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Tightrope: Workers, customers are invested in your business
— -- I received an e-mail about last week's column that caught my attention. The writer started by saying that he had several reasons to disagree with my idea about following the golden rule where employees and customers are concerned.
He said not a single employee of his has ever invested in his dream. Nor has any employee, community member or neighbor come forth to share start-up money to fund his venture nor stepped forward to share any of his other burdens. Therefore, my "do good to all" philosophy does not apply.
I thought about this e-mail the other day while listening to the radio. I heard a man tell a story about two women who were fed up with the departments where they worked and decided to go to management and request a transfer. The manager agreed and told the women they could begin working in a different department in two weeks.
To celebrate, they decided that no matter what happened in the next two weeks they would be nice to everyone in the dreaded department. If someone spoke nasty to them they would smile and offer a kind word. If there were any disagreements, even though they knew the other side was wrong, they would smile and let it pass. Each morning they greeted their co-workers with a smile and pleasant words.
For two weeks, these women offered pleasant greetings and kept a smile along with a friendly attitude.
A few days before their planned transfer a surprising thing happened. They went back to management and asked if they could stay where they were. The manager asked about the sudden change of heart. The women said that everyone in the entire department had made a significant change and had become more friendly and pleasant to work with.
The truth was everything and everyone in the department was the same as before. What had changed were the perception, attitude and behavior of the two women.
This story illustrates that everything in the world is a reflection of the dynamics within us.
The responsibilities of an entrepreneur are like balancing yourself while walking a tightrope, making sure not to fall while carefully moving forward. The wise entrepreneur is aware of the importance of achieving an equitable balance among commitments to family, community and business; of being recognized as an asset to the community; of earning a livelihood adequate to meet financial needs and to satisfy, as well, a reasonable number of wants; and achieving all of this through work that is satisfying and of service to other people. This last point includes fair and equitable treatment of employees.
Should you ever find yourself thinking that your employees and customers have not invested in your dream or they have mistreated you in some way, I would suggest spending a couple of weeks like the two women who wanted to move to a different department. You might be in for a surprise.
Gladys Edmunds' Entrepreneurial Tightrope column appears Wednesdays. As a single, teen-age mom, Gladys made money doing laundry, cooking dinners for taxi drivers and selling fire extinguishers and Bibles door-to-door. Today, Edmunds, founder of Edmunds Travel Consultants in Pittsburgh, is a private coach/consultant in business development and author of There's No Business Like Your Own Business, published by Viking. See an index of Edmunds' columns. Her website is www.gladysedmunds.com. You can e-mail her at gladys@gladysedmunds.com.
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