RECORD DEALS

He looked like a bum. Everyone at the record company laughed all the time about the fact that their boss, the owner of the company, looked like an old drunken bum that you would run into in the park. It was just his style. He was an old hippie. He had tons of money, yet he was always living in his head, thinking about business, working on the computer, and never having any fun or dressing like he had any money. The money didn’t mean much to him anyway, what he enjoyed was the joy of running the company and the strategy and intelligent thinking that it required.

Some days he would venture to take a walk to the park for his lunch breaks. He did this because he enjoyed the park, it was a nice place to go for lunch. However, what he really got a kick out of was the fact that the people in the park thought he was a drunken old bum because of the way he was dressed, and nothing could be further from the truth. Some people in the park would smile because they knew him and they knew that he wasn’t a drunken old bum, quite to the contrary he was a very rich business man. They would also smile because they would see the reactions of other people who didn’t know him and sincerely thought he was a drunken no account bum in the park.

Many times he would have his luncheon meetings set up at the park restaurants. They had tables outside that allowed him and his clients to sit in the sun and enjoy their meals while they talked about business. He really enjoyed meeting his clients at these restaurants for lunch, because it gave him a chance to see how they would treat him before they knew who he was. Many times they had turned him away from the table thinking he was a drunken old bum only to realize that he was the person the they were meeting for lunch. They were always embarrased and he would usually be able to evaluate them as human beings by how they treated him in these short instances. Whether they were kind or rude would always be a very important factor in whether he continued any future business dealings with them.

Many ground breaking deals could be crushed with the wrong greeting from future clients at one of those outdoor tables. Luckily for most of the prospective future clients, Harry’s reputation preceded him, so they knew what to expect. Harry was a very successful and savy business man, and he had a kind heart. He wasn’t one to follow societies conventions, he made his own rules and he was good at what he did. The people who threw waded up dollars at him at the park or told him to go get a job, were really blind. They judged him totally by what he looked like, and what their stereotypes were of what was successful and what was not successful. The fact was he was very successful, much more so than most of them would ever be, and he had many more one dollar bills to wad up than they ever would. They only limited themselves by judging him with such short sight. He was a thousand times more successful than most of them would ever be.

JANE Á PARIS

Copyright ©2008 JANE Á PARIS

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Tags:

conventions, friends, hailfellow, intelligence, judgements, life, money, reputation, social and success