Story: The CEO And The Gas Attendant Or What’s The Real Cause Of Your Success?
I heard a funny story that Thomas Wheeler, CEO of the Massachusetts Mutual Life Insurance Company, told about himself.
One day he and his wife were driving along a highway when he noticed that their car was low on gas.
He got off the highway at the next exit and the only gas station he could find was a rundown gas station that had only one gas pump.
He asked the attendant – the only one working – to fill the tank and check the oil. He then went for a little walk around the station to stretch his legs.
When he got back to the car, he noticed his wife and the attendant were engaged in an animated conversation. The conversation stopped when he got there and so he paid the attendant.
But as he was getting back into the car, he saw the attendant wave and heard the guy say, “It was great talking to you.”
As they drove away from station, he asked his wife what was going on and whether she knew the man.
She calmly admitted she did. They had gone to high school together and had dated steadily for about a year.
“Boy, were you lucky that I came along,” Wheeler bragged.
“If you had married him, you’d be the wife of a gas station attendant instead of the wife of a chief executive officer.”
But to his surprise his wife answered, “My dear if I had married him, he’d be the chief executive officer and you’d be the gas station attendant.”
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Sometimes it’s easy for all of us to think our success has only to do with us.
But there are many people who have helped you get where you’re at today.
Who do you need to thank today?
Photo by doug_wertman
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