April 28, 2020
No one has all the answers right now, but that didn’t stop us from asking a ton of questions to our CEO, David Foy. Here are just a few of his answers.
Early in my career, I had a mentor who used to say, “If you are going to succeed in business, you have to face adversity with confidence”. I always thought that seemed like sound advice. The only problem was that I hadn’t built up enough experience to feel confident in my own abilities to always make the right choice.
After 35 years in advertising, I know exactly what he means because I’ve faced adversity enough times, that I realize it always works out for the best in the end. And that the adversity is either never as bad you imagined it will be, or that it motivates you to work smarter to find a solution. There’s something to the expression, ‘the fire in your belly’ that lights a match under you and keeps you moving forward.
Typically, I’m an optimist by nature, but that doesn’t mean that I don’t get down or feel depressed by the circumstances I find myself in at times. Career setbacks, recessions, lost pitches and more, all feel dreadful when they happen. You lose sleep, worry constantly while you imagine the worst possible outcome swirling in your head, and then all of a sudden, something happens and in one instant, a bit of good news pulls you out of your funk. That’s life.
Whether you own a business, lead an account, manage a brand, or simply serve a client, you always feel pressure to succeed. The highs and lows in life, the joy of succeeding and the despair of losing, are experiences given to you to help you learn how to manage difficult circumstances so you can keep going and face adversity with confidence.
COVID-19 might be a new virus, but it is not a new adversity. We’ve faced great recessions, we’ve faced terrorism, we’ve faced war, we’ve faced illnesses, we’ve faced fear and uncertainty. Like always, we draw upon our experiences, or if we are still early in our careers, we draw upon people we respect with more life experience to seek advice. Learn from the past or from those around us.
Here’s what I’ve learned about facing adversity with confidence.