lunch at the Ritz
Yesterday at the Ritz Carleton
So, yesterday The Firm took us to the Ritz Carleton for lunch and a seminar. It was delicious: cranberry balsamic chicken, rosemary new potatoes, almond-raspberry couscous, summer salad and an amazing ginger, lemon, carrot soup with sourdough. Mmmm! And coffee and opera, tiramisu, almond-espresso tort, and fruit tartelettes.
Now that I’ve shared the important part…
They brought in another marketing guru. Unlike the last one, however, this speaker was more in touch with the reality of his job and did not veil it in motivational or self-actualization bullshit. His “this is how we make more money” approach was pleasantly direct and honest.
He talked a lot about niche markets (duh), superior service (duh), and differentiating yourself from the competition (duh). Lots of the advice he gave left me thinking, “you mean there are brokers who don’t do that already!?!” That said, he did a good job confirming my pre-existing suspicions and ideas.
One of the more embarrassing moments of the presentation occurred at the half way mark. . . He had made a very nice point by telling us about a young black woman in TN who had an MBA, but was having a hard time marketing. She found out there was an African American MBA Society in her town and soon her business was booming. It was a nice concrete example.
A few moments later, however, he found one of the African American brokers in the audience and, for a subsequent example said (essentially), “And you, you might have a lot of black clients. Black physicians, black laywers, black denists, black MBAs, whatever black because you’re black. . . black! Black!. . . and black people do business with black people because they’re black so you’ll have black clients. . .” The first example worked for me, but a few moment’s later I got the offensive message that “you are your racial category, unless you’re white and then you’re defined by interests, background, inclination and personality. If you’re black or Chinese, you’re just black or Chinese.” GRRRRRRRR.....
It was odd hearing a marketing guru suggest a bunch of things I wanted to do anyway, like send clients newspaper articles that might interest them, or lend a book I read recently to someone with overlapping interests. At first, I hated the idea that someone was giving that as advice, so that people could do calculatingly what I had hoped to do sincerely. A few moments later, however, I was over it. I was picturing some broker pulling a classic they hadn’t read off the shelf and offering it to a client. Eventually, a client will read one and the broker will be found out.
Sincere AND Slytherin.
Go me!
Enthused about work! No, enthused about *career.*
(Let’s hope it lasts.)
So, yesterday The Firm took us to the Ritz Carleton for lunch and a seminar. It was delicious: cranberry balsamic chicken, rosemary new potatoes, almond-raspberry couscous, summer salad and an amazing ginger, lemon, carrot soup with sourdough. Mmmm! And coffee and opera, tiramisu, almond-espresso tort, and fruit tartelettes.
Now that I’ve shared the important part…
They brought in another marketing guru. Unlike the last one, however, this speaker was more in touch with the reality of his job and did not veil it in motivational or self-actualization bullshit. His “this is how we make more money” approach was pleasantly direct and honest.
He talked a lot about niche markets (duh), superior service (duh), and differentiating yourself from the competition (duh). Lots of the advice he gave left me thinking, “you mean there are brokers who don’t do that already!?!” That said, he did a good job confirming my pre-existing suspicions and ideas.
One of the more embarrassing moments of the presentation occurred at the half way mark. . . He had made a very nice point by telling us about a young black woman in TN who had an MBA, but was having a hard time marketing. She found out there was an African American MBA Society in her town and soon her business was booming. It was a nice concrete example.
A few moments later, however, he found one of the African American brokers in the audience and, for a subsequent example said (essentially), “And you, you might have a lot of black clients. Black physicians, black laywers, black denists, black MBAs, whatever black because you’re black. . . black! Black!. . . and black people do business with black people because they’re black so you’ll have black clients. . .” The first example worked for me, but a few moment’s later I got the offensive message that “you are your racial category, unless you’re white and then you’re defined by interests, background, inclination and personality. If you’re black or Chinese, you’re just black or Chinese.” GRRRRRRRR.....
It was odd hearing a marketing guru suggest a bunch of things I wanted to do anyway, like send clients newspaper articles that might interest them, or lend a book I read recently to someone with overlapping interests. At first, I hated the idea that someone was giving that as advice, so that people could do calculatingly what I had hoped to do sincerely. A few moments later, however, I was over it. I was picturing some broker pulling a classic they hadn’t read off the shelf and offering it to a client. Eventually, a client will read one and the broker will be found out.
Sincere AND Slytherin.
Go me!
Enthused about work! No, enthused about *career.*
(Let’s hope it lasts.)