My First Business Crisis
I presented two people who I trust to have extremely good business sense with an analogy.
You have been working with one supplier for a particular project over a period of a month. But at the last minute, you receive an offer from a better supplier. The price is a little higher, but you think you can squeeze it. Which one would you go for? Quality or Supplier Relations?
Both replied similarly. Quality.
Business principles clash with human ethics. This is not the first time I have encountered this thought. As I have pondered further about my area of study for the next three years, I've observed this clash of values.
One reason that I received for the choice was that there is no loyalty in the market. But isn't this what is wrong with the entire industry to begin with? Isn't this what is wrong with the world? I know it isn't up to me to correct the ways of the world. Yet it is my duty to correct my ways and adhere to human ethics. Is trust not one of those ethics? Does a person's word mean nothing in this business-oriented world of the 21st Century?
Is my stife to be a principle-oriented person entirely futile as I embark upon my journey to the Real World?
I realise my own naivety at my earlier pledge to go through life in the business world by placing human ethics first. At every fork in our life I guess all we can strive for is to make the right decisions.
Desperate for a Christian point of view, one that I can trust will place human interest above all, I reach for the phone.
I got the same answer. Yet there was a side to it that appealed to my gentler side. It was the part where you use the wonderful tool of effective communication to lay the other person down gently. I no longer feel so callous.
Jack Welch, in his biography Straight From The Gut, describes how he lessened the guilt of having to let someone go. Jack Welch offered his employees a six month notice, a considerably longer period than the norm. In my analogy, the short notice is the point of disappointment. However, if I am able to offer some form of compensation, it would surely negate my guilt.
So all I have to do is offer my supplier another outlet to supply to. Surely I can be innovative enough to achieve this!
You have been working with one supplier for a particular project over a period of a month. But at the last minute, you receive an offer from a better supplier. The price is a little higher, but you think you can squeeze it. Which one would you go for? Quality or Supplier Relations?
Both replied similarly. Quality.
Business principles clash with human ethics. This is not the first time I have encountered this thought. As I have pondered further about my area of study for the next three years, I've observed this clash of values.
One reason that I received for the choice was that there is no loyalty in the market. But isn't this what is wrong with the entire industry to begin with? Isn't this what is wrong with the world? I know it isn't up to me to correct the ways of the world. Yet it is my duty to correct my ways and adhere to human ethics. Is trust not one of those ethics? Does a person's word mean nothing in this business-oriented world of the 21st Century?
Is my stife to be a principle-oriented person entirely futile as I embark upon my journey to the Real World?
I realise my own naivety at my earlier pledge to go through life in the business world by placing human ethics first. At every fork in our life I guess all we can strive for is to make the right decisions.
Desperate for a Christian point of view, one that I can trust will place human interest above all, I reach for the phone.
I got the same answer. Yet there was a side to it that appealed to my gentler side. It was the part where you use the wonderful tool of effective communication to lay the other person down gently. I no longer feel so callous.
Jack Welch, in his biography Straight From The Gut, describes how he lessened the guilt of having to let someone go. Jack Welch offered his employees a six month notice, a considerably longer period than the norm. In my analogy, the short notice is the point of disappointment. However, if I am able to offer some form of compensation, it would surely negate my guilt.
So all I have to do is offer my supplier another outlet to supply to. Surely I can be innovative enough to achieve this!
posted by Melanie at 9:06 PM
2 Comments:
I think this is the point at which your personal entries begin to evolve into somthing bigger - somthing different. Keep it up.
Who ever posted the last comment was right... ur evolving.... not in a bad way
btw
i would have chosen supplier
cuz i've been doin that for the last 4 years
i have this deal with a computer distributer
and even though i see all these other classy deals
and other better offers
i can count on one thing
reliabilty from my distributer
and i think roshan can vouch for me
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