I 100% accredit this notion to Earl Nightingale. I heard this on his Direct Line series of tapes. If you don’t know who Earl Nightingale is, do yourself a favor and AT LEAST do a YouTube search on him.
He tells a story (and I’m paraphrasing here):
During the Great Depression, there was an over abundance of people going around to businesses “asking for jobs.” They’d literally go up to a place of business and ask if they had an positions available. No one was hiring.
Well I had a friend, who during the most severe economic crisis in American history, got a great job and prospered.
Why did HE get a job while MILLIONS could not?
The millions who could not find employment remind me of the story of the man who told the stove, “Give me heat, THEN I’ll add wood.”
My friend took the opposite approach:
First, he sat down and decided what type of work would be agreeable to him. Something that at least moderately interested him.
Next, he learned ALL HE COULD about that business. He devoured books from the library on the subject, took notes, read articles, asked question to people already in the business, read trade magazines and EVERYTHING HE COULD FIND about his prospective job.
Next, he made a list of the places he wanted to work, and he did something VERY DIFFERENT from the millions of others:
He went to the business and asked to speak to the manager/owner and said, “I believe I know quite a few ways I can improve your business very quickly….and quite significantly” Right away the managers were interested and he got hired almost immediately!
You see, businesses ALWAYS have a position available for someone who can increase their profits or add tremendous value. They DON’T always have positions for someone just looking for a handout.
By simply doing a few weeks of research, my friend was FAR ahead of millions of potential job applicants.
This reminds me of a A LOT of people right now….they’re simply looking for jobs. However if they simply took some time and effort to learn more about a particular industry, they could easily see how to add TONS of value.
Harvard MBA applying for a job? WHO CARES.
What can you do for me? That’s what matters.
Even for my own business HouseOfRave, I’m not hiring. However if someone came up to me and said, “For $5,000 I can almost guarantee your profit will go up by $10,000/month…”
…do you think I’d say no?