Until recently, Susan Boyle was unknown to the world.  Today, it seems that everyone knows about this undiscovered talent and her seemingly overnight success story.  Now Susan Boyle is on top of the world and is going to sing for the Queen of England and most likely, theatre stages around the world.

Here’s a YouTube.com link to the video from Britain’s Got Talent, television show:  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9lp0IWv8QZY

What I would like for you to observe in the video is how the audience snickered and doubted the talents of this woman as she was interviewed by the judges before her performance.  Even the judges had their doubts.  

Before this life changing performance, Susan Boyle lived a relatively simple life in a village in England for 47 years.  At the time of the show, she lived with her cat, was unemployed and said that she had never been kissed.  All she ever wanted to do was sing in front of an audience.  For whatever reasons life, till this moment, never permitted her the opportunity to fulfill her dream. 

All of the assumptions the audience and judges had made about Susan, suddenly and dramatically changed the moment she started to sing the song, I Dreamed the Dream, from the Les Miserables.  It was the most incredible voice.  A voice that belongs on the stage.  Even the manner in which she stood and presented the song was more like that of a professional performer.  She shocked the audience and the judges.  Suddenly, people were on their feet with applause and cheers.  The judges were smiling.  At the end of her performance not only were people overcome by tears but they were also in awe of her natural talent.  The judges were using words like – stunning, awesome, incredible and a privilege.  It was a wake up call to the cynical judges.

This is a great business lesson.  Too many times all of us make life judgments and business judgments based on someone’s appearance instead of looking past the appearance and looking to who they really are and what talents they may have to contribute. 

Rethink how you may judge people including your current employees and management team.  Even your vendors and other business associates.

By misjudging someone based on their appearance, as a business person, you may look over the perfect candidate for a job opportunity or miss out on some other big opportunity for your company.  You wouldn’t want someone to misjudge you based on your appearance, would you?