When there is a crisis: Should you be an optimist or a pessimist?
I have just given a speech in the city of Cartagena in one of my favorite countries in Latin America, Colombia.
It’s been a few years that I hadn’t visited that beautiful city, so similar to old San Juan. My client took me on a ride in one of those horse carts where the guide explains the interesting sites throughout the city, while people with guitars approach you and others have dinner in one of their excellent restaurants.
My speech was given to a large travel agency with a presence in over 100 cities and 18 countries in Latin America; I believe they have one agency here in San Juan.
Like every other intelligent company, they are preparing for the year 2009 which looks like it will be a tough year for almost every country in the world.
When you are facing a negative economic outlook, should you be a pessimist or an optimist? This is a very interesting question, and I believe the answer is nor one or the other. The correct answer is: You should be a realist.
A long time ago an officer in the US Navy, if I correctly recall, named Stockwell was shot down in Vietnam and put in jail. Since he had nothing better to do, he decided to study other prisoners to see who survived and who didn’t. He came to the conclusion that the pessimists died because they never saw anything positive in their circumstances and they always thought that the worst was going to happen, so the worst always happened.
The optimists also died because they thought they would be freed next week, or next month, or next year, year after year, until they got discouraged and died. The realists were the ones that understood that they were in a tough situation but never lost their faith in themselves and they just aimed at surviving one more day, one day a time, until they were finally freed.
In this meeting in Cartagena, I had travel agencies from all of Colombia and a couple of other countries, Mexico and Costa Rica. They spoke about the economic situation of the world, and of Colombia specifically. Even though Colombia is one of the countries in better shape in all of Latin America, they are already feeling a downturn in their economy. They also had a financial scandal, related to a pyramid scheme which cost them millions of dollars.
There I was in front of a group of entrepreneurs that insisted in looking at the opportunities that this situation presents instead of crying and blaming everybody else for their problems. They analyzed the situation of the country, looked at the financial indicators and they communicated some of the actions that have to be taken to be able to survive and progress in the future.
Let me tell you, the travel industry is a tough industry, especially for travel agents. They are right in the middle between airlines and clients, and the airlines want to deal with the clients direct and they advertise so as to do so.
The only way that they can get business is if they prove to clients that they add value to the equation. If they simply wait for the phone to ring they are dead in the water. Many, many agencies will go down the tubes because they are not proactive in offering products that people want.
When the airlines stopped paying commissions to travel agents, many of them complained, cried and thought that it would take them out of business. Many had to close their doors. But you know what? Many agencies took it as a challenge and looked at other ways to serve the client and they are now doing better than before. Three of those agencies spoke at the conference and they all told their success story. They said that the airlines taking away the commissions were the best thing that could have happened to them. They were forced to look at other ways to bring in revenue and they found it.
The message is clear. Entrepreneurs that accept change, alter the way they do business, look for opportunities and ways to satisfy what clients need, will be successful. This applies to all of us in the business world.
When times are tough, there will be opportunities for those that innovate, that market intelligently, that take advantage of those that give up or are so negative that they will freeze their advertising or their training.
Blessed are the losers since they will determine who the winners are.
I started my session with a question: Why are you all here?
To learn ways to be more effective? Some raised their hands.
To network with other agents? A few more raised their hands.
To get away from the office and have some fun? Only one raised his hand.
To take a break from a tough boss? No one raised their hand, probably because they were there with their boss.
I then told them that those reasons were ok, but in reality, it wasn’t the real reason they were there. A blank look in their faces! The real reason, you are all here today is TO BETTER SERVE YOUR CLIENTS. That is the real reason why you should do anything in your business. To look for ways to better serve you clients. In tough times, this is more important than ever.
Some other ideas I gave them which could be of value to those of you in business.
Diversify. Don’t place all your eggs in one basket. (This travel Group just bought a hotel in Cartagena)
Be a smart marketer. Take advantage of public relation opportunities and advertising and try to grab market share from companies that are scared and pull back on their marketing efforts.
When you advertise, target a specific niche you can more effectively and more economically reach.
Make effective use of technology in order to reach clients. Look at electronic newsletters, social sites such as face book, LinkedIn, my space, twitter, etc. Have a web 2.0 site, one that is interactive and sells for you. It is amazing how you can get your message out without spending one cent.
Work as a team. Now more than ever, everyone in the company must understand that there is a need to work together, to help each other, to cover everyone’s back. It is tough enough to find clients, in fighting needs to stop.
As Helen Keller, that courageous, wonderful lady once said: Security is superstition. It doesn’t exist in nature. Life is an adventure or it is nothing”
There is a heck of an adventure awaiting us in 2009, be ready for the ride.
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