The Best Thing I Can Do For You….

….is to give you my recommendation. It’s not to pay you, it’s not to hire you, it’s not to give you an A+ on an assignment, it’s to tell someone in my life how I honestly feel about you.

Isn’t that the best thing anyone can do for us? Give their recommendation of us to someone they know?

Think about it. An old Manager talking to a business owner who offers you your dream job? An interview while in school for a co-op placement and your Volleyball coach give you a rave reference? (This happened! Jeremy who worked with us for a little while and who I coached with for a couple years had me as a reference for a job placement over the Summer, I had so many positive stories about that boy they HAD to hire him after talking to me).

The best thing anyone can do for you is to give an honest recommendation of you to a peer or colleague. There’s no higher honour than someone saying, “oh, you want good cupcakes? You MUST talk to Jeph, he makes the BEST cupcakes!”. No advertising could ever be better than honest word-of-mouth.

I could hire you, pay you money, but that’s a short term solution, in the long run a recommendation of appreciation goes much further.

An honest recommendation from someone is invaluable. You can’t buy it, you can’t go to school for it, rich parents can’t give it to you, the privileged have no better chance of attaining it than someone else. It’s one of the hardest things to get from someone, their recommendation.

In a world where it’s getting increasingly more difficult to “impress” people, you must get outside your comfort zone and seek out moments to help people.

Actually impressing someone these days is so rare, almost as rare as people doing good deeds for others. Never miss an opportunity to do something nice for someone. 

Hold a door, volunteer, say yes, smile, compliment someone, don’t ask if someone needs helps, just help.

We confuse our goal in life a lot. As kids we assume pleasing the teacher by getting good grades is the best thing we can do. If that’s true by the time that individual is finished school that’s all they’re good at, doing what they’re told. 

No one who did anything amazing did it by doing what they were told.

Life isn’t about following the rules. I mean in some professions yes (doctor, engineer, lawyer) I hope they follow the rules, but when it comes to business and especially marketing, those who abide by rules get lost on the dust.

I always find it odd in the classroom on the first day or so talking to students about grades. There are always a couple students who put the highest priority on getting the best grades that they overlook the true goal of school, to learn something. 

Beware of the people pleasers

They don’t care about relationships, the people beside them, or any learning outcome, all they care about is being the best. The problem is that the teacher gets to decide, it’s not fair, it’s not perfect and many feelings have been hurt over grades. Stop trying to impress some imaginary authority figure and start doing things for yourself (which obviously means helping others because as you know that’s the best way to help ones’ self).

Stop worry about what other people think, the boss or your teacher is bias, they don’t really know do they? The teachers opinion is bias anyway isn’t it? Heck they proved years ago that the opinion the teacher holds of a student largely dictates how well they do. That means “gifted” students will always do better than “late bloomers” which is completely false.

Stop putting so much emphasis on landing the deal, making the big sale or getting another 99%. You’re putting undue stress on yourself. Focus on the process, focus on how you’re improving. And make sure what you’re learning is relevant, there’s nothing worse than getting “experience” at a business that is antiquated, slow moving or not on the cutting edge.

Stop trying to please people and just help people. Stop talking bad about people behind their backs and start spreading good rumours.

Perfection isn’t realistic, you aren’t pizza.

Perfection isn’t realistic nor is it something you can sustain. Stop trying to please that one person who you think holds all the power and start helping those around you.