The-Slight-Edge

166 The Slight Edge
“And he will! He’ll know this one person who not only lives in Germany,
but happens to be coming over to Miami at the same time I’m going over there,
which will work really well—
“Because even though he’ll go back to Germany all excited about opening
up there, if this plan works just right then that won’t happen because it’ll turn out
that the company isn’t ready to open up in Germany yet after all and that’ll be
just perfect because then I’ll tell this guy, ‘Hey, why don’t you go over to England
instead for a few months?’ which my guess is he’ll probably go ahead and do,
maybe even renting a flat with his wife.
“Which will be just perfect, just like I planned it, because one day when they’re
walking, they’ll walk right past this house, which will be timed just right (because
as luck would have it, it won’t be raining on that day either!) so they’ll stop and
strike up a conversation with this housepainter, which is perfect because I will have
trained them to ask, ‘Hey, do you know any Germans?’ so they’ll ask that question
and if this all goes just according to my plan then the housepainter won’t even have
to stop and think about it ’cause he’ll just say, ‘Yes, actually, I do know a fellow in
Germany, and in fact he’s quite a successful bloke over there,’ and that’ll be perfect
too because when I do finally get over there to Hamburg, even though it will look
like I don’t have the slightest clue about what I am trying to accomplish in Germany,
the truth is that this guy who met me in Miami (the franchise show doctor’s nextdoor-neighbor’s
friend) and the successful guy in Germany (the guy that the Miami
guy’s neighborhood housepainter knows) will meet me in the hotel and travel with
me as my translators and because they’ll be translating for me they’ll understand the
business better than anyone else I talk to by the end of visit—
“And then maybe those two guys will go on to build the largest sales and
marketing organization in Germany, and one of the largest in all of Europe.
“Yeah ... ” and I nodded sagely. “That should work ... Good plan, Olson!”
And I finished putting on my socks and shoes.
Do you think that’s how it happened? Of course not! Then how did it?
The truth is, I started with a plan. My plan was this: I told people to ask
others, “Do you know any Germans?” That was it. That was the plan.
And you know, it worked. A simple plan—you could even say, it was so
simple it looked stupid. But if you start with a plan, and you practice those simple
daily disciplines ... one plan leads to the next plan, leads to the next plan—
Can you imagine how many times this ridiculously unlikely chain of events
could have fallen apart? (Twice, an innocuous afternoon rain shower would have
scuttled it!) Why didn’t it? Because we started with a plan, and then allowed the
Slight Edge to work.