Respect creates opportunity

People talk. The way you spoke to a receptionist, a supplier's helper, a homeowner who turned out not to be a customer — those stories outlive the moment by years.

Respect, given consistently and without calculation, returns through doors you did not know existed. People recommend you in rooms you will never sit in.

The opposite is also true. A few moments of rudeness, repeated over a career, quietly close doors you will never see being closed.

There is no version of a long career where this stops being true.