To succeed in life you need an area, a skill, or something that you like and you can do as a natural.
I studied trombone for twelve years including two years in college. At that time, I was taking private lessons with a great teacher. One day, another guy showed up at the lesson and he played just unbelievably. I was shocked. And my teacher said this to me: “This guy studied for just two years. You worked to reach the level you’re at but he’s just natural. You may want to look at something where you don’t have to work so hard, where you could be a natural. But if you stay in music, you will be looking over your shoulder for the rest of your life for the young natural people coming to take your job.” Two months before this, I won the highest-level design competition on the planet. I received the highest score in 38 years of this competition and I hadn’t even tried very hard. I designed and built a model car. I turned my brain off and I just did it. So I’m sitting there thinking, “Wait a minute, two months ago I got the highest score in 38 years of competition, 11 million young men entering the competition. I won it and I didn’t try.” He was telling me I should do something that came naturally to me. The next day, I took my trombone, I polished it up, and I put it away. I changed from music to design. I got accepted at the Art Center College of Design. I finished: 600 people applied, 44 were accepted, 4 finished. I was number one. I could do design without thinking. In design, I have a skill where I don’t have to work. I didn’t need a teacher to tell me that I was a good designer. I figured all that out by myself. The only thing he said to me that was significant was that you’re going to be looking over your shoulder for the rest of your life. He didn’t tell me I had talent or I didn’t have talent. He just said you might want to find something where you’re a natural. I had already figured that out. Negotiating Up In China, they can cut a penny into 1000 pieces. I was called into a meeting after our Purchasing Manager beat up a long-time supplier to get a low price. I was told this was a price just above cost; they wanted our business. I told the meeting that we would not be able to use the supplier because his price was too low… The room went into shock! How could a price be too low in China?—unheard of. I explained that we had to build relationships with vendors who would be with us for the long term when the product took off and volumes got high. The price they gave would bankrupt our best supplier. I suggested he raise his price to make a 9% profit so he would be around for the long term. He loved it; it shocked my staff. I then had the supplier finance the parts for six months when I could not get bank credit. The lowest price is not always the best solution to the overall problem because in the next phase of growth that comes, you’re going to triple and quadruple the volume of your products. But if your supplier is losing money now then he’s going to lose three or four times that amount of money. So, he will go bankrupt and won’t be there when you need him. You want a long-term relationship. You don’t want a relationship where a supplier tries to buy your business and then is not there in three months when you need him. In this case, because we looked out for him at the start, he trusted us enough to bank roll the contract later, when we needed it. Negotiating with Wings When you’re negotiating, you have to understand whether you have an emotional involvement or whether you are engaged intellectually. I see so many times, even catch myself, getting involved in a situation emotionally. When I catch myself starting to get sucked into the emotional side of a negotiation, what I do then is I reach down in my pocket and take out two white angel wings that I keep in my pocket. I put them on my back, start flapping them, and fly up about 200 meters above the room. And then at 200 meters, with my wings flapping, I look back down into the room, look at myself, and look at how I’m responding to their conversation. And at 200 feet away, it is different from being in that room. You can intellectualize the situation and escape emotion. By using this technique, I’m intellectualizing an emotional situation: “Am I happy with what I’m doing down in that room? No, I’m not happy with my response. What are they doing?” Once I can intellectualize, then I can become a true thought leader.
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