I met a friend of mine about 6 years ago and he’s an extremely ambitious and determined individual. He still runs a successful London based wireless telecommunication company and his business seems to be growing rapidly since I last heard from him.

He’s a great guy and I have great admiration for him.

During one of our meetings over lunch many years ago, he talked about how people can make their own luck by doing the right things that most successful people do. If you do it constantly enough, you will eventually reach your goal.

Well, I agree – Partially.

I agree that if you did the right things combined with time and unfaltering determination then success will soon welcome you to its doors. However without luck, your journey in reaching your goals will consume more time, money and effort; not forgetting that you will also have to overcome whatever threats your business bring to you.

How do I mean by this?

Well, sometimes you have to be at a certain point, at the right time and place to get that ‘distinct’ advantage.

For example, say that you’re on a flight to Tokyo and you were sitting next to a well suited man. You decide to start a conversation with him.

During the conversation, he mentioned to you about how dissappointed he was with his current vendor and he couldn’t seem to find any trustworthy and dependable alternatives.

He has been trying for many months and you could literally see the dismay on is face.

Somehow, your eyes beamed. You couldn’t believe what he was saying.

The potential supplier that he was talking about has your name written all over it. You’ve got plenty of supplies with many happy and repeat customers willing to give you genuine business testimonials.

In the end, you explained to him about your business and how your business could be the perfect partner in his business. You told him about how you are always able to deliver on what is agreed and that your customer service is always there to meet any additional demands he requires.

Both of you agreed to meet at his office with his marketing team in two weeks and you exchanged business cards.

Two weeks later, you come out of the business meeting with a £1 million business contract and a huge smile on your face.

None of that could have happened if you didn’t take the flight and that if the airline didn’t give you the seat sitting next to that man.

I know that this is just an example and it may not apply to you. But I hope you can reflect back to your own personal experience and analyse how luck had made an impact to your life and goals.

Luck is not something that you can plan. It just happens. The question that matters most is how you’re going to seize that opportunity and quickly reap the benefit from it.

What do you think?

Ambar Hamid.