Business Rule #1: Don’t Kill the Client

Maybe it’s my Canadian upbringing. Perhaps its because I was born in the sixties. But I tend to hold the view that not all illegal drugs are created equal. (I know, it's very un-American of me).

For instance, if I found out my son, at 16 years old, was smoking pot, my response would likely be to ask him to consider eating it, since eating marijuana is much less detrimental to his health than inhaling it. (Now, if I caught him doing any drugs of any kind in any way before 16, my reaction would be quite different…“boot to the head!”)

I’ve smoked and eaten pot. Years ago I tried mushrooms (great story there!). And once, some moron put a hit of acid in my drink at a bar. That’s the only time I’ve ever tried what I’d consider a hard drug. I recall feeling almost exactly the same when I dropped acid as I did following surgery when some idiot nurse gave me Tylenol 3’s, even though the red armband I was wearing said quite clearly that I’m allergic to codeine.

Despite not being able to claim empathy for hard drug addicts, I am very sympathetic to those people who find themselves with drug addictions to heroin, cocaine, pain killers, and so on.

I don’t like to hear that a bad batch of some drug (legal or illegal) has caused a bunch of people to die, or even to become sick. So that’s my position on drugs.

I also have some thoughts about business. There’s this concept I recall learning while I was taking some business training that had something to do with spending 80% of your marketing and sales resources on keeping your current clients happy and 20% on finding new clients. An application of Pareto’s Law.

Right now I make a reasonable living as a self-employed writer, strategic planner and documentary filmmaker. If I wanted to make more money, I could switch professions. I could, for instance, become a drug dealer, or maybe the manager of a basement lab that makes heroin and other hard drugs. If I did make the switch, I think I’d still want to apply Pareto’s Law. It just seems to make sense that no matter what business you’re in, your current clients are your most valuable asset.

So why would any heroin-maker or dealer, with two brain cells to rub together, mix their heroin with a drug that boosts muscle growth in cattle?

Do you think it was the chemist who decided this may be a good idea? Maybe he was trying to help the typically too thin heroin addicts bulk up a little.

Or maybe, the heroin dealer is moonlighting as a cattle rancher. Maybe he accidentally mixed the two white powders, making both his heroin addict clients and his cattle sick. Gives whole new meaning to Mad Cow Disease. (Business Rule # 17: Whether it’s on file folders or on little plastic baggies, a smart business person uses labels.)

If you live in New Jersey, New York, Connecticut, South Carolina or North Carolina and you use heroin: be careful. Some boneheaded, failed business-school dealer or chemist seems to have forgotten that his business won’t thrive and survive if he injures or kills his clients.