Be Early – Always!

I believe an important way to live in business (and yes, in life) is to always be early, at least 15 minutes early.

When one is early, it shows desire. In business, decisions are often influenced by a gut feel: “Who wants it the most?!”

And, of course, the opposite is true – being late is not impressive. Sure, people make excuses, think they get away with it, maybe they do, maybe they don’t. Seldom will someone say they were not impressed that we were late arriving or delivering a report or a proposal, though deep down they were not impressed and that may have a heavy influence on a decision(s).

When visiting clients, even potential clients, my experience was that things seemed to take a favorable turn when I arrived, say, 15 minutes early. Several times the person I was scheduled to see would happen to walk by or out of her office, see me, seem surprised and pleased, and it seemed our meetings would get off to a good start.

Maybe my being early was taken as a sign of respect on my part, or maybe as a sign of desire. And it both cases, they were right. It was respect and desire on my part!

Sometimes it was not the person I was there to see, but rather the person’s assistant who would welcome me, again seeming impressed that I was early, and often we’d get into a conversation about how things were going and helpful information was even occasionally offered.

I believe being early (and certainly not late) in delivering work, reports, proposals, studies, etc., before the due date is important, for same reason, a indication of respect and desire.

In a similar vein, I also believe we should get to our office before our boss. It’s the right thing to do.

“Who wants it the most?” matters!

Being early is a sign of wanting it.

My Call To Action:

This week, let’s try to be early in everything we do – and watch how good things happen for us!