Life is just a series of trades Wednesday, February 28, 2007
When you ask someone for help, whilst they may do it out of sheer kindness, it's good to have considered what's in it for them and at least try to offer someone evidence of compensation.
In saying this, I'm not referring to ambulance crews or life threatening situations and suggesting you need to get you wallet out. I'm referring to business, and in that environment the process doesn't involve take, take, take. And if that's how you operate you are screwed. Sure, you may catch some people out a few times, but you will quickly get the wrong kind of reputation and that news always goes viral!
So, when approaching someone for help, consider what it is you can offer them and that doesn't need to be cash/stock in most instances. It may simply be a token but at the very least it shows you understand the game. Similarly it may not be much relative to the recipient's "worth", but if it is relative to yours it shows you care - better yet, find something that will be worthwhile to them. In many cases, you may get a "don't worry about it" but it will matter to them that at least you offered, unlike the hundred other people that didn't.
Hence, offering Bill Gates a dollar isn't going to register on the scale but it may if you only have $2. But if you offer to help his foundation by getting them seats to XXX for auction from your brother who does YYY, that could be worthwhile.
Noah Kagan puts this even more starkly [He's the crazy guy who offered to post a comment on every blog post for two weeks in exchange for a single post on his blog - he was overwhelmed by the volume].
posted by John Wilson @ 11:40 PM Permanent Link
newsvine
reddit
2 Comments:
-
At 7:18 PM,
said...
-
Interesting post on trades. I am still commenting away=)
-
At 10:26 PM,
John Wilson said...
-
Noah, great to have you back on this blog. Surprised you aren't sick of the sight of blog comment sections after you marathon.
