Scary times

I have long known that Fear is a wonderful motivator. What’s the line in the movie, “The Hunt for Red October”: ‘When Cortes landed in the New World, he burned the ships. As a result, his men were well motivated.” (Oh, and btw, the only way to read that last line is with Sean Connery’s accent).

As a sales rep coming out of college, I was well motivated by fear. Cast adrift from the mother ship, I was terrified to fail and have to return home. Success didn’t come easily, but it did come.

There was a point in my life where success came like a tidal wave. Not coincidentally, I was miserable. There was no challenge in life and my motivation was gone. I remember it vividly, because my largest client fired me from lack of attention. What a lesson to learn!

Today, you don’t have to look far to find something to motivate your sales. The economy sucks and very talented people are having trouble finding work. My wife works in an office where her boss and a co-worker switched roles and now he works for her. What an insult, but did he storm out and quit? Nope. He took the punch. Apparently, he reads the paper.

These are scary times. If you need motivation, cut out the headlines from the business section and stick them on your wall. You might not like your job, but you will like unemployment even less.

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