Relationship Development starts with the unconventional premise that relationship building is not a matter of luck, genetics, or social status. There is a system – shared mindsets, process, and skills – employed by those who connect and prosper.
My operating assumptions are as follows:
"BR = PR: Business Relationships are Personal Relationships."
- Relationships are fundamentally critical to your professional success.
- Most people lack the number, quality and level of relationships to achieve their goals and have no effective way to solve that problem.
- With the right mindsets, process, and skills, you can dramatically improve the productivity and speed with which you build business relationships and achieve your goals.
Remember, insanity is doing the same thing again and again and expecting different results. You need to fundamentally change the way you operate if you want to change your success trajectory.
1. BR = PR: Business Relationships Are Personal Relationships
The most common mistake people make when building relationships for success is treating business contacts differently than personal friends.
Just think for a moment about the people you work with on a professional level who are also close, personal friends. Aren’t they always more forgiving when you slip up and more helpful when you’re in need? Of course! I guarantee your work will become easier and more joyful if you make your business relationships personal.
2. Relationship Building Is a Choice
Make no mistake: Connecting at a level appropriate to building real relationships is a choice, one that must be practiced every day, before every meeting and every event. You have to choose to care about the people you come in contact with in every aspect of your life. If you choose to care, people will take notice.
3. Relationship Building Is a Skill That Can and Must Be Learned
Let’s counteract two major misperceptions I see all the time around relationships. One, that deep relationships are a factor of serendipity and chemistry, not purpose and practice. Wrong! Anyone who has parents that have been married 30+ years know they’ll be the first to tell you that the best relationships take work – careful maintenance and tending. Also keep in mind that purposeful relationship building does not mean that your care is inauthentic. It means that you care enough to take the necessary steps to build intimacy and trust.
The second misperception: “People skills” are something you either have or you don’t. Sure, connecting comes more easily to some than to others. But there is a spectrum of skill in this arena. Everyone can make the right contacts with concerted effort, and by extension, succeed beyond their wildest dreams.
You can and you will build the skills you need to create your community in this course.
4. Lifelines Keep You Flowing
"Your work will become easier and more joyful if you make your business relationships personal."
Success is the ability to create the results in life we truly seek and not, say, just the amount of money you make. People who have a clear picture of what makes them tick, who know their true inner motivations and priorities, simply don’t get in their own way. They can focus with energetic intention on their goals. It’s what allows ordinary people to live extraordinary lives.
Acquiring that knowledge is a journey with no single destination – and yet somehow we all still get lost at times. When we do, we need the external perspective of what we call Lifelines – an eye-opening kick in the butt.
All of our relationships are important, but Lifelines represent a select few relationships with a certain level of connection that has a disproportionate effect on who you are, who you become, and what kind of life and success you create for yourself and your community. They are the keys to risk taking, constant self-evolution, and accountability to bring our most ambitious plans to fruition.
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