Naked Competition

 

I have been competing all morning to get #2 of Competition Week done. Here it is!

 

competition 2

When Naked is Good

Naked is good when you are appropriately showing your true self to those whom you want to show yourself to. Being vulnerable, telling who you really are, your struggles, successes, failures, flaws, highlights – those are all in the ‘naked is good’ category and people respond to it. It makes you MORE popular and endearing to your friends, fans, followers, customers, clients, to see a well-rounded version of you.

When Naked is Bad

Naked is bad when you are inappropriately showing your stupidity, desperation, insensitivities, and disrespect. You aren’t choosing to be intentionally vulnerable, you are making a fool of yourself.  You are ruining yourself in the eyes of others. You aren’t seeing yourself clearly, otherwise you would never expose yourself the way you are.

Witnessing Naked

Most of the people I know who could possibly be considered my competitors in one field or another are good friends or at least respectful acquaintances.  I would be willing to help them to some degree and I know they would do the same for me.  But in business if someone is directly competing with me for specific business I am not going to give them my insights as to why a move they might be making is a bad one. 

I am not wishing them ill. I am certainly not designing any activity that would purposely make their business more difficult to run. But I am doing all that I can can to make sure I am the better person for the job and that includes leaving them to their own devices. If they succeed, I am happy for them. If they don’t, I am going to take advantage of the void they create.

What about you, what do you think of this idea?

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Drawing by Marty Coleman, who doesn’t have many enemies.

Quote by Napoleon Bonaparte, who had a lot of enemies.

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Never Ascribe to Malice – updated 2017

One of my pet peeves is conspiracy theories. This quote is why. The vast majority of things that happen in the world are not controlled by nefarious, evil-doers bent on world destruction (though some are).

Most are a result of a guy falling asleep at the wheel, a woman leaving a pot on to boil and then taking a nap, a government official signing the wrong thing in the wrong place, or the engineer transposing a number after an all-nighter trying to finish a project.

So, remember, the store return clerk is not out to get you, they are just not very good at their job, at least today. The wedding coordinator is not working to make yours a disaster, she just forget to write something down on her ‘to do’ list.

Give people the benefit of the doubt about their motives, but don’t hesitate to demand competence. The incompetent person doesn’t really want to be that way, they may not know how to do the job right, or might just be lazy and not have the ideals or vision for themselves they really would like to have. Be kind about your demand, but demand it nonetheless.

Drawing and commentary © Marty Coleman

“Never ascribe to malice that which can be adequately explained by incompetence.” – Napoleon Bonaparte, 1769-1821, French General and Emperor