No Surprises

I hate surprises! Well at least most surprises in business anyway. Yes, surprises happen and it is impossible to prevent them all from happening. That said, I assert that a person that is properly managing their responsibilities and doing their job will have far fewer surprises than a person who is lackadaisical about their job or who are not very focused. A salesperson who is dialed into their accounts and is carefully watching their competition will not be surprised when a certain doctor starts using more of the competitor’s product. If that salesperson sees it coming and is not surprised, then he or she can formulate a plan for winning their business back before the competition gets too entrenched. However, if that person is surprised, then likely all the activity happened much earlier and it will be much harder to regain that customer.

I am often asked “what about positive surprises, surely they are good, right?” Well, my answer is that they sure are better than negative surprises, but I still don’t generally like them. The reason is that means that if they happen regularly, then you just don’t understand the market or the situation that is creating the surprises very well. If you don’t understand the underlying dynamics of what is going on, how many times will the surprises be positive? How long before those surprises turn negative and then really disrupt your business? I would much rather be in a situation where when bad things happen, we saw them coming and did everything we could to either prevent them from happening or to at least mitigate the damage or impact to my business. The same goes with the positive things – If I see something positive coming down the road, I can prepare for it and find a way to maximize the benefit to my company and organization. If I am surprised at it, my chance of maximizing the benefit is greatly reduced.