I have recently moved to Tauranga and each day I am here I find many things to be thankful for. I enjoy reading community newspapers as they are filled with positive stories about people and events.

However a seminar titled ‘Taking Your Competitors' Customers', advertising an upcoming course being hosted by the Tauranga Chamber of Commerce (The Weekend Sun, Friday 10 July) presented an idea I find quite disturbing.

People of every race, creed and religion agree that stealing is not ethical and is indeed illegal behaviour. How does stealing clients differ from stealing property? It is this mindset within parts of the corporate world that I have difficulty relating to. For those readers who may think that this is simply the nature of business and what constitutes healthy competition, I draw the analogy of sports events. Competition is, of course, a key factor in sport, though this sits alongside the spirit of cooperation, collaboration and community in any good event.

It is the ‘winning at any cost' and ‘taking down the competition' mentality that leads to acts of violence and cheating on the sports field.

A much healthier practice is to look inside your own business and ask ‘What can we do better?' and in this way draw clients to you through building the integrity and reputation of your own business and indeed your sector rather than employing the ‘dog eat dog' mentality required to steal customers.

What drew me to Tauranga was my decision to set up as a massage practitioner here. Much of my energy in these first weeks of building my practice has gone in to finding out what services and complementary therapies are available in the health and wellbeing sector, not so I can steal customers, but so I can build relationships with other practitioners. In so doing I am able to confidently refer my clients on when they may be looking for support outside my area of expertise, therefore providing them with better service.

I was curious enough about the course in stealing customers to look at signing up for it to gain insight into this mentality, though somewhat ironically I couldn't make it as on the day it was on I was gathered with about 20 other people on a course devoted to reflecting on how to live more meaningfully and mindfully in the world.

N Robb,Tauranga

The Weekend Sun contacted The Tauranga Chamber of Commerce for a right of reply. A response was not received before our deadline.