So, You Think You're Special?

By Bongani Matshisi

In response to a job advert I had put in the paper a few months ago, I received more than 150 applications. Needless to say, the process of trimming the applicants down to five candidates was very difficult and extremely time consuming. The reason for that is because the applicants were more similar than different and I therefore had to carefully study their CV’s to find those that had outstanding qualities, skills or achievements. After 3 days of doing nothing else, I had my five candidates.

A few days after I’d completed the short-listing process, I received a call from a friend of mine. She told me that a friend of her boyfriend’s would like to apply for the job even though applications had closed three weeks prior. Obviously there was no way I was gonna allow that but I didn’t say that to my friend. I was a bit taken aback by the nerve and the audacity her boyfriend’s friend had to ask me, a complete stranger to him, to consider his VERY late application, not to mention the means he used to try to enter through the back door, so to speak.

Instead of giving him, through my friend, an outright no, I decided to teach him a lesson. What lesson, I wasn’t quite certain then. But this is what I said to my friend: “You and your friend both know that the closing date for applications was 3 weeks ago but you still want me to consider him. That would be unfair to the people who to applied on time. But I’m not saying no because you never know, this guy could be a star. But since he wants special treatment, I need him to tell me, through you, in two days time what is special about him. In 8 words or less.”

Two days later, I got this response from my friend via sms: “dedication, passion, ambitiousness, being ethical*, drives me daily”.

There’s nothing special about that. And I told my friend as such. I can say with almost certainty that almost all of the applications in circulation out there have the same exact words in them. Even if the guy had applied before the deadline, chances are he would have been one of the 150 applicants that didn’t make the shortlist. And that’s because there’s either nothing special about him or there is, but he just doesn’t know how to communicate it.

What could he have said that would have made me consider him, you may wonder? Plenty of things. He could have told me he speaks 10 languages, or he can play 5 musical instruments well, or he has spent 2 years travelling around 20 countries in Europe or Africa, or a lot of other things that most people cannot do or have not done. Learning one language takes discipline and dedication, let alone 10. The same goes for learning musical instruments.

The world of work is changing and you and I have to change along with it. It’s very competitive out there and it is only those of us who have something special or different to offer who will survive. How does an employer differentiate one BComm or MBA graduate from another? Unless you’ve got that something special, you’re leaving a lot to chance. And against 150 or so other applicants, I’d say those are pretty steep odds?


*(italics mine. The irony of what he was saying was completely lost to him.)

You Don't Need Customers

By Werner van Zyl

In Bongani’s previous post he wrote about failure and how Edison failed 10 000 times before eventually inventing the light bulb. (Seriously, how hard could it be?) The post certainly made me feel much better about my 50 previous failed attempts at writing a book. If Thomas Edison is anything to go by, I still have another 9 950 shots left at writing that elusive first book.

I have already started thinking about my 51st attempt which will be titled “You don’t need customers”.

Basically, the book will be about turning your customers into fans. Why fans, you ask?

That’s because unlike customers, fans will support you through thick and thin. At least the real fans will. And that would exclude the Manchester City fans. Again, I’m talking about real fans here. Like the fans of Leeds United.

Leeds were (and still are) a major football club in England. They played in the Premier League during the 90s and even the Champions League where they once reached the semi final if my memory serves me right. They also did quite well in the Premiership, finishing in the Top 4. Times were good and the fans were happy. Then disaster of Chilean-miner proportions struck. Leeds ran into financial difficulties and suddenly this massive club started sinking. Fast. Within a couple of seasons they found themselves plying their trade in League One (the 3rd tier of English football). A major embarrassment for such a huge club.

What happened to the fans? Did they start supporting another team? No. Here you had a League One team with crowds in excess of 30 000 at home games. To put this into perspective, League One teams struggle to get 10 000 fans into their grounds on a good day. The Leeds fans stuck with their team and supported them even in the dark days. They won promotion last season and now play in the Championship (2nd tier of English football).

So what exactly is my point? Thank you for asking.

Now imagine, instead of customers, your business or product had fans. Real fans. Like the Leeds United fans.

Customers generally don’t come back after a bad experience. Fans do. Fans always come back because they are fans. They love your business or your product so much that they can excuse you for that one time that you delivered a bad experience or a faulty product. They believe in you or your product and fans will almost never change their loyalty. Fans are there to stay. Customers, on the other hand, are not. Customers will try that new restaurant that just opened or will go to your competition because they have a Valentine’s Day special running. Not fans. They go to your restaurant every lunch time. They love your restaurant even if the tuna-melt smelt a bit funny today. They will be back tomorrow.

Now what would you rather have? Customers or fans? If you want fans, then my book is for you. The book will tell you how to turn customers into fans. Real fans for life.

Failure

By Bongani Matshisi

A few months ago Werner and I asked our friends, colleagues, family and just about anyone who would speak to us what the most important lesson they’ve learnt in their lives was. People were very forthcoming and in the process we got some real gems. Over the next few weeks I will be taking a closer look at some of my favourites and sharing my thoughts on them.

To kick things off, I’ve decided to start off with what is the most important lesson I’ve learnt so far. And that is: As human being we are destined to fail and to fail often.

There is not a single person on this earth who hasn’t, at one stage, or another, failed at something. But does failing make one a failure? It depends.

In my opinion, the most important thing about failing is not to wallow in the failure but to actually learn from it. As imperfect human beings (at least those of us who challenge themselves), we are bound to trip up every once in a while. Take Thomas Edison, the American inventor, for instance. On his way to inventing the electric light bulb, Edison failed approximately 10 000 times. We now know that he didn’t give up but used each failure as an opportunity to learn.

With each failed attempt, he made a note of exactly what he'd done and what components he had used. Then he made an adjustment to the experiment and tried again. And when that "failed" he made a note of that, readjusted and tried again. He kept learning from every experiment. He learned all the ways that it wouldn't work. He discovered all the chemicals and elements that wouldn't work. And each time he found a way that wouldn't work, he knew he was closer to finding a way that would work.

When Thomas Edison was interviewed by a young reporter who boldly asked Mr. Edison if he felt like a failure and if he thought he should just give up by now. Perplexed, Edison replied, "Young man, why would I feel like a failure? And why would I ever give up? I now know definitively over 9,000 ways that an electric light bulb will not work. Success is almost in my grasp." And shortly after that, and over 10,000 attempts, Edison invented the light bulb.

Thomas Edison understood the profound secret that to succeed you have to be willing to fail and fail fast. To Edison all failure provided valuable information that he could use to correct his course, and lead him to eventual success.

So I urge you, and myself in the process, to go out there and fail. Often.

Stop Watching Lost!

By Werner van Zyl

This blog is all about sharing what we learn or experience with the rest of the world. For free (and yet they say nothing is for free). I’ll be posting weekly on this blog but to start off I thought I would share with you my all time favourite Youtube video.
If you haven’t heard of Gary Vaynerchuk, where have you been? See the video below, but be warned it may change your life forever. I love this video for several reasons and it has been an inspiration to me ever since I saw it for the first time a year ago. I now watch it at least once a week. Watch it and let me know what you think and what your favourite parts/quotes are. Its powerful.

While You Wait

by Bongani Matshisi

After months of putting it off, I finally decided to get a new laptop. After doing my research matched with my needs and my budget, I was able to zero in on 3 options. When I got to the store, the gentleman (of the most charming kind) who helped me described the pros and cons of each of the options I was looking at and after a little while, we settled on the winner.

I then proceeded to the checkout point to pay for my new acquisition. For some reason, my debit card would not work. And it wasn’t because I had no money in it. The cashier tried once. Declined. She tried twice. Still declined. Not wanting to risk blocking the card, we thought it best to stop there.

With some quick thinking on my part (even if I say so myself), I came up with a Plan B. Being a store that sells high-tech equipment, I knew they had to have an internet connection. I would just transfer the money from my account into theirs. Edward, the aforementioned gentleman, made sure I had everything I needed and, ignoring everyone else in the store, was there to assist me at every step of the way.

Unfortunately, he told me, I had to wait until the next day for the money to reflect on their bank account before I could take the laptop home. No worries. I was in no rush.

The next day, on my way to work, by pure chance, I drove past Edward. He greeted me by name, which was nice, considering the number of customers he must interact with everyday. He told me to expect a call from him during the course of the day.

At 13:00 the call came. There was a problem with their systems and for that reason my payment was still not reflecting on their bank account. As already mentioned, I was in no rush to get the laptop. But when you’ve paid the kind of money I paid for it, you’d like to have something to show for it sooner rather than later. I couldn’t get upset, not with Edward at least. His hands were tied. What he did, however, was to ensure me that he would monitor the situation and if there were any developments, he would let me know.

At 16:00 on the dot, I got another call from Edward. There was still no change. He sounded a bit nervous, probably expecting me to go off on him. I didn’t. I didn’t because of two reasons: 1. It’s not the nicest thing to do and, 2. It probably would not have changed the situation. Also, Edward didn’t try to duck and dive in his explanation of it nor did he try to blame the system or anyone else for the delay. What he did was to give me a clear and concise explanation. Not only that, he gave me his word, which had significantly increased in value to me, that he would continue to monitor the situation, and if by 09:00 the following day there was no change, he would do whatever it took to make sure that I got my laptop that day. That’s all needed to hear.

And as promised, Edward called at 09:00 the following day to inform me everything was sorted and that I could collect my laptop whenever it was convenient for me...

As Tom Peters likes to say, the problem is never/rarely the problem. It’s almost always the response to the problem that invariably becomes the problem. I have found that people are pretty thick-skinned when it comes to a lot of things that we think they’re not. As long as people know you’re being straight with them, they’ll forgive almost everything.

I think there’s a lesson in that.

Another lesson to learn here is that people usually don’t remember how long the wait was. They remember what it was like.