Probably your marketing program is like mine—its in auto-pilot. Programs and products are in place, salespeople are closing orders, and customers are happy. More-or-less, anyway.
The point I want to make is that we don’t often realize how much is depending on us marketers. The blunt extreme is this: if there are no sales, there are no jobs. We hold the fate of people in our hands, whether we realize it or not.
Catching fish:
I am not a sportsman. Just this year I started fishing with the nudge of my neighbor and my kids. Its actually fun, but I don’t like holding the fish (or cleaning them). The fish are just too slimy and wiggly to securely hold, so I use a towel or glove. And tossing the fish back eliminates the cleaning part.
While on vacation a couple weeks ago, one of my boys (8) and I were on a paddle-boat fishing, after unsuccessfully trying from the shore of the small lake. My son quickly got two that we threw back. As we were paddling, I got a bluegill. Because we were moving, the hook was deep in the fish’s jowl and I couldn’t get it out.
Suddenly, the fish flipped, I flinched, and my pliers went flying into the water. Now I had a fish with no way to get the hook out (it is one of those three-hook spinners) and no equipment to keep him. My son had a pocket knife, so I cut the line and let the fish keep its new jewelry.
Being prepared:
We paddled back to shore, my nerves jangled and feeling guilty. And pondering a lesson about being prepared, being confident, or something bad may happen…to someone or something else. Since then, a couple other personal and work incidents had me feeling the same way.
I think that President Bush and a lot of others got caught on auto-pilot last week. They were assuming the SOP as they had done well with Charley last year would work. Instead, they should have been actively engaged in the situation, actively changing their response based on the situation and threats. And so should you and I! Lives are on the line, after all.