A client and I were recently in a spirited discussion about a particular speaker/author/seminar leader. He’s someone the client admired – and let’s say that I do not share his viewpoint.

“You’re just jealous of his success,” my client and friend said. “He owns his own jet, fancy cars, and makes a lot of money!”

“Do you think he’d make a good friend?” I asked. “Well, probably not,” my client said. “I sense he doesn’t play well with others. But, maybe it takes an ego that big – maybe even a bit of narcissism — to be that successful.”

“I sure hope not,” I replied. Then, I asked, “If you booked him – or if you were doing business with him…would you trust him?”

Now my client looked at the floor and said, “In fact, no I would not. Just watching him online or watching his training courses, you can tell it is all about him. I don’t think I’d trust him to have my company’s best interests at heart. My guess is that he would think he was doing us a favor, rather than viewing us as a valued client.”

“And you’ve just nailed why I am not a fan of his,” I said.

• “I would rather be something that clients trust than someone they envy.”

Seth Godin wrote about this recently.  He said, “Earning trust outperforms earning envy.”

I believe he meant that in every way. Trust might take the long haul – sometimes outlandish flamboyancy generates quick results.

However, give me a long career based on trust than a short career focused on just making a splashy impression.

At the recent Ultimate Business Summit, we offered that we could help improve your efforts by 10%. During a webinar, we were asked why we didn’t say “10X” instead of 10%?

The answer was simple – we knew from experience we could deliver on our promise. If your business is doing $1,000,000 a year, we believe that we can easily help you get to $1,100,000. (We’ve had many participants obtain much higher multiples.)

However, if you’re doing $1m, do you really think a two-day seminar will get you to $10m? I don’t think that’s possible. Could you go from $1K to $10K? Maybe. But once the numbers get higher and the participants are more successful, outrageous promises are just that – outrageous.

For some, promises of ten times results aren’t sufficient, evidently. This week, I saw a book in an airport bookstore promising “100X Leaders.” Too bad for you, John Maxwell, Dorie Clark, Mark Sanborn, Barbara Corcoran, Mike Myatt, and other top leadership authors and speakers. This book will make leaders one hundred times better!  Yeah, right.

• Remember that scene in “Something About Mary” with “7 Minute Abs”? (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JB2di69FmhE) It’s like this comedy has now become our reality! It doesn’t matter what you can deliver…just promise more! I had a friend on Facebook write me this week to joke that he now had the title for his next book, “1000X Leaders!”

On a recent podcast I was a guest on, the host mentioned that going forward, the two most important qualities for professionals will be transparency and integrity. While we might quibble on whether those are the top two of all aspects we will need to exhibit to colleagues and customers, it’s a darn good place to start.

• Focus on being the type of person — and professional — who builds trust.

• While you probably won’t get there as quickly, my bet is that you’ll eventually have the kind of reputation and life that others will envy.