Givers Gain is a very powerful law that, when practiced sincerely, reaps huge rewards, but there is something – Edmunde Burke called it a ‘passion’ – that kills our ability to fully realise the power of ‘giving’, and that ‘thing’… is fear.
As Mr Burke so succinctly put it: “No passion so effectually robs the mind of all its powers of acting and reasoning as fear”.
How does fear express itself in BNI? In many ways:
It expresses itself in the member who covers several categories and wants to keep them all to him or herself. For example, perhaps the graphic designer keeps printers out of the chapter because of his or her ability to broker print.
By denying the chapter another productive and profitable member, not only do your fellow members lose out on opportunities for referrals and profitable relationships, but the designer denies him or herself an opportunity to form a networking partnership.
We do this because we fear losing out on referrals, or because we fear the newcomer will be more popular, or more credible, or that they will take business away from us… but very often the fear is just an insubstantial dread that won’t stand up in the cold light of logic.
Fear expresses itself in our holding back on getting a referral for somebody because we’re worried that something might go wrong, or we fear not having control or perhaps losing out on an opportunity we could take for ourselves.
How is fear it affecting you?
The next time you feel a momentary panic about something, pause and examine it. Try to get to the bottom of it and study it with some cold logic, then replace it with the spirit of ‘Givers Gain’.
Remember, if everybody in the chapter were solely focussed on finding referrals for fellow members, we would all do enormously well.
“In life we don’t get what we want, we get in life what we are. If we want more we have to be able to be more, in order to be more you have to face rejection.” – Farrah Gray.
No matter what your fear is, it’s doing you damage. Generosity is a far more profitable substitute.
Colin Kennedy is a keynote speaker, writer and marketing consultant at Iron Road. As BNI New Zealand’s marketing director he is responsible for the organisation’s communications strategy, and also serves as an assistant director for North Central region of BNI.
3 comments
Thanks Colin,
Great post. Fear manifests itself in so many ways. How many organisations are run on the basis that “It is better to ask permission than seek forgiveness?”. How much better to foster a culture that the organisation seeks to empower its people to be the best that they can be – safe in the knowledge that they will be supported when they do something as opposed to being made to justify why they did what they did. Such a culture stifles creativity and creates a “not my problem” type of attitude – where people do what is necessary to keep the boss happy – but nothing more.
Hi Colin, I agree with you. Fear can prevent us from really experiencing life in all its fullness. But if we “face the fear and do it anyway” it’s never as bad as we imagined. I heard this before: FEAR stands for False Evidence Appearing Real. I used to love my comfort zone but it’s a really boring place to be. It’s much more fun pushing those boundaries!
Thanks Alison – I like that, False Evidence Appearing Real. Sometimes it can appear only too real and it takes a lot of courage to take that step anyway!
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