Most people think "rejection" is an ugly word. Getting rejected is a put down, an affront to one's dignity. And so it is. But everybody gets rejected. Everybody. But not everybody handles rejection the same. The successful people in this world are successful not because they don't get rejected but because they recover from rejection.

I'd like to share some thoughts with you about not letting rejection keep you down. Although they're based on an article I originally wrote for salespeople, they apply equally to the men and women in the safety profession, particularly those currently in a career transition.

An Exercise in Visualization

I phoned my friend, Doris [not her real name], who was just getting started in sales. She sells furniture. Like all salespeople do, she had experienced a week full of rejections and was feeling mighty low. It was Friday night and she had scheduled an appointment with what she hoped but was far from confident would turn out to be a customer the next morning. So I decided to give her a little pep talk.

"Doris," I said, "I want you to close your eyes and visualize what will happen at your appointment tomorrow. First, picture what that customer looks like. He's just bought a couch and he's happy with the purchase. Is everything true so far?"

"Yes," she replied. "He did like the couch and now he needs a couple of matching chairs. We just so happen to have two in stock."

"Excellent. Now, I want you to imagine that he's walking over to one of the chairs and sitting down on it. He's smiling. He's happy. He likes the chair very much. So much that he's decided to buy the pair. Can you see it, Doris? He's signing the contract. You've closed the sale!"

And do you know what Doris's response was? "Gee, Art. I don't know. He'll probably want to think it over first."

"POW," I cried. "You just killed the sale!"

"But that's what people have been telling me all week and that's why I haven't sold anything!"

Poor Doris. She had become one of rejection's many victims. She had let it cloud her thinking. Now she expected people to reject her and had created a self-fulfilling prophecy.

The Poem Nobody Wanted

The other way to handle rejection is to brush it off and keep trying, confident that you will ultimately succeed. Let me tell you another story. It's about a silly poem I wrote more than 30 years ago called "Pay Attention Brother." It's a long poem but here's the gist:

Do you ever get that winded feeling,
Ever find your head a reeling,
Keepin' up with the Joneses down the street?

Now I want you to pay attention to me,
Did you ever get to feeling gloomy,
Just because they seemed a little more elite?

Well then, brother, if you're like me,
You'd like to find a place to flee,
A place where you don't have to be keepin' up.

A place where people smile a lot,
And are quite content with what they've got,
And are grateful that they've got coffee to fill their cup.

To appreciate what you got, brother,
That's the secret, there ain't no other,
Just thank God that you've got something nice.

And don't start thinkin' that it's a disaster,
When you see the other guy movin' faster,
Count your blessings, brother, that's darn good advice.

The relevance of this poem isn't just its words but my experience with trying to get it published. I sent that poem out to an editor expecting a check. What I got was a rejection note. I tried again. Another rejection note. And again. Same result.

After my sixteenth attempt, the editor of the magazine Modern Maturity sent me a nice note: "Art, we love your poem and we want to use it but we don't pay anything."

Well, by this point I was running out of postage stamps. So I told her, fine, you can use the poem for free. Just let me know when you publish it.

And then I waited. And waited. And waited some more. I waited 16 months. But I didn't hear a word.

I had every right to be discouraged and throw in the towel. But I decided to send the poem out to other publications. Finally, after attempt number 26, I found a publisher-the magazine Liguorian. I even got a check. Since then, that poem has been published three or four other times.

The Moral

I see that poem as a symbol of overcoming rejection. I still hand it out to safety professionals and encourage them to hang it on their office wall. Getting rejected 26 times isn't easy. I took each one of those rejections personally. But, I kept getting up after each one because I believed in the poem and was confident that somebody would want it. And I was right.

I know that people in the safety profession encounter rejection all the time. It can happen when we pitch our safety program to the CEO, try to gain buy-in from supervisors and workers and, of course, when we interview for jobs. My advice to you is this: Remain confident in your abilities and the merits of what you're selling and, with persistence, you are all but assured of ultimate success.

HEROES OF WORKPLACE SAFETY

Alexander Graham Bell: One smooth operator

Alexander Graham Bell

By Glenn Demby

I've never met Art Fettig. But I've formed an image of him as the genius in white frock coat tinkering in the basement with his latest invention. Sort of like an Alexander Graham Bell.

Bell was born in Scotland in 1847. His childhood was marked by two things: the deaths of his brothers by tuberculosis and a pronounced curiosity in the natural world. It soon became clear that this unusual boy who liked to collect and sort botanical specimens had it going on between the ears. At age 12, Alexander built a homemade device that combined rotating paddles with nail brushes to dehusk wheat that was immediately put into operation by a local flour mill.

Although his curiosity extended to many spheres, Alexander had a special fascination for sound. He wrote poems and taught himself to play the piano. He also mastered a kind of ventriloquism and loved to use his "voice tricks" to play practical jokes on family guests. At age 16, Alexander was taken by his father to see a crude robot invention with a simulated human voice. He was so enamored of the machine that he and his brothers invented their own version, complete with throat and larynx. Alexander soon turned to live subjects, performing experiments on the family dog, Trouve. He found that by manually manipulating the dog's lips and vocal cords, he could get Trouve to produce a crude sounding "Ow ah oo ga ma ma" - "How are you, grandma?"

Bell continued his experiments with sounds and vocalization and began working with the deaf. In 1871, he moved to Boston and bought a home in Ontario. A year later, he invented a "harmonic telegraph" that could transmit audio messages at different pitches.

It was in 1875 that Bell perfected his most famous invention. The story of how the telephone was invented has been relayed countless times. But what the heck, it's a great yarn and one more recounting won't do any harm. We'll allow Bell to relay the story in his own words. This, from his March 10, 1876 notebook entry in which Bell talks about conducting an experiment with his assistant, Thomas A. Watson, in the next room:

"I then shouted into the mouthpiece the following sentence: 'Mr. Watson. Come here. I want to see you.' To my delight, he came and declared that he had heard and understood what I said."

Bell's scientific talents were matched by an acumen for business. Securing a patent on his invention, Bell formed the Bell Telephone Company in 1877. Bell's life, scientific work and business success would continue until his death in 1922. I'd like to tell you more but my phone is ringing...

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