Last night I was at a business networking event and thoroughly enjoying myself when an old contact approached me and started to moan about “how slow business is”. His main misfortune was that companies weren’t buying his product and his pitches seemed to fall on stony ground.

He was downbeat, defeatist and depressed and after spending five minutes trying to motivate him to think more positively suggested that he was not going to improve his situation by spending time me. I was, after all, a friend who was never going to buy from him because I’m not his market and that he needed to be making new contacts, working the room, and not sticking with the familiar.

“Well thank you for being sympathetic!” He said with a growl
I ignored the veiled criticism, smiled and introduced him to the people I had been talking to earlier and who I thought might be in a position to need his expertise. Within a few minutes I saw that he was on his own again.

This morning I hear that retail sales had their worst ever December and thought of my friend. Could we in the UK be, unnecessarily, talking ourselves into another downturn, worried about inflation, afraid of the future, terrified of Government spending cuts and generally making ourselves depressed?

Probably!

This entry was posted on Friday, January 21st, 2011 at 3:21 pm and is filed under Financial downturn.