Who am I? What am I? A stream of subconsciousness IV by those who may know - or not...

"you ARE an artist, and not a BS one, which is the best part, exactly, A BUSINESS artist", - Friend, Author/CNN regular, New York. "My take is that you are being authentic and taking charge of your own destiny ... by putting it out there and not being attached to the outcome." - friend, Marketing Director, Wisconsin. "I am no intellectual ....you are, so you keep to the blog writing LOL! - another friend, New York. "You have the most interesting adventures!" - an old friend, Illinois. "the Kinzo Air copy you wrote was very good, I have recommended you for further business", - Business associate, Berlin. "the thing that makes your blog addictive is the fact that you write (most of the time) what others think and (I am willing to bet) write them before others think them, or write them the way they would think them if they could think. " - Author, SEO professional, London. "By chance through a friend I got in touch with your YouTube presentation. I find it very different and interesting. Sometimes coincidences help to bring projects forward." - Potential Business Partner, Munich.

All interesting and positive but they bring to mind another not so positive comment recently that criticized me for selling myself, as opposed to my talents or what I do tacitly in business - and this is where many people choose to disagree. What is valuable about me or anyone? Am I personally the value in a job or relationship? Or is it a particular product I produce? Recalling the words of a headhunter back in the 80s, upon meeting me she said, "David, never send your portfolio without you being there. You are the product, you are interesting. Many people can do the work, but you, yourself are something special." And I think that many times, many people, forget that. We are our own personal products. It is said often, that aside from just being able to do brilliant work, that we must be nice to work with. We must do more than just cross the "T"s and dot the "I"s and give more than 100%. We must do that, and do it all gracefully. So that people will want to work with us again - and I'm afraid that I have not always understood that as much as I could have. Sometimes we think the product is so important, that people don't matter - when in fact, it is almost the opposite.

Anyone in business who thinks that just doing the best job is really doing the best job is missing a huge opportunity. I realized a long time ago that there were other people who could do something that I did, technically much better, but what I could bring to the party was in making that work, accessible, salable and even enjoyable. This is the one quality I have cherished most in my most successful business relationships - to have a job or a project not only reach and exceed its goals - but to also have had everyone involved feel good about that when it was time to move on to the next challenge.

Figure out that trick, and life's a dream.