
Putting a big value on customers is what converts them into big, regular patrons. Attaching little value to customers sends them elsewhere. A student related this pertinent incident to me, explaining why he’ll never again eat in a certain cafeteria.
“For lunch one day,” the student began, “I decided to try a new cafeteria that had just opened a couple of weeks before. Nickels and dimes are pretty important to me right now, so I watch what I buy pretty closely. Walking past the meat section I saw some turkey and dressing that looked pretty good, and it was plainly marked 39 cents.
“When I got to the cash register, the checker looked at my tray and said, ‘1.09.’ I politely asked her to check it again because my tally was 99 cents. After giving me a mean glare, she recounted. The difference turned out to be the turkey. She had charged me 49 cents instead of 39 cents. Then I called her attention to the sign, which read 39 cents.
“This really set her off! ‘I don’t care what that sign says. It’s supposed to be 49 cents. See. Here’s my price list for today. Somebody back there made a mistake. You’ll have to pay the 49 cents.’
“Then I tried to explain to her the only reason I selected the turkey was because it was 39 cents. If it had been marked 49 cents I’d have taken something else.
“To this, her answer was ‘You’ll just have to pay the 49 cents.’ I did, because I didn’t want to stand there and create a scene. But I decided on the spot that I’d never eat there again. I spend about $250 a year for lunches, and you can be sure they’ll not get one penny of it.”
There’s an example of the little view. The checker saw one thin dime, not the potential $250.
3. The case of the blind milkman. It’s surprising how people sometimes are blind to potential. A few years ago a young milkman came to our door to solicit our dairy business. I explained to him that we already had milk delivery service and we were quite satisfied. Then I suggested that he stop next door and talk to the lady there.
To this he replied, “I’ve already talked to the lady next door, but they use only one quart of milk every two days, and that’s not enough to make it worthwhile for me to stop.”
“That may be,” I said, “but when you talked to our neighbor, did you not observe that the demand for milk in that household will increase considerably in a month or so? There will be a new addition over there that will consume lots of milk.”
The young man looked for a moment like he had been struck, and then he said, “How blind can a guy be?”
Today that same one-quart-every-two-days family buys seven quarts every two days from a milkman who had some foresight. That first youngster, a boy, now has two brothers and one sister. And I’m told there’ll be another young one soon.
How blind can we be? See what can be, not just what is.
The schoolteacher who thinks of Jimmy only as he is—an ill-mannered, backward, uncouth brat—certainly will not aid Jimmy’s development. But the teacher who sees Jimmy not as he is now but as he can be, she’ll get results.
Most folks driving through skid row see only broken-down stumblebums hopelessly lost to the bottle. A few devoted people see something else in the skid row–ite; they see a reconstructed citizen. And because they see this, they succeed in many cases in doing an excellent rehabilitation job.
4. What determines how much you’re worth? After a training session a few weeks ago, a young man came to see me and asked if he could talk with me for a few minutes. I knew that this young fellow, now about twenty-six, had been a very underprivileged child. On top of this, he had experienced a mountain of misfortune in his early adult years. I also knew that he was making a real effort to prepare himself for a solid future.
Over coffee, we quickly worked out his technical problem, and our discussion turned to how people who have few physical possessions should look toward the future. His comments provide a straightforward, sound answer.
“I’ve got less than $200 in the bank. My job as a rate clerk doesn’t pay much, and it doesn’t carry much responsibility. My car is four years old, and my wife and I live in a cramped second-floor apartment.
“But, Professor,” he continued, “I’m determined not to let what I haven’t got stop me.”
That was an intriguing statement, so I urged him to explain.
“It’s this way,” he went on, “I’ve been analyzing people a lot lately, and I’ve noticed this. People who don’t have much look at themselves as they are now. That’s all they see. They don’t see a future, they just see a miserable present.
“My neighbor is a good example. He’s continually complaining about having a low-pay job, the plumbing that’s always getting fouled up, the lucky breaks somebody else just got, the doctor bills that are piling up. He reminds himself so often that he’s poor that now he just assumes that he’s always going to be poor. He acts as if he were sentenced to living in that broken-down apartment all the rest of his life.”
My friend was really speaking from the heart, and after a moment’s pause he added, “If I looked at myself strictly as I am—old car, low income, cheap apartment, and hamburger diet—I couldn’t help but be discouraged. I’d see a nobody and I’d be a nobody for the rest of my life.
“I’ve made up my mind to look at myself as the person I’m going to be in a few short years. I see myself not as a rate clerk but as an executive. I don’t see a crummy apartment, I see a fine new suburban home. And when I look at myself that way, I feel bigger and think bigger. And I’ve got plenty of personal experiences to prove it’s paying off.”
Isn’t that a splendid plan for adding value to oneself? This young fellow is on the expressway to really fine living. He’s mastered this basic success principle: It isn’t what one has that’s important. Rather, it’s how much one is planning to get that counts.
The price tag the world puts on us is just about identical to the one we put on ourselves.
Here is how you can develop your power to see what can be, not just what is. I call these the “practice adding value” exercises.
1. Practice adding value to things. Remember the real estate example. Ask yourself, “What can I do to ‘add value’ to this room or this house or this business?” Look for ideas to make things worth more. A thing—whether it be a vacant lot, a house, or a business—has value in proportion to the ideas for using it.
2. Practice adding value to people. As you move higher and higher in the world of success, more and more of your job becomes “people development.” Ask, “What can I do to ‘add value’ to my subordinates? What can I do to help them to become more effective?” Remember, to bring out the best in a person, you must first visualize his best.
3. Practice adding value to yourself. Conduct a daily interview with yourself. Ask, “What can I do to make myself more valuable today?” Visualize yourself not as you are but as you can be. Then specific ways for attaining your potential value will suggest themselves. Just try and see.
A retired owner-manager of a medium-size printing company (sixty employees) explained to me how his successor was picked.
“Five years ago,” my friend began, “I needed an accountant to head up our accounting and office routine. The fellow I hired was named Harry and was only twenty-six. He knew nothing about the printing business, but his record showed he was a good accountant. Yet a year and a half ago, when I retired, we made him president and general manager of the company.
“Looking back on it, Harry had one trait that put him out in front of everyone else. Harry was sincerely and actively interested in the whole company, not just writing checks and keeping records. Whenever he saw how he could help other employees, he jumped right in.
“The first year Harry was with me, we lost a few men. Harry came to me with a fringe benefit program which he promised would cut down turnover at low cost. And it worked.
“Harry did many other things, too, which helped the whole company, not just this department. He made a detailed cost study of our production department and showed me how a $30,000 investment in new machinery would pay off. Once we experienced a pretty bad sales slump. Harry went to our sales manager and said, in effect, ‘I don’t know much about the sales end of the business, but let me try to help.’ And he did. Harry came up with several good ideas which helped us sell more jobs.
“When a new employee joined us, Harry was right there to help the fellow get comfortable. Harry took a real interest in the entire operation.
“When I retired, Harry was the only logical person to take over.
“But don’t misunderstand,” my friend continued, “Harry didn’t try to put himself over on me. He wasn’t a mere meddler. He wasn’t aggressive in a negative way. He didn’t stab people in the back, and he didn’t go around giving orders. He just went around helping. Harry simply acted as if everything in the company affected him. He made company business his business.”
We can all learn a lesson from Harry. The “I’m doing my job and that’s enough” attitude is small, negative thinking. Big thinkers see themselves as members of a team effort, as winning or losing with the team, not by themselves. They help in every way they can, even when there is no direct and immediate compensation or other reward. The fellow who shrugs off a problem outside his own department with the comment “Well, that’s no concern of mine, let them worry with it” hasn’t got the attitude it takes for top leadership.
Practice this. Practice being a big thinker. See the company’s interest as identical with your own. Probably only a very few persons working in large companies have a sincere, unselfish interest in their company. But after all, only a relatively few persons qualify as big thinkers. And these few are the ones eventually rewarded with the most responsible, best-paying jobs.
Many, many potentially powerful people let petty, small, insignificant things block their way to achievement. Let’s look at four examples.
Just about everyone wishes he had the “ability” to do a first-class job of speaking in public. But most people don’t get their wish. Most folks are lousy public speakers.
Why? The reason is simple: most people concentrate on the small, trivial things of speaking at the expense of the big, important things. In preparing to give a talk, most people give themselves a host of mental instructions, like “I’ve got to remember to stand straight,” “Don’t move around and don’t use your hands,” “Don’t let the audience see you use your notes,” “Remember, don’t make mistakes in grammar, especially don’t say ‘for he and I,’ say ‘for him and me,’” “Be sure your tie is straight,” “Speak loud, but not too loud,” and so on and on.
Now, what happens when the speaker gets up to speak? He’s scared because he’s given himself a terrific list of things not to do. He gets confused in his talk and finds himself silently asking, “Have I made a mistake?” He is, in brief, a flop. He’s a flop because he concentrated on the petty, trivial, relatively unimportant qualities of a good speaker and failed to concentrate on the big things that make a good speaker: knowledge of what he’s going to talk about and an intense desire to tell it to other people.
The real test of a speaker is not did he stand straight or did he make any mistakes in grammar, but rather did the audience get the points he wanted to put across. Most of our top speakers have petty defects; some of them even have unpleasant voices. Some of the most sought-after speakers in America would flunk a speech course taught by the old negative, “don’t do this and don’t do that,” method.
Yet all these successful public speakers have one thing in common: They have something to say and they feel a burning desire for other people to hear it.
Don’t let concern with trivia keep you from speaking successfully in public.
Ever stop to ask yourself just what causes quarrels? At least 99 percent of the time, quarrels start over petty, unimportant matters like this: John comes home a little tired, a little on edge. Dinner doesn’t exactly please him, so he turns up his nose and complains. Joan’s day wasn’t perfect either, so she rallies to her own defense with “Well, what do you expect on my food budget?” or “Maybe I could cook better if I had a new stove like everybody else.” This insults John’s pride, so he attacks with “Now, Joan, it’s not lack of money; it’s simply that you don’t know how to manage.”
And away they go! Before a truce is finally declared, all sorts of accusations are made by each party. In-laws, sex, money, premarital and postmarital promises, and other issues will be introduced. Both parties leave the battle nervous, tense. Nothing has been settled, and both parties have new ammunition to make the next quarrel more vicious. Little things, petty thinking, causes arguments. So, to eliminate quarrels, eliminate petty thinking.
Here’s a technique that works: before complaining or accusing or reprimanding someone or launching a counterattack in self-defense, ask yourself, “Is it really important?” In most cases, it isn’t and you avoid conflict.
Ask yourself, “Is it really important if he (or she) is messy with cigarettes or forgets to put the cap on the toothpaste or is late coming home?”
“Is it really important if he (or she) squandered a little money or invited some people in I don’t like?”
When you feel like taking negative action, ask yourself, “Is it really important?” That question works magic in building a finer home situation. It works at the office, too. It works in home-going traffic when another driver cuts in ahead of you. It works in any situation in life that is apt to produce quarrels.
Several years ago, I observed small thinking about an office assignment destroy a young fellow’s chances for a profitable career in advertising.
Four young executives, all on the same status level, were moved into new offices. Three of the offices were identical in size and decoration. The fourth was smaller and less elaborate.
J. M. was assigned the fourth office. This turned out to be a real blow to his pride. Immediately he felt discriminated against. Negative thinking, resentment, bitterness, jealousy built up. J. M. began to feel inadequate. The result was that J. M. grew hostile toward his fellow executives. Rather than cooperate, he did his best to undermine their efforts. Things got worse. Three months later J. M. slipped so badly that management had no choice but to issue him a pink slip.
Small thinking over a very small matter stopped J. M. In his haste to feel he was discriminated against, J. M. failed to observe that the company was expanding rapidly and office space was at a premium. He didn’t stop to consider the possibility that the executive who made the office assignments didn’t even know which one was the smallest! No one in the organization, except J. M., regarded his office as an index of his value.
Small thinking about unimportant things like seeing your name last on the department route sheet or getting the fourth carbon of an office memo can hurt you. Think big, and none of these little things can hold you back.
A sales executive told me how even stuttering is a mere detail in salesmanship if the fellow has the really important qualities.
“I have a friend, also a sales executive, who loves to play practical jokes, though sometimes these jokes aren’t jokes at all. A few months ago a young fellow called on my practical-joking friend and asked for a sales job. The fellow had a terrible stutter, though, and my friend decided right here was a chance to play a joke on me. So the friend told the stammering applicant that he wasn’t in the market for a salesman right now but one of his friends (me) had a spot to fill. Then he phoned me, and, boy, did he give this fellow a buildup. Not suspecting anything, I said, ‘Send him right over!’
“Thirty minutes later, in he walked. The young fellow hadn’t said three words before I knew why my friend was so eager to send him over. ‘I-I-I’m J-J-Jack R.,’ he said, ‘Mr. X sent me over t-t-to talk t-t-to you about a j-j-job.’ Almost every word was a struggle. I thought to myself, ‘This guy couldn’t sell a dollar bill for 90 cents on Wall Street.’ I was sore at my friend, but I really felt sorry for this fellow, so I thought the least I could do was to ask him some polite questions while I thought up a good excuse as to why I couldn’t use him.
“As we talked on, however, I discovered this fellow was no stupe. He was intelligent. He handled himself very nicely, but I just couldn’t overlook the fact that he stuttered. Finally, I decided I’d wind up the interview by asking one last question. ‘What makes you think you can sell?’
“‘Well,’ he said, ‘I learn f-f-fast, I-I-I like people, I-I-I think you’ve got a good company, and I-I-I want t-t-to make m-m-money. Now, I-I-I do have a speech im-im-pairment, b-b-but that doesn’t b-b-bother me, so why should it b-b-bother anybody else?’
“His answer showed me he had all the really important qualifications for a salesman. I decided right then to give him a chance. And you know, he’s working out very well.”
Even a speech impairment in a talker’s profession is a triviality if the person has the big qualities.
Practice these three procedures to help yourself think about trivialities:
1. Keep your eyes focused on the big objective. Many times we’re like the salesman who, failing to make the sale, reports to his manager, “Yes, but I sure convinced the customer he was wrong.” In selling, the big objective is winning sales, not arguments.
In marriage the big objective is peace, happiness, tranquillity—not winning quarrels or saying “I could have told you so.”
In working with employees, the big objective is developing their full potential, not making issues out of their minor errors.
In living with neighbors, the big objective is mutual respect and friendship—not seeing if you can have their dog impounded because once in a while it barks at night.
Paraphrasing some military lingo, it is much better to lose a battle and win the war than to win a battle and lose the war.
Resolve to keep your eyes on the big ball.
2. Ask “Is it really important?” Before becoming negatively excited, just ask yourself, “Is it important enough for me to get all worked up about?” There is no better way to avoid frustration over petty matters than to use this medicine. At least 90 percent of quarrels and feuds would never take place if we just faced troublesome situations with “Is this really important?”
3. Don’t fall into the triviality trap. In making speeches, solving problems, counseling employees, think of those things that really matter, things that make the difference. Don’t become submerged under surface issues. Concentrate on important things.
In the left-hand column below are listed several common situations. In the middle and right-hand columns are comparisons of how petty thinkers and big thinkers see the same situation. Check yourself. Then decide, which will get me where I want to go? Petty thinking or big thinking?
The same situation handled in two entirely different ways. The choice is yours.
| SITUATION | THE PETTY THINKER’S APPROACH | THE BIG THINKER’S APPROACH |
| Expense accounts | 1. Figures out ways to increase income through chiseling on expense accounts. | 1. Figures out ways to increase income by selling more merchandise. |
| Conversation | 2. Talks about the negative qualities of his friends, the economy, his company, the competition. | 2. Talks about the positive qualities of his friends, his company, the competition. |
| Progress | 3. Believes in retrenchment or at best the status quo. | 3. Believes in expansion. |
| Future | 4. Views the future as limited. | 4. Sees the future as very promising. |
| Work | 5. Looks for ways to avoid work. | 5. Looks for more ways and things to do, especially helping others. |
| Competition | 6. Competes with the average. | 6. Competes with the best. |
| Budget problems | 7. Figures out ways to save money by cutting down on necessary items. | 7. Figures out ways to increase income and buy more of the necessary items. |
| Goals | 8. Sets goals low. | 8. Sets goals high. |
| Goals vision | 9. Sees only the short run. | 9. Is preoccupied with the long run. |
| Security | 10. Is preoccupied with security problems. | 10. Regards security as a natural companion of success. |
| Companionship | 11. Surrounds himself with petty thinkers. | 11. Surrounds himself with persons with large, progressive ideas. |
| Mistakes | 12. Magnifies minor errors. Turns them into big issues. | 12. Ignores errors of little consequence. |
1. Don’t sell yourself short. Conquer the crime of self-deprecation. Concentrate on your assets. You’re better than you think you are.
2. Use the big thinker’s vocabulary. Use big, bright, cheerful words. Use words that promise victory, hope, happiness, pleasure; avoid words that create unpleasant images of failure, defeat, grief.
3. Stretch your vision. See what can be, not just what is. Practice adding value to things, to people, and to yourself.
4. Get the big view of your job. Think, really think your present job is important. That next promotion depends mostly on how you think toward your present job.
5. Think above trivial things. Focus your attention on big objectives. Before getting involved in a petty matter, ask yourself, “Is it really important?”
Grow big by thinking big!