The law of relativity

I love physics, I really do. In fact, I took it twice during my student days, and I flunked both times. I made up for it with summer classes. This wasn’t because I was dumb or the teacher was unskilled. It was simply because I wasn’t interested. Today, I find physics fascinating, and I wish I had spent more time and attention on the subject matter.

I see the laws of physics applicable to business and life. One major aspect of physics that I couldn’t forget involves the man of the century, Albert Einstein, and the theory of relativity.

Albert Einstein shook the foundations of physics with the introduction of his Special Theory of Relativity in 1905 and his General Theory of Relativity in 1915. The first showed that Newton’s Three Laws of Motion were only approximately correct, breaking down when velocities approached that of light. The second showed that Newton’s Law of Gravitation was also only approximately correct, breaking down in the presence of very strong gravitational fields.

This word “relativity” captures my curiosity. There’s a “relativity” principle that goes this way: “At the speed of light, time stands still.” This got me thinking about Einstein’s other thoughts on the matter. No wonder Einstein is considered a genius and I’m a big fan – consider his quotes:

• “When you are courting a nice girl, an hour seems like a second. When you are sitting on a red-hot cinder, a second seems like an hour. That’s relativity.”

• “Two things are infinite. The universe and human stupidity. And I am not so sure about the universe.”

• “The difference between genius and stupidity is; genius has its limits.”

Relativity operates in business as well. (Now don’t take me too seriously, but try to look for the lessons offered in the following illustrations.)

Every time I go to one of our airports, I see the mass ocean of humanity being herded like cattle. There aren’t enough seats for them to sit on while waiting for their flights. So most of the passengers, sometimes even with their kids, sit on the floor; others patiently stand amidst the crowd, waiting to board. But instead of putting more seats in the airport for the comfort of the passengers, more stalls and store spaces are being built to occupy available space. This is evidence that while we mouth platitudes that the customer is the reason for business, we don’t take care of them, and we just milk them for all their worth. The more customers a business has, the less the business people seem to care about them. This looks like relativity to me.

Here’s another observation.

When a food business begins to grow, when word of mouth starts spreading and people keep coming, the servings get smaller, and even the quality of the food deteriorates. And so “pioneer customers” swear never to give them any more business and scout for new establishments. The more customers food businesses have, the lesser their servings and food quality are, to increase their bottom line it seems. This looks like relativity to me.

Let’s go to the work place. In many cases, a casual employee works with great passion and excitement. They don’t mind the long hours. They don’t complain; they just deliver. But once this person gets regularized, he loses the passion, and starts producing less and complaining more over the course of time. This looks like relativity to me.

Whether this is genius or stupidity, I don’t really know, but one principle that has always worked for me is the “Extra Mile Principle”: always give more than what you’re paid for. The business relationship for the long term will always be more important than the business transaction in the short term.

I may be wrong, but I suspect that if Albert Einstein were here today, he might agree with me on this area of business physics.

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