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The NEWORK Centre
Level 2 Willbank House
57 Willis Street Wellington
Phone 499 1048
e-mail nework@xtra.co.nz

No 89 July 2006

Red Herrings are for Foxhunts

For centuries, English fox hunters dragged a red herring in front of their hounds in order to distract them from the scent of the little furry guy.

In time, this practice produced the metaphorical "red herring," which is an attempt to win an argument or negotiation by diverting attention from the real issue at hand.

Introducing a red herring in a discussion or negotiation can be a handy defensive tactic. But sometimes we use personal red herrings, which essentially is when we lie to ourselves.

Personal red herrings

It's one thing to use red herrings with others as a communication tactic. But when we use them on ourselves, it's unproductive at best and destructive at worst.

Shakespeare addressed this issue five centuries ago in perhaps his most famous play. Sharing his wisdom in Act I, Scene III, of Hamlet, Polonius said: "This above all: to thine own self be true . . ."

If you can't be true to yourselves, you can't be true to your dream. And a false dream is an entrepreneurial atomic meltdown waiting to happen.

Perhaps the most difficult challenge you'll face is knowing when to continue to believe in whatever you're working on, and when it's time to move on. And the dilemmas on these horns could range from a small piece of your plan, all the way to the actual validity of your vision and viability of the dream upon which you've staked your future.

One of my mentors helped me learn how to face these "go-no go" decisions by asking this question: "Do you have a fighting chance, or just a chance to fight?"

The key to success in business, and indeed in life, may be as simple as knowing the answer to that question.

Check your position

One way to tell if you are dragging a stinking fish across the trail of your own dream is by checking your position. Here are three examples:

1. Have you conducted enough due diligence to find out if your plan has a reasonable chance of being successful? If not, telling yourself things will work out is a red herring.

2. Is your activity resulting in ANY success? If nothing is working, convincing yourself that you just need to work harder is masking reality.

3. Are your assumptions performing? If you're only consuming resources without creating opportunity, you must tell yourself the truth: You're not on the right trail. Yet.

The whole truth

When even small successes can be found mixed in with the failures, you may have a vision merely in need of adjustments, and worthy of extra effort.

But in order to evaluate all of this, small business owners need all the facts they can get their hands on. And they need the truth from all parties -- especially from themselves.

The marketplace is formidable enough. Use red herrings for fox hunting and negotiating -- not on yourself.

"This above all: to thine own self be true."

Are You Fishing Or Are You Hunting?

Last Summer, I was filling in time between appointments and decided to walk along the waterfront. It was a marvellous day, sunny, still, clear. The harbour sparkled While I was walking I happened upon a man I'd seen many times before in Newtown and at the Overseas Terminal where he was usually fishing. I hadn't seen him in a long while and so I stopped to chat. We spent time catching up on the little we knew about each other and as I went to walk on he decided to walk with me and as he said "keep his eyes out for fish."

He picked up his tackle (a very light line on a real and a short flimsy rod). I asked what he meant. He explained that his sunglasses allowed him to see pretty clearly into the water and that in fact, he could see the fish. He told me that he didn't stand still and wait for the fish to come to him, he went out looking for the fish. He said boldly, "I hunt, I don't fish."

We're walking along, talking, and in mid-sentence he whips around toward the water and crouches down, looks down, this way and than that. He found one! He focused all his energy totally on that fish. Looking at his body language one would think he was listening to the fish. There he was walking along there in the water tracking that fish, not missing a movement.

When he felt the time right, he threw the line right to him. The fish bit, was caught, but wasn't giving up easily. I watched as he went through an elaborate dance with the fish, giving in, holding his ground, giving in and finally, at just the right moment, bringing that fish right onto the wharf. By rights that fish should have broken the line and the rod.

He caught a big 20-inch fish (measured with his feet.) he was grinning from ear to ear. And then he carefully removed the hook from the fish, put it into his bag and moved on.

So, you might be wondering, what does this fish story have to do with being a NEWORKer. Well there were two things:

If I wasn't a NEWORKer myself, I just would not have been there and able to catch up (no pun intended) with this fellow and secondly it lead me to think about "do I hunt or fish for business?"

So, do you hunt down opportunities to provide value for our customers or do we wait for them to take the bait on the hook we have dangling?

Do we clearly focus our sights on creating value for customers and others? Do we move along side the customer as they are moving, listening and watching? Do we dance with the relationship, understanding instinctively what will happen next? And occasionally, depending on the circumstances, do we know when it's time to throw one back? (My fisherman friend had told me that he had thrown two fish back because one was too small and the other was a species that he didn't like eating). Not every customer is the right customer. You need a strategy for attracting those customers that "fit."

Do you hunt or do you fish?

Fishing for opportunities to create value may no longer be enough. Maybe we need to take charge of looking for ways that our business can be outstanding. Get focused and present with your customers and get the whole team on the same page. Listen carefully to all the undercurrents in your business, look for patterns, and search for opportunities……..

Have you thought ……

· Success happens in private, failure in public.

· The way to do more is not to think of things as impossible.

· Two wrongs are only the beginning.

· Nearly all men can stand aversity, but if you want to test a man's character, give him power.

www.youaretheauthor.com

Pessimist & the Optimist ……

A group of anthropologists at Cambridge were conducting research on the concepts of pessimism and optimism. Their subjects were two young boys: one a pessimist, and the other an optimist.

The pessimistic boy was put in a room full of wonderful toys. The optimistic boy was put in a room with nothing but a barrel of manure. When the scientists looked in on the pessimistic boy one hour later they found him complaining about this toy that didn't work, that one needed fresh batteries, the next one wasn't the right color, etc., etc. Recording their findings, they moved on.

As they opened the door to the room where the optimistic boy was, they had to duck to avoid being hit by flying manure. Indeed, manure was splattered everywhere. They found the young lad head-first in the barrel, where he was heard to say, "I know there's a pony in here somewhere".

When your small business faces challenges this year, be sure to look for your pony. It's in there somewhere.