Colin turned down a $3 million consulting contract because the client wanted to start a culture-change effort at middle management instead of the C-suite. Six months later, the initiative failed. He argues that transformation has to begin at the top.
When a competitor beats you and deep inside you are so excited that they did. Let me explain to you something that happened that I will never forget. I was looking at a very big consulting contract, do a huge culture change, shift their entire culture. Contract was worth $3 million over 3 years. And they said to me, Colin, one thing we're going to ask you to do is you're going to start at the middle tier management and then you can move down and then only thereafter can we decide to go to upper management. They actually refused the contract that day and said, I want you to give it to my competitors. I was already beaten by the competitors. I just decided decided not to compromise on knowing what worked. And that day, what works for me is when you change culture, it's from the top down. CEO, C-suite, all the way down. I went back 6 months later and I said to him, let me check in with you because I know 6 months from now you're gonna be half a million dollars in or more and you're gonna wish you hadn't done it that way. He said, Colin, it's been an absolute fiasco. We canceled the contract. I said, hire people that are experts to come and help you do what's right. Culture changes from the top down. You don't do it any other way. So for you, for yourself, when you watch this video, are you doing things or right in your business? Do you walk away from contracts? I walked away from $3 million that day, and it was the best thing I ever did. My reputation is more important to me than getting a contract knowing that it's going to fail. How many times have you taken on something potentially knowing it's going to go sideways and you do it anyway? Don't ever compromise. Do the right thing at the right time, all the time, because that's the definition of integrity.
