People fall down, winners get up, and gold medal winners just get up faster.

-Bonnie St. John

Bonnie St. John lost a leg at the age of 5. Several years later, she would go on to become the first African-American to win an Olympic medal in skiing as she was awarded a silver and two bronze medals in the 1984 Paralympics in Innsbruck, Austria.  This week on my radio program, I asked Bonnie to tell her story about how she won the Silver. She said, “I was leading in the slalom after the first run. Then in the second run, I slipped on an ice patch and fell down the hill. I thought for sure this would cost me a medal, but I got up and continued racing.  Several other competitors hit the same patch of ice and also fell…even the one who eventually won the gold.  The only difference, however, between her and I, and the Gold and the Silver, was SHE got up faster…and THAT won her the gold.”

So what about your business? In this tough year, do you feel like you have “slipped on a patch of ice?” Well if so, NOW is the time to get up…and get up FASTER than your competition. Because there is only one gold, and it’s either going to you or them.

Here are three ways to get up faster in your business:

•    Get out of bed 30 minutes “faster” and earlier each morning.  Then use that extra time to learn something new about your Product, Industry or Competition.

•    Stop procrastinating! It’s time to quit talking and start doing. Write down a list of high value activities that might be painful but necessary to make you famous in your company then schedule time each day to do those things.

•    Network and Cold Call more than the competition. If you are speaking to 10 accounts each day, pump it up to 15 accounts each day.

And remember, the common fuel to “getting up faster” is URGENCY. Make your body feel it, then help others use it to make decisions more quickly. And by this time next year, you will look back on the autumn of 2009, as the greatest FALL of your career…the fall that couldn’t keep you down.

“How’s it going,” were the words I casually used as I walked past a fellow vacationer in a hotel hallway. The bearded man responded reluctantly, “It’s going.” That was it! No “Fine, how are you?” …or “Great, how you doing?” “Oh well, perhaps the guy is just having a tough day,” I thought. The next day as I carried my 3-year old’s floatie to the pool, there he was. As I walked past him I tried again, “How’s it going?” Sure enough, he responded with the same apathetic grunt, “It’s going.”

As I walked away I wondered why he had chosen to make THAT his response to a simple greeting. Why did he CHOOSE to be cold and uninterested in a stranger who was showing interest in him? So how do YOU greet strangers and even co-workers when you pass them in the hall? Do you look down at your feet as if the answers to life’s problems are on your shoelaces, or do you make the first “warm” move? If you said the latter, congratulations!

So this week, pay attention to every casual encounter you have and be sure to deliver your best. Because with each warm greeting and smile you deliver, you increase your worth and value to your customers, organization and world. In other words, your “stock” value goes up. But perhaps even more importantly, you help others “stock” value go up as well. And don’t be surprised if the gift of good nature that you deliver is returned in the form of more knowledge, more money and more honor…whether you intended it to or not.