As a designer and visionary you can bet I have fantasies about building the next great space suit, or flying car. Who wouldn’t want those sexy and groundbreaking products in their portfolio? Our firm’s mission is to help humanity move on to better things and we don’t just mean the next version of your smartphone. We mean becoming a spacefaring civilization responsibly caring for our home planet. Chasing those fantastic projects would be living the dream for myself and our community of visionary masterminds but it is no way to run a business and here’s why…
Projects come and go and the amazing ones are rare creatures. You never know when and where they will pop up! Sometimes startups from nowhere have world changing ideas, sometimes the most innovative brands plateau. To keep your doors open waiting for a shooting star is not an honest way to practice business. It’s simply not fair to your clients. Every client paying you for your skills deserves the same excellent attention to their project. Even if it’s not exciting to you it is important enough to them to invest in purchasing your services.
Being loyal to the quality of your business relationships and not the projects those people bring you is the best way to maintain integrity in your industry. Most entrepreneurs don’t serve things. We pour our energy into our businesses in order to serve people. If your business values are similar, then start by serving your business partnerships. Then you can enjoy it when those people bring you amazing ideas and opportunities to work with. Remember, people do business with people they know, like, and trust. Relationships and partnerships are everything in business.
When your business is about relationships it stays rich and rewarding. It’s true a project can spice up your portfolio while it’s relevant. However a synergistic business relationship can bring you a lifetime of referrals. It can also get you the right recommendation when the project of your dreams comes along. Communication is key to creating and keeping relationships with your customers and clients.
Business relationships aren’t just about their potential referrals, they make all the difference in propelling whatever project you are working on. Sometimes an idea is so magnificent that it rallies people around it. However, most ideas don’t become that great until people work together to grow the idea into its peak potential. We’ve all experienced those unicorn projects that were just fun and easy and turned out awesome. We’ve all also had to slay the beast of a simple project blowing up into a nightmare. In my experience it’s not the idea that’s to blame. It’s the working connections that drive the each mission into an epic or horrible outcome. The relationships are where all the magic happens. They hold the potential for synergy because people are infinitely more inspiring than projects themselves.
A business about relationships is much more sustainable because it’s rooted in trust and integrity and not just results. Clients want to know that you got it right not just because of luck or smooth sailing because it was easy, they want to know that you can attain your outcomes even when the road gets rocky.
And finally, business relationships last much longer than the luster of an exciting project. Our firm is rooted in the values of legacy with lasting positive impact. We can’t stay around forever on the grounds of product innovation. If we did, the ever growing market will eventually leave us behind. Within our relationships, our reputation and contributions will never forgotten.
