Its not what you know…

There’s an old saying, it’s not what you know it’s who you know and most recently this has become more and more evident as I look back on my life and the journey in which I have travelled to date.

Over the years I have met a vast array of people from different walks of life and due to my kind, friendly nature I have always done my best for anyone I’ve met who needed my help, but at times it often makes you wonder if you’ll actually get anywhere if you’re constantly “a nice guy”?

When I first got into the graphic design industry I met one guy who was starting out in business, between me and a couple of others we built a strong team and through a lot of self sacrifice I helped that company to become something much bigger. Over the years I was promised a great many things but sadly none of these promises ever came true and I eventually left that company no further forward than I was when I started, in fact to be perfectly honest, I was probably worse off than I had been when I started.

One day I will learn…

Roll on a few years and we meet some other colourful characters. Passing on as much knowledge and helpful advice as I could helped a number of people to become better known in their respective trades, but did this help me? Again, sadly not, and those who didn’t take the advice I gave them not only ended up worse off themselves, but also took me for a lot of money through their failed business management and my stupid faith that these were true honest people.

Most recently, as I once again take stock of where life has gone somewhat astray I realise that I’m doing it again. Spending all my time building up one person’s business at the cost of my own and while they’re driving round in fancy cars and reaping the rewards of not only my efforts but the efforts of a great many other people, realisation once again dawns.

In the past few months I’ve seen the true colour of some people who had the cheek to call me a friend and having recently fought and won a legal battle with one such individual who, had my family not recently lost a close family relative I would probably have taken to the cleaners, having seen the work that someone else is doing for them now it has greatly built up my confidence in myself that I am better than some of these ungrateful people deserve.

Just because I cancelled the payments and put it in writing that I no longer required your services doesn’t mean that you can stop providing me those services, restore them now, financially compensate me for my mistake or I’ll see you in court!

For some people it takes a lot of work to have self belief, other than myself, my life partner is one such person, is very talented at making cards and personalised gifts and is good looking to boot, but something that once again reinforced my belief in myself and made me think about the way in which my partner behaves was highlighted by a rather bizarre programme I watched tonight called How to look good Naked, presented by Gok Wan. We’ve always been very self depricating, with my partner less than impressed with her body and myself always convinced that anything and everything I do workwise is “alright”, and “could be better”, but in reality, and I guess blowing my own trumpet, I do some bloody good work at times. I won’t say that everything I do is the best you’ll get anywhere, but having spent two months fighting and defending my actions against an idiot and his even more idiotic solicitor, now that I have seen what my replacement has produced compared to what this client complained was overpriced, I honestly believe I didn’t charge the ungrateful b*****d enough for it, nor for all the “favours” I did for him over the years.

Still, I can now look back, smile and laugh at the fact that he’s moved on and that I don’t have to deal with his crap any more.

So why did I start by saying “It’s not who you know”?

Looking over my current penny pinching clientèle who not only want everything as cheap as chips (as the northern saying goes), but they also want salt, vinegar and a fish thrown in for free.

Many of those who know me, who in some cases have worked (or work) for much bigger or better clients than I have in the past have all said that I’m worth more than this and that a lot of what I’ve done in the past is beneath me or that I should be aiming much higher.

Sadly, it’s all well and good these people saying this, but until you find the right person to prove yourself to, to get the right people around you, those with the right contacts or the right knowledge, I feel that my talents and those of many other people that I’ve met in the past who have struggled could go un-noticed and as a result, life could pass us by without living up to our true potential.

At the moment I’m working with some really talented people at Horizon Studios, Adarakion and Wired Lemon on the games front, I’m looking forward to pairing up with Bondi Blue to see what we can do between us in terms of graphic design and promotional materials and I have some promising leads on the web front which I’m looking forward to tackling in the next few weeks/months.

To spin a line from a lesser known Australian singer/band that my partner likes, I believe in Karma what you give is what you get returned.

For too many years I’ve sat in the background as the unknown success behind many companies, watching them reap the rewards of my efforts and on many occasions, watched them accept awards, praise or thank you gifts for the work that I had done for them, without so much as a thank you from them to me, so now I think it’s time to step out of the shadows.