You Are Only as Good as Your Best Clients

One of my best clients told me that!

What is it about people who build successful businesses?

Do you have clients like this? Do you understand them because if you do, they can be a heck of a lot of fun to work with. These people are likely NOT only interested in compliance work. They’ll make you do your best and add value. You can really grow a practice around people like this.

Here are a few things I’ve noticed:

People trust them.-They are just easy to follow. For a million different reasons, the people around them sense that they know what they are doing and do what’s best for all involved. They have experience, but it’s beyond just that.

The see risk differently.-They don’t take crazy risks but they keep pushing and stretching for the next level. They embrace a certain amount of failure. For this reason, some of the most successful people you’ll come across have had very large failures too.

They see around corners-They are always thinking about the future and anticipate market changes, challenges and opportunities.

They can’t help it. Challenges are very attractive, sometimes almost impossible to walk away from. Projects can almost seem to own the person rather than the other way around. When obstacles are encountered, they just stay with it and keep searching for a solution. They don’t give up very easily.

Of course, these traits are not just common among successful business owners, but successful people in general. If you want to see these traits applied, check out the movie Meru. It’s a documentary about some of the world’s very best mountain climbers and how they became the first people ever to summit Mount Meru which is located in the Himalayas. It’s one of the best movies I’ve seen in a long time.

There was a scene in the film where the lead climber, Conrad Anker, makes a telling statement about his mindset after a failed attempt at Meru. The trio of climbers is at the bottom and two of the guys are swearing that they won’t ever be back to try this climb again. Conrad said, “Right after the climb I was instantly thinking about what we could do differently on the next attempt.  I was possessed!”