Archives for March 2015

What you do every day matters. Consistency drives success and failure. Your actions, on a daily basis, determine if you will succeed, fail or just get by in life. Those who succeed in life consistently avoid bad habits and consistently follow good habits. Those who fail in life consistently avoid good habits and consistently follow bad habits. Those who get by in life are inconsistent in their application of good habits and bad habits. Consistency forges a life of success, failure or mediocrity.

Is your business struggling? Do you tell yourself every day how hard you work? Most people do. The purpose of this tip is to give you a little dose of reality. So here goes:

Success in business is actually a very simple two part formula:

1. You do the work you should be doing for those you serve and
2. You produce results that meet the expectations of those you serve.

If your business is struggling, the reality is that whatever work you are doing is not producing results for those you serve and that is why your business is struggling. 

How do you know you are not doing the work you should be doing? Very simple: You know you are not doing the work you should be doing when you are not producing results that meet the expectations of those you serve.

How do you know you are not producing the results that meet the expectations of those you serve? You eventually lose their business; those you serve begin to drift away to find others who will produce results that will meet their expectations. When you lose their business it’s actually a triple loss of business revenues: #1 you not only lose the business you have currently, #2 you also lose any new projects and #3 you lose referrals that would have been.

Doing the right work + produce results that meet expectations = successful businesses. Those who value your service will never leave you and will be happy to pay you more money to do more work for them and will refer others to you so long as you continue to produce results and meet their expectations in everything you do.

There’s a process to building a house, once you own the land:

1. Draw up Blueprints
2. Construct the House

Seems pretty simple doesn’t it? Each component of your house must be defined in the blueprint and then built: the kitchen, bathrooms, family room, dining room, bedrooms, and anything else you want your house to have, are the components of your house.

Constructing an ideal, happy and successful life is no different. It’s the same process. In the case of your ideal life, the components of your life’s blueprint are all of the things that make a perfect life: the job you want to have, what you would love to do for a living, the place you want to live, the life partner you’d like to share your life with, the places you’d like to travel to, the wealth you’d like to accumulate etc. These are known as dreams. You start building your ideal life by defining all of your dreams which, when taken together, become the blueprint of your life.

Your goals are your construction team. You need to define all of the goals that will make all of your dreams become a reality. You design your goals around each dream. One dream could require the achievement of one, five or ten goals. The realization of each dream happens when you accomplish the series of goals that are required in order for each specific dream to be realized. It’s just like building a house. The kitchen requires the completion of certain tasks. Each task, each goal, needs to be competed in order to build your kitchen. Then you move on to the bathrooms, family room, dining room, bedrooms and anything else that will be included in your house. Each specific component of your house requires the completion of certain tasks. Each life dream requires the completion of certain goals.

Designing your ideal life is a construction project.

Ever wonder what it takes to realize a dream? Look no further than Arnold Schwarzenegger. Arnold first gained international celebrity as a professional body builder and then went on to become a Hollywood celebrity and politician. But it all started for Arnold when, as a teenager, he stumbled upon a magazine featuring Reg Park, the famous actor who played Hercules in a very popular Italian movie series that began back in 1961. Inspired by Park, Arnold began working out with weights and his dream of becoming the world’s greatest bodybuilder was born. Arnold’s single-minded focus on realizing his dream is legendary. Two months prior to a Mr. Olympia bodybuilding contest, Arnold’s father died. His mother pleaded with him to return to Austria to attend the funeral. Arnold said no. He told his mom it would distract him from his training for the contest. Years later, Arnold would confess that his decision, although the right one for him because he won the title, damaged his relationship with his mother and his girlfriend. Neither could understand how his dream took precedence over the death of his father. But Arnold’s dream did take precedence. It took precedence over every part of his life.

Arnold picked up his first barbell in 1960. Ten years later he earned his first Mr. Olympia title. Ten years dedicated to pursuing one singular dream. Arnold would apply his laser-like focus in pursuing other dreams, such as becoming a famous actor and, much later in life, Governor of California. Arnold taught us the importance of pursuing your dreams in crafting a successful life. Realizing your dreams in life requires an almost superhuman, long-term, laser-like focus and commitment.

“The foundation of success is built upon a mountain of mistakes. The more mistakes you make in life, the higher your mountain will be. The higher your mountain, the greater your success.” Yours truly

I love kicking off many of my speaking engagements with this quote because it forces people to re-think mistakes. We need to embrace mistakes. While mistakes hurt -they cost us time and money – they have the effect of altering behavior. They force us to change course and move in a different direction. Mistakes are our GPS guidance system for success. But mistakes only act as a GPS guidance system when we are aware of and then learn something from the mistakes we are making.

If you are struggling in life, one of the reasons is that you are repeating your mistakes. Why would anyone repeat a mistake? Lack of awareness and learning. You are not mindful of the mistakes you are making which means you cannot learn from them. The cure is tracking your mistakes. Every one of them. Here’s what you need to do:

For one month, track every wonderful mistake you make every day. Carry around a little notepad in your pocket and, for one month, write down every single mistake you make every single day. At the end of the month review your list. Search for duplicate mistakes; those that repeat. This tracking process will force you to become aware of your mistakes, particularly the ones that you are repeating. Only after you become aware of your mistakes can you learn from them and change them.

Pursuing success is not easy. Particularly for those who are directly affected by your journey. Most of that journey is fraught with failure, mistakes and sacrifice, without any certainty that you will succeed. Many quit, not because they lack perseverance, but because their family life is jeopardized by the pursuit. The long hours, single-minded focus and the financial investment take a toll on those around you; those you love. It’s one of life’s great ironies – pursuing success in the hope of providing a better life for your family, only to lose your family because of the pursuit. This is why those few who do persevere, despite all the costs, are exceptional human beings, deserving of the enormous rewards of success. It takes superhuman effort, not only for the individual pursuing success, but for those loved ones who suffer along with you during your journey.

I suppose the tip this morning is to not take your loved ones for granted. They are suffering along with you. Every failure, every setback, every mistake takes a toll on them as well. So stop what you are doing every now and then and give them a hug and a kiss. Let them know you love them and need them to stand by you during this journey. Your passion may nourish you and enable you to power through all the setbacks, but your loved ones are not the shared beneficiaries of your passion. Their nourishment can only come from your love and appreciation for their support because the cost of the success journey is enormous on everyone.

There’s a revolution happening right before our very eyes. It’s the podcasting revolution. It’s taking the world by storm. Every day, new podcasts are born. These podcasters share valuable, educational, life experiences with their subscribers or listeners. iTunes is leading the charge. You can find a seemingly unlimited variety of podcasts on iTunes. But podcasts are everywhere on the Internet. There are podcasts for entrepreneurs, small business owners, homemakers, gardeners, physicians, financial advisors, athletes, various hobbies, authors, bloggers, you name it. There is literally a podcast for anything you want to learn more about. Join the revolution. Enroll in Podcast University today!

“I have yet to find the man, however exalted his station, who did not do better work and put forth greater effort under a spirit of approval than under a spirit of criticism.”  Charles Schwab

Criticism is necessary for success. You need feedback from others. But all too often that feedback is mired in negative, destructive criticism that lacks any real specific advice or help. “The reason you’re not selling more is your product sucks.” “You’re bossy, arrogant, pompous, (fill in the blank).” You’re failing because you’re bad at what you do, you’re doing it all wrong or you need to change what you’re doing.”

While most of that may be true, it lacks any constructive, specific feedback. You’re wasting your time listening to it. Most criticism you will receive, is unfortunately going to be this negative, generalized destructive type of criticism and not the positive, specific, constructive type you need. These Booleaders offer only negative criticism because they, themselves, have little to no idea how to help you. They’ve never succeeded in doing what you are doing, so their advice must be general and lack any specific, constructive feedback. This type of negative, destructive criticism only brings you down; it deflates you, slowing you down or stopping you on your path to success.

When you are pursuing a dream, big goal or your purpose in life, you absolutely must seek out only those who offer positive, specific, constructive criticism. You need to seek out Cheerleaders and not Booleaders. Cheerleaders offer constructive feedback that will help you succeed. Their criticism has tremendous value because they know what they are talking about. Their knowledge is valuable because they succeeded in doing what you are doing, or they have a track record of helping others like you succeed. They have gravitas by virtue of their previous success.  If you want to succeed in realizing your dream you must surround yourself with Cheerleaders and not Booleaders.