Expand Your Horizons…Excite Your Mind

A few days ago I flew from Philadelphia to Orlando to have dinner with a friend of mine, just in from Africa. The next morning I flew back. It cost me quite a bit of money and most of 2 days. A number of people I mentioned this trip to looked at me askance when they heard it was on my time and expense and there was no specific agenda. Even when I shared the person’s name, his very senior position at an extremely well known global company, and the fact that this was someone people were desperate to meet, they still didn’t get it.

The dinner conversation covered quite a few topics and left me with many things to consider and ideas to experiment with. My one night at the wonderful Orlando Hyatt Regency provided opportunities to meet several other interesting people, including bartenders, the front desk lady, a concierge, and a guard at the Orlando Convention Center who filled me in on Orlando, told me about their backgrounds, and shared their thoughts about their bosses and their employers.

Even the travel was enlightening On the way in from the airport my Haitian driver and I discussed the situation in his country since the recent earthquake and what AT&T charged him as he called to get reports on missing family members. On my way back to the airport the driver was from Bangladesh which led to discussions about the similar climate to Orlando and dealing with hurricanes and flooding.

On my return flight, I had the pleasure of riding under the care of Bill Pratt, Chief Purser. From the moment he greeted me as I entered the airplane until I stepped into the jetway while leaving, he created an exceptional flight experience. I was so taken by his funny, charming, attentive, knowledgeable, and unflappable ways that I went to the effort of writing an email about Bill to Doug Parker, CEO American Airlines. I wound up with not only a great flight but also a wonderful story about exceptional customer service to share during my next speaking engagements.

It seems perfectly normal to me to hop on a plane for dinner with an exceptional person for the sheer pleasure of having an engaging and stimulating conversation. I often have no idea what might come of a trip or what interesting things may happen during my travels, but from experience I know that so many unexpected encounters, so many non-business meetings, feed into ideas and solutions that turn out to be useful when seemingly unsolvable client issues pop up.

Since most of what I do is discuss issues and strategy with senior executives and business owners, I work hard to keep my perspective wide and gather information from everywhere and everyone.

One of the most important skills of senior executives is the ability to get out of their skin and go see what other people and companies are doing, and hear what they are thinking. While second hand reports are helpful there’s nothing like seeing and hearing for yourself so you can capture the full experience and learn how others deal with their issues. You can then take those things you experience, and bring them home to have handy when addressing your own issues.

Sometimes such trips even lead to new business opportunities. This agendaless trip led to my setting up a call for my dinner companion with an old friend of mine to discuss some mutual business interests, making an introduction that could lead to a consulting gig for another friend, and winding up with an introduction to the CEO of a company that may be a great partner for a new business I’m involved in building.

All because I decided to take the time to hop on a plane and meet someone for dinner a thousand miles away. And because I paid attention and talked to everyone I met along the way. You never know who’s going to share the thought that solves the next issue you run into.