In the Spring of 2019, we decided to spend some money on home renovations. Our master bathroom was hopelessly outdated (picture your grandma’s bathroom…yeah, that bad!) as was the laundry room. Additionally, we had some flooding issues at the bottom of our 350 foot sloped driveway and I was worried it could wash out during the next big rain.
Well, as you probably know, it’s hard to find good contractors, particularly out in the country where we live. We had lots of experience during our kitchen renovation with contractors who started a project and then went radio silent for a few weeks before returning to finish. We began having those issues with the bathroom/laundry room project.
Then my wife told me she found a guy who could fix our flood problem with the driveway. She said he’d be over to scope it out and give us an estimate. About 4:00 pm I heard a knock at the door and when I opened it, there stood two rough looking guys who looked like they came right out of the Discovery Channel TV program Moonshiners. In my head I immediately uttered “ah hell no!”
Well, they looked over the drain problem and said (I won’t even try to write their response with an accent, but imagine someone talking with marbles in their mouth with a heavy southern accent) they could fix it for $250.00 using a bobcat (it’s a little mini bulldozer). I had my doubts but agreed.
And that next Saturday morning they fixed it. Fixed it perfectly. I asked if they could clear one of my walking trails, which they did. Impressed, I asked if they could fix the hill that went up to my 4-acre pasture which was rutted out during the recent storms. They did that too. They mentioned they could build me a small retaining wall to keep mud from washing down to the house. This led to them pouring some concrete walkways, spreading new gravel up near my barn, and re-sodding my grass. Then, they even took the bobcat up to the pasture and removed and burned several Thorny Locus trees (these things have 2-inch spikes in them that can tear up the wheels on your tractor or quad).
They fixed all of my problems. Perfectly. Affordably. Reliably. Permanently.
And to think when first I saw them I said “Ah hell no.”
Speaking of hell, I went down the Highway to Hell.
The Highway to Hell model is one that describes how all of us (especially me) takes a look at objective data and moves quickly through a series of steps to take action based on that first impression. Usually, it’s a wrong first impression and that leads to an equally wrong corresponding action. If I continued down that highway, I would have run those two guys off and missed out on all of their outstanding work.
So this week, think about how often you rely on your first impression. It could be with a Boss, co-worker, direct report, or even your HR professional. Think carefully before taking action. Your first impression is often the worst impression.