Seeing Events Through a Rainmaker’s Eyes, Part 2
In an earlier post (Seeing Events Through a Rainmaker’s Eyes, Part 1) I described how rainmakers tend to see things differently from the rest of us. In that post I provided examples of two things that we might see as negative that a rainmaker is likely to see more positively. They also tend to see as positive things that we hardly note at all. Here are three examples of that:
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An extra person from a client organization turns up for a meeting about our work.
• How we might see it: A need for an extra set of the documents we provided
• How rainmakers see it: Another person in the client organization for me to know and a potential future client, herself
A client calls, asking for a small amount of additional information.
• How we might see it: A need to provide a small additional service within the scope of our work or another to-do list item
• How rainmakers see it: A possible reason to go see the client and for a conversation that can cover other things I want to hear about, too
A break is called at a meeting attended by many members of the client organization.
• How we might see it: A chance to check email and voicemail
• How rainmakers see it: A chance to meet and advance relationships
As before, it is not that the rainmakers are right and the rest of us are wrong. All of the interpretations listed are reasonable. But rainmakers see opportunities for small advances in developing relationships that may lead to more business. By taking advantage of many such small opportunities, they sometimes get an assignment. We can, too. If we work at it, we can teach ourselves to see these opportunities, too.