I have come to the clear conclusion that battles are won before they are fought.
It’s always mind over matter, intent over interest.
Many studies show that the best sportsmen, climbers, boxers and negotiators WIN their game because of their mental makeup, even before they begin to play or engage.
Real Example:
We rent a tiny 12 seater office in our office building on the ground floor, dedicated to Quality Control.
It’s a nice, cozy room that serves the purpose of letting QC operate individually and still within an arm’s length from the main production floors.
Two years ago, when the renewal of the lease of this office came up, the landlord (sensing how important it was to us) asked for a stupid hike in the monthly rent.
I mean it was stupid.
First we tried to request him to be rational and then even begged him to be reasonable.
He refused to budge.
A day or two later, I just lost it.
I felt terrible that I was being cheated and could not accept it.
I came up to my colleague Dinesh Gopalakrishnan (who’s been tolerating me for 12 years) and told him, “Dinu, I don’t care what you do, but plan to move all 12 QC folks up to either the 2nd or 4th floors and make arrangements for them to operate from there.”
That was a really insane mandate.
All the seats on both the floors were fully occupied.
I even suggested we break down the conference room walls to make these guys sit.
He said, “Alok, relax. Let me plan this.”
Two days later, he came to me, with a map in his hand and said, “Alok, I have figured it out. I will manage to seat all of them with little disruption. Would you like to see the layout?”
I did not need to see the layout.
That’s because I had won my battle before I fought it.
I called my CFO Satish Iyer and told him, “Tell the landlord to FO. We are vacating.”
Satish called the landlord. (He didn’t say FO, but a more Corporate NO)
The landlord kept quiet.
The next day the Landlord’s CFO called saying that they had agreed to our terms – on one condition.
The condition was that we signed a lease agreement for 3 years!!
We signed and occupy that space even today.
Lesson – I had fought that battle in my mind and won it (with Dinu’s help of course!). It would be have been disastrous to stuff 12 people in an already heavily stuffed office, but I was just convinced of doing it.
When your mind wins, it beams a signal to the Universe. And that signal becomes your victory’s bugle call.
Win the battle – before you fight it.
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Enjoy this real story that teaches another similar lesson – JUST JUMP
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