Most people don’t realize that happiness is a decision. Think about it, the hundreds of decisions you make each day can lead to happiness, sadness or more frequently something in between. When you run your own business the people you decide to do business with can have a big impact on your happiness.

When I was a young sales guy I would close every deal I could. It didn’t matter if the prospect was an SOB or a complete horses ass. To be honest, it really didn’t matter to me as I was just the “sales guy” and did not have to deal with the prospect after he became a client. Had my boss “nixed” a deal just because the prospect might be an unreasonable client I would have been furious ~ I might have considered quitting.

Two years ago we instituted a policy at Architel that the CEO (me at the time and now Scott) would have to meet the owner/ceo/partners of each prospect before they became a client. The idea was to limit the number of unreasonable people we had to deal with on a day-to-day basis. At that same time we took a hard look at our existing client base and made the decision to stop working with two clients who required a tremendous amount of patience to deal with. Almost immediately the management workload decreased and our level of happiness increased. It was more fun to come to work each day knowing that we were pleasing our clients instead of showing up each day wondering who was going be upset or angry.

Get it? If you stop doing business with unreasonable people going to work can be a lot more fun. Make sure you do the same ~ i.e. be reasonable to work with. We may give up a little revenue each month in exchange for happiness, but I guarantee it is worth it.


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