Some of my best memories as a kid were visiting my grandma and grandpa Rose in Maine during the summers. Even as an 8-year old I could appreciate the difference in weather between muggy Houston and the cool summers of Maine.
My grandparents had acres and acres of apple orchards, hay, and a garden that seemed to go on forever. They knew that if you grow great fruit that the bugs will come. My grandpa could predict when the bugs would arrive and what type of damage they would do. I have some great memories of flying overhead with my uncle in a crop duster, helping to ensure the bugs didn't steal away all our precious fruit. Big bucks and a lot of labor went into protecting the fields from critters.
The life lesson I learned from my grandparents is to get out in front of problems before they arrive. We should take everything that ever went wrong with a customer, a file, a transaction, etc., and do something on each new contract to assure it will never go wrong again. All this is extra work but it is far cheaper than losing customers to problems you can predict will surely come without early intervention.
You only have to lose a crop once to know the pain and frustration that comes from leaving out a detail that could have prevented a major loss.
Have you ever lost a customer that could have been saved if you had only done what you know should have been done? If so, make sure you're putting in the effort today to ensure that ugly little bug doesn't raise its head again.
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