The Ledbury is an excellent restaurant with a young, Australian chef. Stuart chose the tasting menu with matching wines, which was a marathon of courses. Scythia departed around course #14 to be sure not to miss her train home!
We finished the Mentor Summit today, then worked with the hotel top management staff after lunch on strategy and its implementation.
Tonight we dine at one of my all-time favorites, Scott’s in Mayfair.
© Alan Weiss 2012. All rights reserved.
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After the second day of Shameless Promotion, Chad Barr and I dined at Ceccone’s in Mayfair, where we had two different kinds of warm octopus, just to start. We then retired to the cigar garden at the Lanesborough Hotel for some Madeira and a Partegas Numero Quatro.
The next day I ran the very intensive Sealing the Deal where we practiced the behaviors and language needed to proceed from a meeting with a buyer to a signed deal with the buyer. I hosted the seven earliest registrants to dinner in the excellent hotel restaurant, Brunello. I found out this morning that they went pub-crawling after I said goodnight!
Today was the first day of the Mentor Summit, with people from Estonia, the U.S., Germany, Denmark, the U.K., Ireland, Switzerland, and Australia, just to name a few. We focused on the best ways to dramatically improve both business and personal time. We have a cocktail reception for everyone in the early evening.
The newest member, Timothy Carroll, had joined us only the day before!
Tonight, Stuart Cross and how wife, Scythia, have invited me to The Ledbury Restaurant: http://www.theledbury.com/
© Alan Weiss 2012. All rights reserved.
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May 7, 2012—Issue #137
This week’s focus point: When you hold firm opinions and defend your belief system, people who can’t debate well often resort to calling you names, typically “arrogant.” Don’t let it bother you. True arrogance is the belief that you have nothing left to learn, while true confidence is the belief that you can help others to learn as you continue learning yourself. (Smugness is arrogance without the talent.) Arrogant people often try to “sell” and “pitch.” Confident people share value, often providing their intellectual property for free in so doing. If you think you’re “selling,” you tend to believe someone wins and someone loses and you must overcome opposition. If you’re providing value, you tend to think that you’re trying to help others and would be remiss not to, since it’s a “win/win” proposition.
Monday Morning Perspective: When the house is finished, death comes. — Thomas Mann
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© Alan Weiss 2012. All rights reserved
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• Another person’s view will often create better descriptions of our accomplishments than we create for ourselves.
• We need to use more drama, be edgier, and be bolder in our promotional conversations and literature.
• “War stories” and examples are powerful, and we need to be able to cite them readily.
• We should have case studies of our successes prominently available.
• Discussions that seek “how” we do things should be diverted to “what” we accomplish for our clients.
• Most web sites are poor supporters of our credibility. They should feature typical client results, testimonials (including video), and value.
• Peer-to-peer referrals among buyers is the most powerful way to gain new business, followed by public, widely-respected intellectual property.
• Intellectual property is most effective when used in diagnostics allowing prospects to evaluate what their status is.
• If you don’t blow your own horn, there is no music.
© Alan Weiss 2012. All rights reserved.
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I slept for five hours of the six-hour, twenty-minute flight, woke up for breakfast on board and arrived at the Baglioni refreshed at 9 am to find my suite ready for me. I’ve continued my goofy streak by asking Virgin Atlantic baggage claim people to find my lost bag when it was simply circling in a lonely fashion on the carousel. It’s not the bag I usually use since mine tore, and I didn’t recognize it!
I had dinner with a wonderful past client on whose non-profit board I currently serve. We dined at Bibendum which is a trendy, unusual place (quail egg and smoked eel as an appetizer, the “best end of the lamb” as my main course). His partner is from Spain and they split their time among Seville, London, and New York, so we had a great time resolving world affairs.
Earlier I had stopped for Mass at the Brompton Oratory, a splendid 165-year-old church which has clung to some pre-Vatican II ways, including part of the service delivered by the priest at the huge, original altar, with his back to the congregation; communion taken at the railing; a friar leading the Rosary in a small side chapel prior to Mass; and a splendid boys’ choir which marches in, genuflects in one movement, and proceeds up to the organ in the choir loft.
Today was my first of two days of the Shameless Promotion Workshop, for which I accept a maximum of six people, and our participants are from Israel, Switzerland, Germany, Japan, and the U.S. Tonight we dine at L’Etranger, one of my top restaurants in Kensington (and, needless to say, an existential experience, if you get my drift).
We finish with another complete day tomorrow, then I conduct my Seal the Deal Workshop.
Part of the great food service at the Boston Virgin Atlantic Clubhouse.
Main door of the Brompton Oratory.
© Alan Weiss 2012. All rights reserved.
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I’m off to London for a week of work: Shameless Promotion, Seal the Deal, Mentor Summit, Total Immersion with a Growth Cycle client, and a strategy session for the Baglioni Hotel, where I’m staying. I hope to include six great dinners, a trip to my favorite cigar club (in the Lanesborough Hotel) and to my gambling club of over 25 years, the Palm Beach Club (I kid you not).
The Virgin Atlantic Clubhouse in Boston is one-twentieth of the one in London, but it’s still terrific, with great food and service.
When I came through security, my computer hadn’t emerged, so I alerted the TSA folks that it was missing. They launched a search, until I realized I had already packed it back into my briefcase. I departed to withering looks.
I’m dining in the club instead of on the plane, and hope to spend the flight sleeping. I’m due to arrive in Heathrow at 7:20 am local time. It’s drizzly, damp, and foggy in Boston, so London will be a pleasure!
© Alan Weiss 2012. All rights reserved.
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Since my wife is recovering from knee surgery, we decided to take a limo to New York rather than the high speed train (Acela) which often wobbles severely (reminiscent of the Toonerville Trolley, an historical reference for some of you). On a beautiful Sunday with no traffic, we made it from ouw door to the Pierre Hotel in 2:45, as good as it gets (faster than the high speed train, ironically).
Sunday night we dined at Remi, the favorite restaurant of Maria’s 78-year-old uncle, visiting from Turino. We seem him every year or two in the states or Italy. Basically, Maria speaks English which I translate into Spanish, which is close enough to Piedmontese to reach some level of communication. He’s a very successful designer/builder in wood, and has done several shops on Madison Avenue.
Monday evening, after a visit to the Grand Havana Room, we met friends and attended the New York Corporate Theater Fund gala for Harry Connick, Jr. at the Pierre. It was impressive that celebrities such as Michael Imperiole, Hal Holbrook, Joel Grey, Mariska Hagitay, and others mingled during the packed cocktail party with everyone else. David Alan Grier was the emcee.
After working with Dan Weedin (a member of my Growth Cycle Program) and his wife during Tuesday, we all had dinner in the R Lounge overlooking Times Square, and then say Evita.
Ricky Martin has received a bad rap in this show. His singing and acting are excellent, the audience clearly loved him, and the fact that he’s not Manny Patinkin shouldn’t surprise anyone. The lead, Elena Roger, is the first Argentinian actress to play Evita Peron in such a production, and she, too, has been unfairly treated by critics. She’s a fine singer (again, not Patty Lupone, but so what?) and a terrific dancer.
The entire show is sung, an operetta, and was outstanding, highlighted by wonderful sets and the best house orchestra I’ve heard since the revival of South Pacific. If you get the chance, go see it.
The limo takes us back this morning, and we’ll still have the afternoon to ourselves at home. One of the real benefits of Rhode Island—it’s close to New York! Now if we could just get rid of Connecticut….
© Alan Weiss 2012. All rights reserved.
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