Amway - IBOs and Personal Responsibility?

In my blogging career, I have seen many IBOs mention that their beloved system is basically foolproof. Follow the system and you will "make it". Uplines nearly guarantee that you will succeed if you follow the system. Many IBOs who did not make it blame themselves for failure.

What I find very ironic is how uplines twist the issue of responsibility. What I mean is some of them will stand on stage, possibly in front of tens of thousands of people and proclaim that IBOs should trust upline and do what upline advises, and that will virtually ensure success. Yet if an IBO fails or does not progress in the business, the IBO is held accountable for any failures.

While the Amway business is not a game of chance, a good analogy would be to promote the lottery and tell lottery customers that you have a sure fire way to increase their chance of winning the lottery. For example, your advice may be to select the month of your birthday as one of the lottery numbers, or use the date of your spouse's birthday as a number. Then when the lottery customer loses, you simple say he failed to pick the right numbers. And of course, if that customer wins the lottery, you cite your wise advice as the reason for winning the lottery. In either case you cannot lose.

It is much the same in Amway. Upline will entice prospects to join by showing them fancy homes and cars, and talking about early retirement. Then when a prospect gets excited about these "possibilities", then upline will try to convert that prospect into a customer of the system. Or they will tell the prospect that they can only succeed by using standing order and attending all functions. They say the system is the only way to go. Then if an IBO fails, they blame the IBO.

It's like upline playing a game of heads I win or tails you lose. Think about it.