Category Archives: Life

Doing it right and keeping it simple

Career, Life

Doing things right is a very simple personal and business philosophy. It means doing the best you can. Once you have done your best, that is all you can do. When you make decisions, as long as you make the best decision you can at the time, I believe that is all anyone can expect of us. The truth is, we don’t always do the best we can and do not always make the best decision for a myriad of reasons. Some of those reasons are short term gain, ego, pride, self-satisfaction, revenge and any number of other bad factors to bring into a decision. Additionally, while we will not admit it to ourselves, we may just not be willing to try as hard as we can.

Keeping it simple is something you learn by experience. I have often told our sales people that the first 30 seconds of a conversation is the most critical part of selling. For better or worse, the people on the other end of the phone call or on the other end of a hand shake, instinctively make a decision on you within an unfairly short amount of time. That is why the first eye to eye meeting or the first phone call very often sets the stage for the relationship. This is something many people choose to overlook but we all know it is true. To prove my point, think of the last person you met and be honest with yourself on how quick you made assumptions on that individual. It is human nature to “size up” people you meet or speak to.

I got a call back today from a hotel owner with whom I had left a message. The first minute was who do you know and how is the weather and it’s a beautiful fall season etc. Then the guy says “I am returning your call.” This was the checkered flag that began my 30 seconds of opening pitch. I was through in 30 seconds with what I wanted to talk to him about and then I just hit the pause button. When I paused, he knew it was his turn to talk and he started telling me about his business and his family’s growth plans for the future. The call went well. After the call I thought about how if I had keep talking for 5 minutes, he would have lost interest.

I have a great friend of mine who is also a great client. We often laugh about the first conversation we had years ago. To hear him tell it, he could tell right away that I stuttered so he said he picked up on three words to tee off on then proceeded with the conversation. Ha. That was the first conversation we had and it must have worked because he and I have worked on many hotels and it all started with that first disjointed call.

When you do the best you can with each opportunity and you keep the complicated things simple, you will be much more satisfied in life, more relaxed in what you do and have more joy and accomplishment in your life. KT

National coffee day

Life

Today is national coffee day and I thought I would share a few points regarding coffee and where it should be located in the grocery store.

First, if it comes in a can, it shouldn’t be located on the coffee aisle in the grocery store. It should be located in the cosmetics section.

Secondly, if the name on the front has two large DD’s, it should be located in the flavoring aisle at the grocery store where you can get bouillon cubes or broth.

If it is Folgers, trust me, the best part of waking up is NOT going to be in your cup.

If it is instant freeze dried (Sanka), just drink some milk. It will taste better and last longer.

If you think about the commercial (Maxwell House) with the popping sound “pop-pop-pa-pop pop,” if you hear this sound in the morning, just roll over and go on back to sleep.

If the coffee advertising has a picture of Juan Valdez growing the coffee in Columbia, the reason they are trying to sell you the coffee is because no one in Mexico wants it either.

If you are in Sam’s, just because the coffee is cheap and you get a dump truck full, don’t do it.

In the coffee aisle, there is a lot of want-to-be-coffees with fancy looking bags that makes you think of drinking a hot cup of coffee nestled in front of the fireplace. This is just advertising because if you buy it, instead of feeling nestled in front of the fireplace, you will feel like you are in your underwear on back porch. Ha

So in summary, have you ever taken a shower with your socks on or kissed your own brother or sister? Exactly, it just doesn’t do anything for you or make you want it again.

Therefore the only coffee brand left is, drum roll please,,,,, Starbucks. That’s real coffee! It will put hair on your chest and give you a hitch in your giddy-up. KT

Be who you is

Career, Life

A country preacher once said something that is one of the most intelligent things I have ever heard.

He said “be who you is, because if you ain’t who you is, you is who you ain’t.”

Ok, class dismissed. Ha

So many times in life we are tempted to try and be someone other than who we really are. What the country preacher said is so very true and one of the greatest pieces of advice you can ever hear. Just be who you are. That advice is good in our personal life as well as in our business life.

The best I can tell, education can only take you so far. Wisdom and understanding is really what we all should be seeking. Education teaches you the knowledge of a subject but it is wisdom and understanding that allow you to know how to use the knowledge.

I like looking at the history of successful people and how they made it. The following is a list of a few billionaires who made it and never graduated high school. Not college, high school. John D Rockefeller, Henry Ford, Francois Pinault and Richard Branson never graduated. You know John D. and Henry Ford’s history but did you know the guy who invented Gucci, Christie’s, Samsonite and Puma was Francois Pinault who quit high school because all the kids made fun of him for being poor? Did you know Richard Branson suffered from dyslexia and quit high school at 16 and went on to overseen 500 companies? These were just a few billionaires. You would be surprised at how many successful tech companies were started by high school and college dropouts.

My point is this. Like the country preacher said, just be who you are. Education is great but the two things we should seek is wisdom and understanding. It is those two things that enable you to become who you really were meant to be. KT

Taking the mask off

Life

Many people wear a mask to cover up who they really are. Some of these people go through their whole life wearing a mask to cover up what they don’t want anyone else to see.

Have you ever met someone you know in your heart is the genuine article? It is so refreshing to see people that don’t march to the beat of someone else’s drum. People who talk, act and look exactly like they really are. People that wear a mask think other people can’t detect the misdirection. The truth is, God put in every one of us this thing in our spirit that I call the tuning fork. If you think of a tuning fork and how it works, once it is hit against something, it basically begins to hum a perfect key so the musician can tune their instrument to the perfect pitch of the tuning fork. They have been around for 300 years

That same tuning fork (metaphorically speaking) is in all of us. When you meet someone for the first time, it is that thing inside you that confirms or warns you that the person may or may not be who they want to portray that they are. We have all experienced this on some level when we meet someone new, there is just an easy or uneasy feeling in our spirit. If something is not right, it cautions you to be careful and move slowly. Whether you heed the intuition or not is your choice.

I have a family member and a friend that are both like this. It doesn’t matter what they say or do, there is this (I call it) invisible fog that surrounds them. In both cases, I love them but I am always on high alert anytime I am around them. If you can imagine a spiritual antenna, (I know it is silly,) but when I am around them my antenna is standing straight up and on full alert. It is telling me something is wrong and to be careful and move slowly.

I think the answer to this is to first get real with yourself. Get alone and get honest and real with who you are. Once you know who you are, make the decisions you need to make in order to start getting your heart and face in harmony. When you can finally do this, you can then take the mask off and let the world see and experience the real you. Once you are the real you, you will never want to go back to wearing a mask while trying to be someone you are not. KT

The difference between work and life

Career, Family, Life

Work is that thing you do to make money and life is all the other aspects and moments.

Seems so simple, yet so many people miss life thinking about work. I have always admired people who have mastered the ability to be mentally where they were physically. What I mean is, when you are with your family, are you really there or somewhere else in your mind? Be engaged when you color with your children or read stories at bedtime or just sit together in front of the fireplace. The term is to “be there” and I think that term says it all.

The invention of the blackberry to the workaholic was like getting hooked on crack cocaine. People in business renamed it the crackberry instead of the blackberry because people would bring it home and look at it constantly. The IPhone just exacerbated it with all the fancy apps, videos, texts, emails and Facebook etc.

Trust me when I tell you, when you get older in life, you will not remember all the work you did when it was family time. What you will remember is all the family time you missed while your mind was on work.

My late father in-law had the ability to turn it off when he left work and be fully engaged when he got home. I went fishing with him a number of times and I can tell you for a fact, when he was fishing, he was NOT thinking about work. When he fished, by God that man fished like his life depended on it.

The point of the blog post is to be there in the moments of your life. They are the things you will remember as you get older. KT