All the top business schools in the world teach their students to be savvy, train them to be analytical quants, groom them to be polished communicators with the sole objective of helping them out-smart, out-maneuver, out-manipulate, out-shine, out-get, out-profit their fiercest competitors. No wonder their lives are so difficult. This is especially when their customers are also increasingly becoming smarter over the years.
But the best secrets for not only business or professional but also overall life success have already been taught to all students back when they were in kindergartens and primary schools. Be kind. Be compassionate. Be respectful. Be honest. Be helpful. Be nice. Be responsible for our own actions.
Just use what we have learnt in primary schools and we will be able to do well in life.
We don’t need to out-smart, out-manuever or out-manipulate our competition. Because they too are going to do the same to us.
Instead, aim at out-doing everyone else in areas they are not even interested in trying at all. Aim at out-caring, out-giving, out-helping, out-democratising our competitors. Treat our customers like we treat our closest friends. Even when you are not the best and the brightest nor the smartest person in town, people want to be doing business with you because they know that you truly care for them.
You think people are so stupid they can’t tell the difference just because you have gone to one of those fancy sounding business schools? These savvy MBA graduated sharks in suits today are a dime a dozen. Honest, sincere and caring individuals who may not have MBAs to their names are the ones that are being highly sought after.
But no, we don’t think real success can be that simple. We have to make a killing, 'scale' our operations, monetize our followers in social media, milk our 'likes' on Facebook, hit seven figure revenues within two years and meet whatever ambitious KPIs to really celebrate our success.
Fight-till-the-other-man-falls, kill-him-before-he-kills-you type of reasoning ...
That’s when if you succeed, you’ll fail, a phrase borrowed from Sadhguru. He also said something along the lines of this is no different from trying to “succeed” in cutting the very branch on which you are sitting!