11th February 2011
`Naysayers Never Built a Great Enterprise'
Howard Schultz
We are judged not by what we are capable of doing, but by what we have done. In a job interview, the agenda before the interviewers is to assess what the interviewee is capable of performing. The task in front of the interviewee is also the same – to impress what he is capable of delivering. In the time that is available, the interviewee presents what he has already done. If you have done well in the past, by logic we can be confident that we will do well in the new assignment also. Underlying every human interaction is the confidence that we will fight against the odds and deliver the results.
If you read the life history of great people, you will see that they encountered maximum rejections and put-downs. If you want to succeed, you have to believe that your idea will work, whether others agree or not. If you are waiting until everyone around you also has the same view point, you are chasing a rainbow.
Suppose you have a brilliant idea and you are excited that the idea will work. However, in order to make the idea to work, you need people to support you with various resources – mainly money. You have to meet investors and convince them that they will have a reasonable return on investment. Suppose you present your project to 242 prospective investors and 217 say that the project will not be viable. What you would have done? Most people would have given up their project. But Howard Schultz did not. He is the Chairman and CEO of Starbucks. He continued to meet people until he got people who believed in what he believed.
This is the story of any great achiever. Be it Mahatma Gandhi or Martin Luther King. Be it Mother Teresa or Colonel Sanders.
Remember that it is your hand and mind which is writing your bio data at the rate of one day per day!
N C Sridharan
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