Jeremiah Owyang, social computing analyst at Forrester Research, waxed poetic this morning regarding human relationships – personal, professional and otherwise. It’s a deceptively simple point, but one that bears repeating:
Via Web Strategy by Jeremiah:

It’s amazing how things come back around, when you least expect them.
Earlier today I talked to John Battelle, the CEO of Federated Media, he spends a lot of time educating clients and helping them learn, moving them from the “Why” to the “What” to the “How” questions. It pays off for him in spades, as he’s able to demonstrate his knowledge, leadership, and get his customers to trust him and his company.
Just goes to show, that helping people –even when there’s nothing in it for you– can lead to great rewards in the future…
Be good to others, share with them and nurture them, can’t think of anything more ’social’ than that.

We like to think that this concept is baked into FM’s DNA (how’s that for a mixed metaphor?) We try not to “sell.” Instead we educate and collaborate. Every discussion starts with the needs of the partner or customer, and usually the first need is for someone to understand their goals.
Thanks for noticing, Jeremiah! And since we’re waxing poetic, here, I thought I’d toss in one of my favorite quotes from John Muir’s My First Summer in the Sierra. It strikes me that this is another way to say the same thing:

When we try to pick out anything by itself, we find it hitched to everything else in the Universe.