A friend that I knew from Chabad contacted me to try to interest me in a multi-level marketing opportunity. At the time I had zero interest in it as a business, but agreed to try the product mostly to help him out.
The product was a 75-year old recipe of botanicals in a liquid form that many people claimed did amazing things for them, especially in terms of increased energy and oxygen levels. I figured there was no harm in trying it.
After just a few days using this black liquid concoction (called Matol in Canada, where it was made, and marketed under the name “Km” in the US), I found that I did in fact feel a rush of energy. This made me want to know more about it, so I attended some local meetings and got hold of all their marketing materials.
Short story is that I was sufficiently impressed to want to try my hand with it — not so much as a business, but to let others know about this amazing natural product. Over several months I attended a few training seminars, read lots of materials (including videos of the inventor), and got a number of people to try the product. A few even signed up to attempt it as a business once they too felt a positive response to taking it. One fellow even told me that it cured the frequent migraines that he had had all his life!
When we moved to Chicago in 1992 I continued with this on a very part-time basis for a while. I wasn’t really too interested in it as a business, but a few people did sign up to try it, and several people reported amazing results with the product. I continued very casually until I landed my job at Abbott. Once working full-time I really didn’t have the time or interest to pursue it. I did, however keep taking the product myself for many years.
Although multi-level businesses were not really my thing, I found that I learned a lot of valuable marketing and personal business ideas from their trainings. They had a different way of looking at things, because in MLM, the more successful you make those recruits under you, the more successful you become. This is in contrast to most corporate managers who are usually more interested only in getting the best value from their subordinates for the least investment.
I leveraged those ideas (and others) as I got more into management roles, because I believed this was the best way to manage. When I hired people in various specific technical roles, I chose people who knew those areas better than I did. I might have had a greater over-all view of the technical and business situation, but I wanted those working for me to each be experts in their narrower field. Much later, as I read management books, I discovered that this was considered the essence of good management. I have MLM philosophies to thank for putting me on that “best practice” management path.
