"You don’t have to dance on anyone else’s stage"

Um dos preconceitos que alimento é relativo aos empresários que integram comitivas governamentais ou presidenciais.

Eu sei que por vezes para entrar em certos países, é preciso que a abertura de portas seja feita a nível de governos mas essa não é a regra. Depois, a esmagadora maioria dos empresários bem sucedidos que fui conhecendo ao longo da vida nunca participou nessas comitivas. Alguns, como um aniversariante de ontem, até ficam aborrecidos quando um ministro invade o seu pavilhão numa feira em Itália:

"Cada minuto que o ministro lá está é um minuto a menos em que estou disponível para os clientes e potenciais clientes e, é um minuto a mais em que me afugenta do stand potenciais clientes por causa da entourage."

Porque tudo isto? Por causa deste artigo delicioso, "Why we choose profit":

"Profit buys you time and flexibility. Profit is the ultimate flexibility because it buys you the ultimate luxury: time. As long as you remain profitable, you can go in any direction you want and take as much time as you need.
...
Profit is the ultimate shield against bullshit. When you’re profitable you don’t have to play games, succumb to substitutional metrics, cross your fingers, or grovel for other people’s money, validation, or acceptance. You simply make more money than you spend — and run a fundamentally sound, economics 101 business. When profit’s a requirement, it becomes a lot harder to step in the bullshit.
...
$1 in profit is the ultimate FU money. ... all you need is $1 in annual profit. Because once your company is self-sustaining and profitable, and you don’t owe anyone anything (in my book, if you owe money you aren’t truly profitable), then you can say FU to just about anything. You don’t need to do anything you don’t want to do when you don’t have to rely on anyone else to be sustainable. You don’t have to dance on anyone else’s stage, or play by anyone else’s rules. FU money isn’t about buying an island, it’s about being an island — your own sustainable entity.
...
[Moi ici: O trecho que se segue é um aparte acerca do problema do fragilismo. O fragilismo coloca-nos sempre no fio da navalha, sem margem de manobra] Profits provide insulation. When tastes change, when trends shift, when the markets flutter, funding freezes up. That happens whether your particular business is unaffected or not. And you might well be caught out in the cold and freeze to death. Remember 2008? 2009? The nuclear winters of funding? Those were some of our best years! Profits insulated us from jittery investors, and our customers still kept paying for Basecamp."