He charmed everyone.  He greeted you with a glint in his eye and a laugh. His first words showed that he remembered you and made you feel special.  Being with him gave you a lift.  Spend fifteen minutes with this man and you came away all charged up. 
 

He was like everyone’s ideal kid brother, smart and spunky.  That he stood no more than five feet, five inches contributed to the impression.  I remember watching him present to a prospective client and thinking, “I sure like that kid.  I hope he gets it.”  Yet I knew he was almost twenty years older than I was.
 

I used to wonder how anyone could be that charming. That isn’t to say that he wasn’t a tough businessman.  He was.  Or that he was flawless.  He wasn’t, any more than anyone else is.  But the charm was special.
 

One day we were working in his office, when his assistant announced over the intercom that Marie Smith (I don’t remember the real name) was on the line.  He walked to the phone, paused, and put his hand up to signal me to keep quiet.  He paused again, pinched the bridge of his nose between his thumb and forefinger, closed his eyes and remained frozen for several seconds.  Then, suddenly animated, he reached for the phone.  He laughed lightly, “Marie! It must be almost a year to the day since we saw you at . . .”
 

He had paused to prepare these few words!  That was when I realized that the personal touch, which made him so special, was something he worked at.
 

So, if you want someone to feel special, pause for a moment to recall something special about them.

This entry was posted on Monday, July 16th, 2007 at 5:05 pm and is filed under Prospective Client, Rainmaker Story. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.