Instructors, realtors, contractors...

I wanted to write this blog for a long time and at long last, here I am addressing a subject that has always delighted me. It has to do with how people influence us and most precisely how most of us tend to let certain business relationship impress upon them so much that it can become a personality-changer.

If you have the good fortune to work directly and personally with someone who's wealthy, famous or highly influential, while providing them with skills or knowledge they lack but deeply admire, you rapports, if they are at least decent, will give you the opportunity to relate on an equal level with them.

This applies to ski instructors, realtors, contractors, personal trainers, etc. It probably happens far less with a housemaid, cook, or any other “lowly jobs” if you get what I mean.

As a result of this close relationship, if the service provider and the skills brought to the fore are highly appreciated by the client, they will also elevate the supplier to the user's realm and the relationship that follows will be as the almost-equal to the high-profile of the individual served, be it in terms of smarts, consideration or even class. Of course, that wont extend into personal net worth, but all the other elements will be “as if...”

When all these conditions are present, they will be conducive to an inflated self-opinion permeating the service provider's behavior. That person is likely to develop an ego commensurate with the caliber of people he or she patronize.

So let's rewind and start again: If you know a ski instructor or a general contractor that displays an over-dose of self-importance, be considerate and compassionate; this is not entirely their true, hateful nature, it's not even their fault, it's just the sad result of the typical occupational hazard that befall these professions!