Why Try To Get Out Of Your Box, When You Can Use What's In It?
A lesson in darts.
Math would tell you the more you throw, the likelier your chances are you’ll score.
The problem is, the harder you try to make hits, the less likely you’ll make hits at all.
Your arm tires. Aim becomes sloppy. Toes go over the line.
The same goes for business.
The solution: aim small.
The right hits matter more than so-so hits and much more than wrong hits.
Stay Positive & Aim Small
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The best way to break the rut is to literally break it.
Break that thing you regard with “I’ve always done it this way before.”
Break that piece that’s slowing you down.
Eliminate what you can’t make better so you have a void to fill with something…well, better.
Stay Positive & Be Betterable
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A mentor is there to console you. She’s there to keep you facing the right direction. She’s there to remind you of your goal that you may have forgotten overnight. A mentor is there for you to talk things through with. What worked? What didn’t? A mentor, at the end of the day, is your friend. There’s a bit of a fault to that, I believe.
A trainer, on the other hand, she’s there to keep you moving in the right direction. She’s there to remind you of the step you need to take right now. A trainer is there for you to celebrate your wins with and quickly jump on what’s next. A trainer, at the end of the day, may leave you frustrated and exhausted. There’s a bit of glamour to that, I believe.
The problem I’ve seen is people search for a mentor at work and a trainer outside their organization or they flat-out think they need a mentor when they really need a trainer.
Knowing which you need starts with understanding what a mentor does and what a trainer does. Then you’ve got to decide how accountable you want to be held, how fast you want to learn, and how easy the conversations you want to have.
Certainly there’s no harm in having both, it’s actually better you do.
Stay Positive & Just Don’t Confuse The Two
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It’s almost always more profitable and fulfilling and collectively rewarding to work in doubt than in certainty.
If you’re certain it works, then it loses its main value.
A juggler isn’t great because he can juggle. A juggler is great because he might fail.
It’s worth noting how often you’re asking “could we do this?” Could we take an idea to the edge? Could we try something we never have before? Could we succeed with something new?
If your team says, “I don’t know, but let’s give it a shot,” then you’re surrounded by a supportive team.
If they push back, if they fight for keeping things the way they are, if they want to stay in the space of certainty, it may be worth your time to search for a new team.
Stay Positive & Play In The Field Of Uncertainty (It’s Where The Magic Is)
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I admit that I check Facebook a few extra times a day than I should. Sometimes I’ll send a text out if I don’t get one by the afternoon. I suppose I do it because I know I won’t be able to for much longer.
The email, Facebook, tweet, and text queue will get longer the more we go down the path of creating remarkable work.
Checking the ding is an opportunity to feel momentarily good when we’ve been feeling uncertain, fearful, anxious about the work we’ve been doing for the last 20 minutes.
The distinction that everyone needs to make: is responding to the dings helping you?
I’ve admired Seth Godin for limiting the channels he engages people on. He set himself up for communicational success with his fans. He wouldn’t have time to do the remarkable work he’s doing now if he was always responding to the dings.
Same goes for us.
Stay Positive & Care If You Want, But It’s Likely You Have An Email Waiting For You
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On this episode of In The Box Podcast we talked about how businesses success without advertising, if money really does talk to everyone, whether or not you should write things down, how to ask for funding and controlling the rumors about you.
Episode 48: WOM Advertising, Asking For Funding, Writing Things Down And More
Word Of Mouth Advertising – How do businesses still succeed without advertising? Is it a smart move to be purely run on word of mouth?
Sellouts – Does everybody truly have a price?
The Ask – One top on how to make the “Ask” while fundraising?
Write Down – How do you personally handle the question “Should I write this down?”
Bonus – How important is it to control the narrative around your life?
Stay Positive & Subscribe Here If You Haven’t Yet
A past colleague of mine would always remind me to follow-up with reporters about a story, even after I had called four times and sent 5 emails. I didn’t want to bug the reporter any longer. I had every excuse to quit, to move on, to acknowledge the reporter wasn’t interest.
Yet, I tried reaching out again.
That time the reporter responded and said he wished he had my persistence and that he would try the product with no guarantee of writing about it. The latter didn’t matter, it’s a great enough product that I knew he would publish a piece on it (and will in July of this year). What has stayed with me is his initial comment about persistence.
He wasn’t supporting the way I stayed persistent, because I kept changing my pitch, my emails my messages. I followed him closely enough to know what was going on at that time and angled my communications differently each time until I resonated with him.
What my colleague and this experience taught me was persistence isn’t doing the same thing again and again. No. It’s maintaining the same goal. My friend didn’t say, “Send the email again.” She said, “Remember our goal.”
The reporter didn’t say, “Your words convinced me.” He said, “You care enough to keep trying.”
Yes, how you deliver matters, but more importantly is you do what you promise again and again.
Stay Positive & Remember Your Goal
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