I was at a business gathering recently. I wouldn’t call it a networking group since the person who invited us all to attend never showed up. That is a blog all in itself. However what I got out of this and what I wanted to blog about was what I made out of this opportunity.
What I like doing in these situations is have a conversation with someone there who looked like they would be doing something interesting. That is the fun part for me to guess from the way a person dresses and appears what they do for a living. I am seldom right, but it is fun. I recommend this to people who find these gatherings pretentious or scary.
What was interesting was the conversation I had with this young man who looked to be a financial adviser but as I found out was an architect project manager. Boy, did I get that one wrong? The closest that came to being correct was that those professions both do a lot of math…go figure.
The young man, who was probably around 23 years old, found what I did professionally as boring and he was really trying to find a challenge of a question that would trip me up. He did a pretty good job, but like I said, I like challenges and especially the ones that go back on
my business experience.
He asked, where would golf take him if he used it as a business tool?
Well obviously the young man had not been out playing golf as part of business. I would venture to say he has never played business golf. If he had he would have some inkling of how it works or had seen how it works.
My answer could have been pretty long winded, but I cut to the chase. I told him playing golf for advancement in business is touchy. It cannot be done in one round, and it may not even get done in a hundred rounds if you do not have what it takes to succeed.
It also depends on where someone wants to go in business before I could say where golf can take them.
If you want to be the president of a company and you just hired on in the mailroom, it might take a while to work your way up before playing golf with the chairman of the board. In this case patience is in order.
But, if you are experienced more than you are educated in the field you want to succeed in then you have a leg up that most people
don’t.
Working to succeed or advance is all based on if you are ready and being experienced is just the first step to becoming ready.
You have to have the ability to highlight your strengths or demonstrate them naturally instead of verbalized or paraphrasing them in a statement. Saying you are experienced and capable of more responsibility is easy to do. Showing your experience and capabilities is a better way to get the message across.
Trustworthiness has to be demonstrated before you can tell yourself you are ready. You have to be able to show confidences more than telling yourself you are confident. Once you are able to show confidence and demonstrate your strengths without telling someone about them, then you are ready.
Still there is the golf thing to go about doing correctly. Yes, golf is a great way to demonstrate your character, strengths and confidence. They need to be balanced and do not let one of them out weigh the others or you run a chance of looking like you are play
acting your abilities. This is not good.
Do not think because you are a 36 handicapper you do not have what it takes to succeed. Your natural confidence in yourself, your
ability to carry yourself honestly and showing respect to others while you play golf will make you a scratch golfer in the eyes of your business golf partner.
Work on being confident in yourself and demonstrating your ability to take on higher responsibilities. If you succeed at doing that then the business golf turns into a pleasant experience instead of a sweat box.
If you make a good showing of yourself while playing business golf with the boss it will go a long way to showing what you can offer the business. Most bosses are looking for people they can trust and business golf is the best arena to show that strength.
Golf is one of the only true tests of a person’s character and is the best way to build trust. Success is where you want to be, not where someone wants you to be….so make sure you can trust the boss as well.
Remember, business golf is a two way street. Your partner gets to see you as a person as well as you get to see them. So if you find that you cannot trust the boss, then do you want to succeed in that direction?
Golf can take you to higher levels personally and professionally. Just learn how to use golf as a business tool before you use it.
Let me know how I can help.
