Value, Value, Value!

I've been inspired over the few weeks to evaluate sources of value.

Two months ago, I took the opportunity to listen to Zig Ziglar. I don't if many of you have ever listened to his tapes on selling and goal setting. Regardless of what you think, Zig's teaching are very basic and applicable almost all the time. Even though I don't listen to Zig often, in fact, I haven't listen to one of his tapes since 1988. I can tell you that I have incorporated one key element as a foundation of life. Zig's quote(paraphrased), " The best way to get what you want is to help a lot of other people get what they want". This isn't about manipulation, it's about serving. In spite of failing at it compared to the highest standard, I continue to strive towards a servant lifestyle.

When I was listening to Zig recently, he was talking about communicating the value of a product vs. price. In his words, the impact of price is forgotten rather quickly but the value lasts for the life of the product or service. At this point, I'm still not inspired, I'm just curious.

Not to long afterwards, I had the opportunity to talk to Rob Vandermark of Seven Cycles. We started talking about the potential impact of a weak economy on bicycle sales. He gave me the same answer that I heard from Zig. Rob quickly said(paraphrase), "It's very important that we focus on the value that we are providing". Now, I can tell you that I start listening when I hear the same concept from multiple sources. However, even though I agreed with the concept, I didn't know how to evaluate, or respond to processes that did or did not enhance value.

I'm heading up to Watertown, MA next week. While I'm there, I'm going to get to see the processes that go on from the time a frame is ordered until it is shipped. As cool as this is, I can't wait to see how Seven has incorporated value analysis into every step of their system. This is critically important to me as owner of Gulf Coast Cycle Fit. I want to be able to critically assess every process or service that I provide so that it is sharpened to perfection and provides the highest value possible to each client. I need more hours in the day. When you are inspired, the negative concepts of work disappear.