Divine Brown had just finished performing Saturday night at the Waterloo Jazz Festival. My wife and I both stood to stretch as the Matt Dusk band was coming on stage to warm up. This is when the stranger seated behind us said hello.
This is one of those strangely coincidental conversations.
After exchanging several generalized pleasantries, we learned that Mr Friendly is an executive business coach. Small world!
As the wind instruments gathered strength on the stage, we were discussing the word reflection and sharing our mutual thoughts about the amount of reflection that takes place in a business world where the mantra seems to be “go, go, go”.
Crowd listening to Matt Dusk (courtesy M. Dusk)
This led to my new found friend asking the question “what single skill yields the greatest benefit for the small to medium sized business owner?” I widened the question by adding knowledge and attitude to the mix and then responded by saying that an overall attitude towards striving for differentiation was key. His answer was communication, to which I agreed that it was hard to argue against effective communication.
What do you think? What single skill, knowledge or attitude would you say yields the biggest return?
I invite your comments to the above.
Future State of Affairs 