I had an experience recently that brought to light the importance of taking ‘long shots’ every once in a while. What’s a long shot? In the world of entrepreneurship, I would define a long shot as an initiative that has very little chance of success. You might wonder why anyone sane would bother with a course of action that is bound to fail. Put simply, the potential for gain is huge and the potential for loss, aside from rejection, is non-existent. Allow me to illustrate. A few months ago, I was reading an article in the National Post about the Canada Youth Business Foundation (www.cybf.ca). It’s an organization that helps young entrepreneurs launch businesses. In addition to providing financing through the Business Development Bank, they use a very hands-on approach by matching the entrepreneur with a qualified mentor for a period of two years. The article was about a young entrepreneur in Montreal who started a retail store that sells products related to skateboarding. He has having difficulties in the area of human resources. A mentor from the Business Development Bank helped him deal with these issues by crafting a new HR and management strategy.
I was very impressed with the mentor. He seemed very eager to help the young man succeed. I thought to myself that he is exactly the kind of person I am looking for in a mentor. I wondered if he would be willing to take on a similar mentoring role with me. I read the article again to see if it mentioned his contact information. It didn’t. All I had was his name and where he worked (BDC). I then went on the BDC website to search for his name. Nothing either. I could start calling each BDC branch one at a time, but it would be time consuming. Besides, I wouldn’t know what to say to him. Personally, I’m a big fan of email. I like getting a conversation going through email first before a face to face meeting. It allows the exchange of basic information. There is also less pressure on both sides and it is less intrusive (I find it annoying when I receive a call from someone, who wasn’t referred to me by somone I know, asking to meet me…it doesn’t seem natural). If the email exchange goes well, I then suggest a meeting in person.
The problem here was that I couldn’t find the gentleman’s email address anywhere. I then had a great idea…a real ‘long shot’. Anyone with a corporate email address will notice that it usually follows one of several patterns: lastname.firstname@company.com, firstname@company.com, “x”lastname@company.com (where ‘x’ is the first letter of the first name), etc. What I decided to do was to send an email to all these different email combinations, hoping at least one of them would hit. I kept the email very simple. I talked briefly about my startup and the progress I made so far. I also included a link to my website, in case he was interested in learning more about me. Here is the email I sent:
Like I mentioned, this was a long shot. The odds of reaching this person was small and the odds he would reply even smaller. However, within a few days, the gentleman replied. Not only was he willing to answer my questions, he insisted we meet in person the following week. Our meeting went extremely well. Pending some administrative stuff, we will start our mentoring partenership shortly. This just goes to show that every once in a while, we need to take long shots in life (whether in our personal or professional lives). It’s only our fear of rejection that is keeping us from taking these risks.
Why not just pick up the phone and ask to speak with the president of a big company to explain why your product or service can make his or her life easier? Don’t think it will work? It worked for a friend of mine who has his own business planning software company. A few years ago, he called up the then President and CEO of Corel, Michael Cowpland. He didn’t know Mr. Cowpland in person so he called the general number and talked to the receptionist. Amazingly, there were very few barriers and within a few minutes, he was speaking directly to Mr. Cowpland himself. He introduced himself and explained how including his software alongside Corel Wordperfect could make Corel’s product offering more competitive and help differentiate if from MS Office. Mr. Cowpland asked him to visit his office that same afternoon. My friend then met with Mr. Cowpland, along with senior members of his product development team. Shortly thereafter, he won a licensing contract to include a copy of his business planning software with Corel Wordperfect.
Take long shots every once in a while (i.e. huge potential payoff, little chance of success but zero downside). You’d be surprised at how a seemingly crazy idea may end up being one of the greatest decisions you’ve ever made. Someone once told me that when you take risks, things happen. You disrupt the status quo and set things in motion. You create ripples in otherwise calm waters. Yet, one of those ripples can potentially transform itself into a powerful wave. It’s true that the odds are not in your favor. But then again, what have you got to lose?
- Comments(0)