When the World Cup of Soccer is over, in addition to those annoying horns going silent, very few will remember who came in 2nd or 3rd regardless of how hard each team played.  If you make a profit in the stock market it is coming out of the pocket of some other investor.  A seller just said “yes” to list with one of your competitors —they win, you lose.

The idea that business, and even life for that matter, is a zero-sum game is deeply ingrained within our highly competitive Western society.  By the way, our primitive reptilian brain loves the idea of “I win, everyone else loses” because it is so survival-centric.  Which of course should give you a clue that perhaps this way of thinking is not the best for your long-term well being and happiness.

A much more powerful (and healthy) way to look at competitive situations is to consider what you can learn each time you “lose”.  For example, when I started selling real estate back in 1976 (okay, hold the AARP jokes) I focused on listing FSBOs.  At first I was terrible at it.  However, every time I “lost” the listing to another agent I made a point to ask the seller a very important question:

“Mr. & Mrs. Seller, congratulations on listing with _______, I am sure they will do an outstanding job for you.  Would you mind sharing with me what it was about ________ that caused you to choose them to market your home?”

By taking this approach, I went from “terrible” to “pretty darn good” pretty darn fast!  Each time I lost a listing to a competitor, it became an opportunity to learn what set them apart.  From that perspective I should thank each of them for helping me become the “FSBO Kid” (as I was known) in just three months flat…

Make failure your teacher, not your undertaker.

Zig Ziglar

Zero-sum is a very limiting way to look at life and business.  Celebrate your wins of course, and be grateful for the opportunity to learn when you don’t come out on top.  It truly is a gift if you choose to see it that way.