Insights on...Missed Opportunity

Insights on…
By: Stepan W. Baghdassarian, December 10, 2006

My friend Deborah Shames wrote the following:

“MISSED OPPORTUNITY: The holiday season is typically a time for vacation travel and social functions – but don’t overlook it for generating new business. Corporate and networking parties offer an opportunity to stay in front of colleagues, cement existing business relationships, and nurture new ones. Approach people you haven’t seen in awhile. During the conversation, put your full attention on them. (Nothing is more frustrating than speaking to someone who is scanning the room!) Ask probing questions. Be a good listener. Offer to provide a resource or connection that would be beneficial to them. And share a client anecdote, especially if it reveals a new aspect of your business.”

What Deborah is saying is very true and equally applicable in our personal relationships as well. A missed opportunity is a missed opportunity and it is never coming back.

In the song “Missed Opportunities” Hall & Oates wrote
“Keep on missing each other Our world's out of orderAll I see is missed opportunity.

The story is that Hall & Oates wrote this song after they missed meeting Elvis. Soon afterwards Elvis died.

I don’t mean to be overly dramatic, but I am making a point. If there is someone you would like to meet, just to have that person as a friend, send a Charismas card, invite them to a party that you’re having or your business is having. For the next two weeks, I will be attending at least one or two Holiday functions every night. These are great opportunities for me and I love going to these events and seeing old friends and meeting new people and getting to know them.

As my friend Chien J. Wang says “It’s not who you know, but who knows you.” Get to be known by others for something you do, for your area of specialization, for the resource you can be not only for the people who know you, but for their friends, colleagues and clients. Here the concept of MySpace is right on point. We gather “friends” and get on their pages. Now not only we are “friends” with those people but we are also available and accessible to their friends’ friends and they are equally accessible to us which presents us with great opportunities that hopefully we will not miss.
Special Quote: “What we call failure is not the falling down, but the staying down” Mary Pickford (1893- 1979)
”Merry Christmas & Happy New Year”

I hope you enjoyed reading this blurb and please pass it on to others if you think they will enjoy reading it as well. I will send out similar blurbs from time to time. Send me your thoughts and comments.

Thanks

Stepan W. Baghdassarian


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