Who Can We Trust?

There are a lot of people saying, in effect, "just ask/follow me! I have all the answers to your business questions!" (Possibly even this blog sometimes.) You can't follow them all, unless you're really fond of having a headache. How do you choose?

Last week I learned something important about who not to follow.

I want to offer more business instruction. Webinars, ebooks, live classes, etc. That's a significant re-jiggering of my professional life. I decided it would be wise to do a more formal "market analysis" than I've done so far.

The Small Business Administration has a partner organization that offers free business advice, coaching, and mentoring. These consultations are with retired executives who are volunteering their expertise and experience. I signed up for a consultation.

With just a few cursory questions, the mentor declared that my business idea was hopeless and would never work. He announced this 5 minutes after I sat down and spent the rest of the hour explaining to me why he was so well-equipped to make this decision, how big his former business was (retail furniture sales), how impressive all the other volunteers were (having run multimillion dollar businesses), etc. There were a lot of mistakes in his assumptions about our profession but he wouldn't shut up long enough for me to explain that.

My favorite of his reasoning? Since his organization offered, in effect, the same thing (business classes and mentoring) for free and they had trouble getting people to use their services, my plan couldn't possibly succeed. After all, I couldn't begin to match their qualifications and credibility.

He also chuckled lightly throughout the hour. This may have been sheer nervousness. I'm aware that when I'm really angry, it's almost impossible to keep that emotion off my face.

And I was really really angry. After I got over the urge to cry at being treated so dismissively. I walked out of there utterly determined to make my plans work, just to prove him wrong!

It's not enough to be "smart". When I need help with my business questions, I want someone who:

• listens well,
• asks lots of questions,
• is patient,
• shows compassion for my burning desire to make my business idea work (no matter how unrealistic),
• teaches rather than judges, and
• leads me through the kind of questions and research that will help me realize my idea is unrealistic if that's true.

I didn't get that. A week later, I'm still really really angry.

The quote at the top of this post is from an Australian life coach, Ingrid Arna. She's right. Why shouldn't our business partnerships have a strong (positive) emotional component to them?

It's foolish to think "doing business" is all about what you've got in your head. If you've been a massage therapist for very long, you've learned that every aspect of it, including the business aspects, involves your heart and soul.

When you're contemplating doing business with someone else, listen to the parts of your body below your eyebrows. Does your heart expand when talking to this person? Does your gut relax and trust? Do you get excited about what you and this person can do together?

Is there love present? Love for your work, love for your profession, love for your business?

I will say, this guy helped me get real clear about what my approach to working with all of you is. I will:

• actually listen to you and ask a lot of questions, not presuming I'm so damned smart I already know all I need to know
• give you the education to help you make your own decisions, possibly including the decision to change your mind about what you want to do
• respect the passion that drives you to make your practice work, maybe even get excited about it with you
• use language you can understand
• explain terms and concepts in ways that fit in your world
• presume you're smart and deserve to succeed
• respect that your dream may be a little crazy but it's still worth a try
• NOT MAKE YOU CRY

Now you tell me: what do you want out of someone offering your business advice or coaching?