We Just Can’t Do It

Photo Credit: Alexander Andrews

The towing and recovery industry is a service industry to the motoring public and unfortunately — while we want to service or help everyone who calls — we just can’t do it. This was so true when many of us were, and are, dealing with severe weather. I turned down many calls. We just couldn’t service or help them in a timely manner. I only have so many employees and equipment.

Not being able to help or please everyone is not limited to our industry. I’ve found this out through the various roles I’ve had throughout the years. For example, I was on the Human Concerns Committee for my parish, and while I would have liked to give financial support to every outreach who requested a donation, I didn’t have enough in the budget to do it. It was hard to decide on which outreaches we could help, and which ones we couldn’t.

Another example was when I served as president of a women’s towing organization. I was questioned a few times about decisions I had to make. I just couldn’t please everyone. I needed to make decisions based on what was good for the whole — not the few.

I read a quote from Herbert Bayard Swope which I believe puts all of this in perspective:

“I cannot give you the formula for success, but I can give you the formula for failure – which is: Try to please everybody.”

We just can’t do it.

I guess we shouldn’t get caught up in what’s possible or impossible and just concern ourselves with what is workable and not-workable. This we can do.