Do not waste your talents

Whether you are a religious person or not, this parable has a good life lesson to learn from.

In this parable, The "Parable of the Talents", in Matthew 25:14–30 tells of a master who was leaving his house to travel, and, before leaving, entrusted his property to his servants. According to the abilities of each man, one servant received five talents, the second had received two, and the third received only one. Upon returning home, after a long absence, the master asks his three servants for an account of the talents he entrusted to them. The first and the second servants explain that they each put their talents to work, and have doubled the value of the property with which they were entrusted; each servant was rewarded:

His lord said unto him, Well done, good and faithful servant; thou hast been faithful over a few things, I will make thee ruler over many things: enter thou into the joy of thy lord. — Matthew 25:23

The third servant, however, had merely hidden his talent, burying it in the ground, and was punished by his master.

A deeper look at this parable reveals that the reward, and the punishment was not for the increase or profits, or the lack of profits, sure at first glance it may seem as if it was, however if the work was done the profits would not have happened in the first place, the reward, and punishment both were rewarded for the effort. You see 2 people but forth the effort, they tried to the best of their ability, the third out of fear did nothing. The third guy who did nothing , did not think to ask for help, he did ask for advice, he did nothing. Not only did the third guy burry the money land owner gave him to invest, he buried the help of the other two that were available to help him. Many times as leaders we ask for help, we pray for help, and when it arrives, it is not always the help we expect or the help does not come from who we expect the help come from, and by over looking it or in some case ignoring it all together, we not put the help in the hole we have dug.

I have consulted and coached some business owners, or people that wanted to start a business, and they simply could not seem to get it off the ground, so to speak. In most cases they had viable business ideas, a good product or service, and a big dream. Those are all fine qualities to have when starting out. These budding entrepreneurs came from different backgrounds, religions, all had different levels of education, some had the financial freedom to chase their dream, others not so much. There was one thing that they all had in common, they had no idea what starting a business or better yet, what being a business owner meant. They were clueless to what starting a business meant and the work that was involved. The believed in the " if you build it, they will come philosophy. In this day and age this philosophy is not only out dated, it is dangerous to subscribe to. Not only is there competition out there , there is thing called the internet. You HAVE to do work to get customers, clients victors what ever you want to call them. They believed their job as a business owner, from day one, was to hire people (without having 1 single customer) get an office, come into work every morning, check the bank balance, their email and then go home. They did not put in 1 ounce of effort, not one. They buried their dream in the backyard, and it went nowhere. They were rewarded for their effort.