When things start complicated, it is usually a precursor to how it will be all the way through.

I cannot tell you the number of business engagements over the years I have resigned from for this very reason. In our line of work, it starts with the engagement agreement where the client hires us. It then moves on to the creation of the materials, websites, marketing process, contract period, due diligence and finally the closing. If I have a client that wants to micromanage and wordsmith our engagement agreement it tells me right up front that this is how the client will be all the way through the process. I have on many occasions just backed away so I don’t have to put up with what I know will surely follow.

In our business the one thing you must have is a ready, willing and able seller. Not buyer, but seller. We can always go get another buyer but if you don’t have a seller that is fully engaged and committed to the sales process, you are just wasting your time. Yes, you may get through it but more times than not, a bad seller will kill the deal and you look up six months later and all you have is wasted time and effort.

Case in point. This week I had a situation just like this. It was a coveted engagement that I would have loved to work on. The client executed our engagement agreement without much issue, and I thought, this is going well. The same client called me three days later and asked if we would reduce our fee. I’m like, “come again?” We got that resolved and executed a revised fee agreement and then the same thing happened a week later. I told him I loved him, but I wasn’t any longer going to work for him. I knew if he did that two times in the first week and a half, that’s how it was going to be all the way through the process. I backed away because I choose to work with people that respect me personally and our company and are committed to the sales process.

Many times, life is too short to work with boneheads and I find it is much more enjoyable to spend time with people you trust. KT

When you have an idea you want to pursue, just know that the finish product might differ greatly from the original idea. That is ok as demonstrated below.

We have all read stories about how products like Play-Doh, Post-it notes, Kleenex, Bubble Wrap, Slinky all started out as something else before becoming what we know them to be today.

Take these three different companies, Heinz, Kellogg’s and Coca-Cola as examples in this business thesis. They all started out as something else that went on to become household names.

Henry Heinz went bankrupt making Horseradish before inventing ketchup. In those days there were no refrigerators, freezers, controlled processing of food. It was all sold fresh and would go bad very quickly. Many times, people ate meat that was spoiled that had been washed with bleach, dye etc. so the vendor could still sell it as “fresh.” Ketchup was invented as a cover-up sauce for bad meat to mask the spoiled taste. The idea that it would turn into a wealthy company (40 billion,) never occurred to Henry Heinz. He just wanted to be able have something sweet to cover the bad taste of food

Will Kellogg’s middle name was Keith (great name!) and helped his brother run a sanitarium that created all kinds of therapy to help the people suffering from various medical issues.  They needed to have a quick way to serve something to eat for breakfast, so they started grinding up these big granola cakes and served it in a bowl to the patients. Once day Will Kellogg saw one of the patients ask for some milk and watched him pour it over the granola. That is where the idea of Kellogg cereal came from. Later, they had mistakenly left a container of granola out on the counter overnight. In an attempt to dry it out using a roller, they discovered it turned into a flake like substance. That is where the idea for Corn Flakes started. No one had any idea it would create a company worth 22 billion

Coca Cola was invented by John Pemberton as a medicine to treat his illness. He sold the prescription to pharmacies for pain management and noticed people ordering the cola because they enjoyed drinking it cold. Pemberton was dying of stomach cancer and sold the rights to Coca Cola to Asa Candler before his death. The rest is a long story but today Coke is worth 224 billion and one of the most recognized brands in the world.

As with many things in life, what you originally planned for can on occasion turn into something you never expected and never even knew to hope for. KT