Here’s a shocking piece of corporate inspiration – it has been only nine months since “the largest accidental oil spill in history” and the company responsible for the disaster finds itself deeply submerged in new business opportunities.
While the Gulf of Mexico is still the world’s largest piece of proof that oil and water don’t mix, BP PLC is en route to the Arctic where a deal with Russia has allowed it to charter new waters in off-shore exploration. Earlier this week, BP issued a statement that actually attributed the oil spill in The Gulf as helping the company win favor with foreign governments. To petroleum producing prospects, all of the experience acquired in dealing with a disaster stands out more than the disaster itself. Thus BP stands out to commodity-controlling bureaucrats around the world over its drilling contract competitors.
Such a situation is a prime example of one of entreQuest’s core values in action. It is specifically termed “GROW REGARDLESS” and the three behaviors we aligned to this value are:
- Never settle for an existence of mundane or mediocre.
- Always aspire for extraordinary and expansion.
- Learn from every failure to foster future success.
BP could have hidden itself in a cloak of humiliation and quietly sifted through miles of murky water and millions of murky lawsuits for the next decade until the stain on its reputation was greased over enough to try and make a comeback in the international community. But they didn't.
BP could have also gone the born-again route by changing its name, logo, advisory board, headquarters location, favorite font, etc. and start over completely anew leaving the past behind. But they didn't.
Instead it appears that BP isn’t settling for mediocre, that BP is aspiring for expansion, and that BP is doing its best to learn from that catastrophic failure last year in an effort to foster future success a mere few months later.
If BP is likely to GROW REGARDLESS, there is absolutely no excuse as to why the rest of cannot do the same. Covet the setbacks you and your business have survived and cherish the wisdom you and your team have discovered. You will likely find that experience – both good and bad – is an asset akin to striking oil.
Kristen Zatina is a writing specialist at entreQuest who scours worldwide business news for corporation inspiration.
(*Information Sources:
"Rosneft Tie-Up Shows BP's Ability to Deal after Spill" by Guy Chazan. The Wall Street Journal. Tuesday 18 January 2011.
"Arctic Deal Won't Freeze Out TNK-BP" by Andrew Peaple. The Wall Street Journal. Thursday 20 January 2011.)
