WE CAN LEARN FROM LAWRENCE OF ARABIA

"All men dream, but not equally. For the Dreamers of the Night awaken to find it was merely their vanity. But the Dreamers of the Day are the dangerous ones, for they dream with their eyes open, and they make things happen” – Lieut-Colonel T.E.Lawrence DSO,CBE (Lawrence of Arabia)

G’day there

First of all, on behalf of Sam and myself, may I wish you and your business all the very best for the year ahead. It looks like being a hard one in some areas but not if you can come to grips with the auction method of marketing.

This Newsletter is about real estate (eventually) but I would ask you to “hang in there” with me for a moment as I give an outline of where I am coming from and the lessons we can learn.

Earlier this week, Sam and I, and Sam’s daughter Emily, were exceedingly fortunate to have been given a personal tour of the magnificent Lawrence of Arabia and the Light Horse exhibition at the Australian War Museum in Canberra

Our “tour guide”, a friend of Emily’s , was Mal Booth, the Exhibition Curator and Head of The Research Centre at the Australian War Museum and the man who spent two years putting it all together.

Being an absolute 110% “Lawrence “ aficionado, I was like a kid in a lolly shop and hung on every utterance that Mal made.

The two things that blew me away, in the interests of reasonable brevity in this Newsletter, were:-

(1) the ONLY COPY in existence of the map that Lawrence drew in 1921 showing how he believed the Ottoman (Turkish) Empire should be redrawn following their defeat. Needless to say, if it had prevailed over what historically happened with Britain and France drawing arbitrary lines across a map, much of the drama we have had, and are still having in the Middle East may not have been there and

(2) his now famous 27 Articles which he wrote on how to successfully deal with, and lead, the Arab tribes.

Even if you read no further than this, and before I make my point on where they relate to real estate, I cannot urge you strongly enough to click on the hyperlink above and read them.

With even a cursory glance it will be shown what folly the US/UK/Australian invasion of Iraq was with nearly every point Lawrence made being ignored. If only people would learn from history!

So where do these ”27 Articles” apply in business and real estate especially?

Simply they make the point that in order to gain, retain and/or create business, you must know what buttons to press in people and be savvy enough to realise that we are all different and that no one blanket covers all.

Which is why we so often see someone who is probably a bit short on the readin’ and writin’ skills but long on people skills make an absolutely wonderful career selling real estate, livestock or other avenues.

Read Lawrence’s 27 Articles and see how, by some re-jigging of them,you can make them applicable to the modern western world and it’s thinking.

Our business, no matter whether you are selling livestock, real estate or fine art ,it is all about communication and it was here that Lawrence was an absolute genius.

The reason he was able to turn King Hussein and his sons, especially Sheikh Feisal, so strongly against the Turks was simply that he expressed his plans in such a way that they took them on as their own and took ownership of them.

Add to that his penchant for physically leading “from the front” and here we have two profound lessons for business owners and managers.

As my dear friend, the absolutely wonderful speaker Sergio Carlos Maresca often quotes, “leadership is all about having others do what you want for their reasons”.

This year will see an increased level of attention given these points in our one day From Signup to Sale course.

Our 2008 Course dates and venues will be our website by the start of next week.

Carpe diem

Tony

Tony Fountain (Principal and Founder) 0418 238341

(Author: The Complete Guide to selling Real Estate by Auction and the e-book The Vendors Guide to selling Real Estate by Auction)

tony@fountainandco.com

Fountain Auction Academy