Photo: Contributed

Have you ever lost your wallet? Or your keys? When these small items going missing it can really disrupt your life and leave you cold. “Where did I leave it?”, “When did I have it last?” You are now trying to figure out a way to recover the lost items. Imagining that a kind person may have returned them to some place near where you may have lost them gives you a little relief. But then you recall that it is a cold world, where so many people operate from a set of selfish motives – you think that you will never see your wallet or keys again.

This exact scenario played itself out for my oldest daughter the other day. She was at the Orchard Park Shopping Centre when she lost her wallet. It had some money and pictures of friends and a gift card with nearly $100 on it inside: a big loss to her. She had searched as best she could to find it to no avail. We played out the scenarios and considered that a good Samaritan may have picked it up. All the while we both were thinking that this was really quite unlikely. But we hoped a prayed and followed up the next day.

Nothing was turned in at the lost and found at the mall. We set our mind on how to get a new bank card etc. Then, later that day, a call from the TD Bank with some good news. Someone had brought her wallet to the TD Bank as that is where her bank account is and her bank card was in the wallet. The person who found it must have noticed that and took her wallet to the bank and they then looked up her name and address and called our home number. Indeed a good Samaritan had found it.

After some time of simply being thankful, I thought about the unique and special event it is that a person had such care for another unknown person to go to all that trouble.

A few years ago I was in a series of business seminars in which the leader brought us through an exercise in organizational development for the business I was involved in. One of the key ideas was that we sit down privately and consider our own set of values. The idea was that once we had set clearly what our values were that we now had a guide to the rest of the work we were to do. The simple idea of “Start with your values” led me to see this as a very useful way to resolve all kinds of issues in business and life.

If I start with my well considered values, and apply them to problems, I should get results that align with my true sense of purpose and good results ought to be the outcome for me and others. While life and business have many unexpected events, this simple idea has been of immeasurable value to me over the years. It is also clear to me that when others practice this approach as well, that in the case of my daughter’s wallet being recovered, other people will benefit as well. Thank you unknown good Samaritan!

The desire to give back, to create value beyond the balance sheet and income statement, has long been a goal of thoughtful business people across the generations. The charitable efforts of Bill Gates for example are well known today as were those of Steel Magnate Andrew Carnegie in his time. As our culture grows in wealth and knowledge, the desire to give back and make a difference of some kind – beyond traditional giving directly to various causes has spawned new and innovative ways of creating sustainable value.

Food banks, United way, and many others have succeeded all the while needing to continuously look for donations, such as holding regular fundraising drives to keep their operations going. The trouble with these funding models of charitable efforts is that they require continuous energy to keep the organization going, asking for a lot, typically from a small group of dedicated volunteers, creating fundraising events, pleas for donations etc.

Over the last generation or so, some new ways to create charitable value have emerged. Habitat for Humanity is one that works quite well. The Habitat Restores do a great job of generating cash needed to fund the start up of a house building program for those who can prove both need and a willingness to assist in the build itself and pay interest free for the house cost itself, less the labour volunteered. This is a somewhat more sustainable model, creating charitable value without the continuous need to lean on a small group of dedicated volunteers to seek funds and donations.

Toms Shoes, among my favorite, is at the forefront of another sustainable social business model, often referred to as the “one for one” model. If you buy a pair of shoes from this company, they will donate one free pair of shoes to someone in a part of the world where shoes are not taken for granted. No donations, no volunteers, and yet a great social and charitable outcome is achieved.

Photo: Contributed

Similarly, here in Kelowna, another version of a sustainable charitable business model has arrived in the form of a new Social Buying enterprise named Smart Betty.

They have a great tag line, “Smart daily deals that give” making it clear up front that they intend to set aside 10% of their revenues for local Charities. The daily deals also focus fully on local deals from local enterprises. Here in Kelowna, Smart Betty has partnered with United Way Central & South Okanagan Similkameen, Canadian Cancer Society,
Kelowna's Gospel Mission, the Society for Community Living, Big Brothers Big Sisters, Bumbershoot Childrens Theatre,
and our newest partner, Crime Stoppers Central Okanagan as well as several others.

When Bruce Maki, owner of Smart Betty here in Kelowna, first heard of the model, he was all in. The business model struck a cord with him as a mid career business man, he had been giving a lot of thought to how his work life could do more for the greater community, while utilizing his many business talents.

“I have found my voice as a professional and a business owner” said Mr. Maki. When asked about his reasons for starting such a business. The passion that he exudes when speaking about the potential to generate sustainable value in Kelowna for both the customers of Smart Betty and the Charitable groups he has partnered with is an inspiration that I hope will be infectious with many others in business here in Kelowna and across the Okanagan Valley.

Photo: Contributed - (Photo: vichie81.jpg)

I have spent much of the last 15 years of my business life either as a consumer of professional services or a seller/deliverer of them. In both capacities I have seen the broad range of options that are available out there, including here in Kelowna : brilliant execution with deep insight on one end and misguided, incompetent ‘wannabees’ on the other end. If you are a business owner, you either currently are, or will soon need to be the buyer of some of these services. Legal, insurance, accounting, or technical are common examples. Not knowing quite what needs to be done, and having to trust these people with critical issues on your behalf makes this among the most important decisions you can make.

To make the decision, look to other options beyond the usual “ask a friend for a referral” method to be certain you have the right person or firm.

1. Interview a few professionals first – most Professionals will take an initial introductory meeting with no commitment or fee as a way to get to know you and your needs, and for you to get to know them. Use this time to get to know the person with some prepared questions ready.

• What experience do you have in my industry?
• Do you have others in your firm who also know my industry?
• What is your staff turn over?

Your goal is to get to know them beyond their promotional material and to be sure they can handle the kinds of issues that you have.

2. Get a referral from another professional – To get a lawyer to refer you to an insurance broker, for example, is huge. The lawyer will have insight as to the skills the broker can bring beyond the typical quote and stand back model. A professional will have some unique insights to the industry and the skills needed of those in the industry. Professionals will also know that their own name is on the line and will be reluctant to refer you to someone they are not certain will enhance their own reputation.

3. Managing risk – It is true that larger firms should have the resources so that you can be sure they will be there next week when you really need them. Therefore, larger firms tend to be somewhat attractive. However, who could have ever imagined Bear Stearns, Baring’s Bank or Arthur Anderson would have disappeared quite as quickly and easily as they did? Big and old is not a guarantee of staying power. It is critical that you ask the professional if they carry Errors and Omissions insurance and Professional indemnity insurance in line with the type and size of services that you are looking for and their background in the type of work that you need them to do.

4. Talk fees early, fully and often – among the most painful things that can happen to a person hiring a professional is to be surprised by the fees. I worked with some people a few years ago who hired a lawyer for some general legal work. The lawyer then went off on some tangents providing huge piles of work that was never explicitly requested. This was all triggered by a brain storm dialogue with the lawyer – entrepreneurs are famous for this – and the lawyer took it all as directions to act on, not simply an exploratory discussion. There was a bill dispute and everyone was unhappy in the end. It is critical to know if you can afford the services that you are planning to hire. Do not wait for the professional to bring it up you need to ensure it is fully discussed at every step.

5. Weigh the data – time to decide - After meeting with 3 or 4 professionals, you are beginning to get a pretty good idea who to go to. Run your insights past someone whose view you respect, and then make your decision, with their observations as an additional guide.

This early effort up front, in a new professional service relationship, is like an ounce of prevention compared to a pound of cure when things go wrong. When things go wrong, they tend to go wrong on a very large scale which can lead at worst, to disaster or at the very least, to disappointment.

Over the past five years, I have spent a lot of time learning and studying the subject of trust. The driver to study this subject so much was the result of having spent a lot of years handing out trust like candy on Halloween and then having some relationships blowing up like the fireworks, a little later on Halloween. The thinking I had been operating from, at the time, was that by trusting others, a level of trust is created that they will ultimately be motivated to, in turn, trust me as well. Of course this was some psycho babble leadership bunk I had read somewhere or heard at some motivational presentation. Following this idea was supposed to then lead to the highest level of any relationship, full trust in both directions that would then allow for ease of communication, sharing of ideas, etc. Great efficiencies and value creation would result for everyone involved. Sounded great at the time.

Photo: Contributed

The trouble with this approach is that it is far too simple. While it has a noble objective, it comes with a flawed path to achieve the end goal. The flaw was my reckless distribution of trust to those who simply should never be trusted. This is not to say there is anything wrong about the person, but rather that they simply may not have the basics needed to be trusted in that way.

To clarify the point, a very well written book, The Speed of Trust, highlights the two keys to determining who you should trust. The idea is that you should only trust people, in a given situation who:

1. Have your best interests in mind - and -

2. Are capable of doing what they are being trusted for.

Consider your own parents, they will have your best interests in mind, but should you trust them to perform a hernia operation on you? Very unlikely, for reason 2 above. Or consider asking someone you have just met with your wallet. Also not likely, but for reason 1 and 2.

With these two guidelines in mind, I became very well aware of some glaring mistakes I had made in the past in handing out trust to other people who did not fit either of the two criteria above. So, today, I always apply this kind of thinking when there is a level of trust in a relationship being developed. It allows me to gain some the goals noted above, while not taking on the risks of trusting the wrong people or trusting right people with wrong things.

Now, to go beyond this level of trust, there is yet another level in which a great Motivator is hidden and waiting to be revealed. Here is how I discovered it. Recently I was on the phone, in earshot of one of my daughters, and had to admit to someone that I had let them down seriously as I had not done what they had expected of me, I had not been completely honest with them. It hurt a lot to admit to my failure to this person but it was the right thing to do.

Later that same day, my daughter came to me and said she had heard the conversation and that, “...that was the first time, I know of, that you were not completely honest about something.” Wow, did I ever let her down, another blow. But isn’t every set back a chance to learn?

And so, in that moment, I came to realize that, while her expectations of me were very high, and I cannot admit to be as good a person as she thinks of me, I came to highly desire to be that person she thinks I am, I want, very much to reach for this level of expectation. I know I will not make it, but this little insight has granted me a huge motivator to shoot as high as she feels that I can reach. To have a person see such potential in you, is the world’s greatest motivator.

So, to find great motivation to be more than you think you can on your own, look around to the people who are closest to you, and see if someone in that group sees the best possible in you as their level of expectation. Once you find them, get to know what they see in you, and then see if you see it yourself now. This may sound like Psycho Babble as well, but Trust me, it works.