Unlocking Potential #11: Q&A With John Saddington

Garth Beyer

John Saddington

I regularly write about the importance of being human, of momentum and of the need to continuously try new things. Top experimenter John Saddington is a living example of doing all the above.

John is linchpin who I recall wore a Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle t-shirt to Seth Godin’s Pick Yourself event in Tribeca, and asked Seth a question about blogging platforms. It should have come as no surprise to me that John was asking for input because he was in the process of developing his new (and awesome!) blogging platform app, Desk.

John has been blogging for more than 14 years, so it goes without saying how much of a privilege it is to have him be part of this series. Without further ado, welcome John.

Q: You’re a hacker and a human. Tell us how you got into hacking. What’s your story?

John: Yes, that’s my tagline. I think it’s important to let others know that I am a human being. This is one of those “duh” statements but it carries a lot of personal importance to me. It means that I suffer and struggle with just as many things as the next person. But, I have “hacked” my way to a solution that works for me.

I will always be looking for more solutions to life, just as the next person, to ensure that I can survive and thrive in the limited amount of time that I have on planet earth.​

Q: What qualities are needed in a person for them to become successful hackers, humans, entrepreneurs? 

John: A willingness to experiment, be wrong, and fail. A desire to get help, all the time, and to stay humble. To be curious about learning new things and tenacious about not giving up. To be a person of integrity, honest, and true.​

Q: For this next question, I’m sure there are hundreds of answers, but just write about the first two or three that come to mind. What are some hacks you can share about entrepreneurship?

​John: Time box everything. What I mean by this is create a “start” and “end” point to all your experiments and projects. This helps create momentum and helps you establish objective markers for whether or not it’s actually working.

Secondly, get help. Do more things with others and less alone.​

Q: Tell us a bit about Desk PM: How did you go about strategizing a publishing app so it would be as successful as it is? What sort of questions did you ask and answer before you built and shipped the app?

​John: There wasn’t a strategy. It was luck and a long marinating process (over 12 years) as I thought about this application as it tied so closely to my writing and blogging over the last 14 years. Then, I executed. That’s about it. I didn’t deliberate or try to do massive planning or anything like that. The only question that I asked was this (and one that I continue to ask): Do I still love this app? Am I using it every single day?

If the answer ever becomes “No” then I’ve lost the original vision and I should throw it all away.​

Q: What’s the most recent big decision you’ve had to make and how did you rationalize your decision?

John: The biggest decision recently was to join with some friends to work @ The Iron Yard.​ This was the culmination of long-standing relationships and a deep love for education (I got a Masters in Education). I joined them full-time in late 2013.

Q: Would you mind sharing one of your biggest failures and how you worked past it or what you learned from it?

John: I raised ~ $300,000 and spent much more than that on a failed iOS app that netted, over a two year period, just north of $1,300 dollars. I am still learning from this fiscal failure of an app and project. I am still recovering. I wrote a few things here.​

Q: Who and where do you go to for motivation? Any particular mentors or bloggers?

John: I go to my friends and most importantly my wife and kids. I find a ton of motivation in my quiet times as I reflect on spiritual topics, God, and through meditation.​

Q: Perhaps there’s a couple quotes or life mottos you live by?

​”Never give up.” – Dad

“Always have options.” – Dad

“It never hurts to ask.” – Dad

Q: What is the biggest challenge todays entrepreneurs are faced with? 

​John: I’m not sure. Does that matter?​

Q: This one might be a toughie, answer however you would like. What does it take to create something remarkable?

John: It starts with a decision to pursue it and then it requires the courage to not quit.​

Q: Where can people find you and you art? What’s the best way to reach you?

​John: My personal blog: http://john.do

 

Stay Positive & Publish On

Checklist For A Happy Day

Garth Beyer

Happy Day Happy Robot

I was meditating earlier and thought of what makes a happy day. This is what I came up with. Note, it’s simple. We often turn simple things complex because it’s easy to do so. I’ve made this as short and universal as it can be.

– Learn something new

– Love someone

– Do something for you

– Teach, ship or build something

If you check these four tasks off during the day, guaranteed you’ll go to bed feeling fulfilled, content, happy with your day. As a bonus, you can always write each day too, particularly about three things you’re thankful for. It’s impossible to be sad and grateful at the same time.

 

Stay Positive & Make This Day A Happy One

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Who Decided This?

Garth Beyer

Toms Decides

Andy Katz-Mayfield and Jeff Raider are the names behind Harry’s. They decided on the voice, the personal assistant each person who purchases Harry’s gets, and the rules of purchasing blades.

Blake Mycoskie made the decision to give a pair of Toms shoes for each pair purchased.

If you don’t like the concept of our Connection Economy, you can only point your finger at Seth Godin who coined and writes about it.

Authorship – essentially, putting a face to a brand or concept or rule – is the best marketing strategy you can start with.

Without a name, who can you blame for pricing Gillette razors? Who said we have to shower before entering and after exiting a public pool? (Of course it makes sense to, but to have no actual authority figure giving a reason why, well, no wonder why very few obey it.) As for a larger example, who decided we were in a recession?

For businesses who have ridiculous rules of engagement and transactions, they’re free to continue doing so because there’s not one person we can write to, attempt to persuade or flat-out fire.

The reason I started to purchase solely from smaller companies is that there’s a person at the other end that has declared ownership; a single person who decides the policies, so if I don’t agree with them, I know exactly who to write to. Not surprising, though, I never need to.

Every decision, rule, policy, product needs to have one person who stands up for it. If there’s no one standing up for something, it might be because they don’t have something worth standing up for. Are we going to allow that to continue?

 

Stay Positive & Stand Up For Standing Up

Stressful Work, Self-Evaluation And Hacking Your Productivity (And How To Win Monopoly)

Garth Beyer

Hacking Productivity

It’s been more than two years since I gave a Toastmasters speech. I connected with the president of the club I used to be involved in and had dinner with her yesterday. We chatted about the PR life and how stressful the work is. (Top 10 most stressful careers!)

I agreed that it’s stressful work, but it’s as stressful as you let it be; there are ways to lessen the stress.

One of my old friends gave a speech at the meeting about saving mental energy for more important decisions by limiting the options you have for what to wear. A few months ago I mentioned the benefit of wearing the same outfit each day. Jobs did it. Zuckerberg does it. So many others do it to save mental energy for work and decisions that matter.

What I do each weekend is evaluate my week in terms of stress, productivity, time, focus… all that important stuff that dictates your level of happiness or unhappiness. I stop doing what’s unproductive, I stop having meetings with people who don’t create value, I read more, I freewrite for 15 minutes every night, I meditate in the morning and recite a mantra I wrote – all the things I do and don’t do are done or not done with purpose.

The president asked me something like, “Isn’t that exhausting or stressful to have to be so on top of everything?” She was obviously thinking about the benefit of going with the flow, letting things be, simplifying life (which certainly has its value at times). My response…

It’s fun to hack your productivity, your energy, your focus. It’s like the moment you learn how to win Monopoly: just make sure you buy St. James. Place then begin to build on the orange. Works every time. The excitement of learning, knowing and then implementing the practice which nearly guarantees success is what drives me to reevaluate, review, and renew my objectives of the week each weekend.

Stress is not an external force we have no control over. We design our stress, and by evaluating ourselves on a weekly or bi-weekly basis, we begin to notice what’s working and what isn’t in our lives. We respond rather than react. It’s an art, and there is so much beauty in art.

 

Stay Positive & There Is No Better Game To Hack Than The Work Game

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How To Get Comments On Your Blog

Garth Beyer

It's Time To Get Comments On Your Blog

This goes beyond asking at the end of the post for users to comment.

There are benefits to not allowing comments on your blog: no criticism, no trolls, one less things to keep an eye one, you may become influenced by what people say they want in a comment.

But there are also benefits to allowing them: there is often a diamond in the rough (positive feedback), it gives you a chance to connect with someone new, it allows you to practice not taking criticism personally.

Instead of asking readers to post a comment without reason, there are a few better options.

It matters what platform you use: If you’re gung-ho about getting comments on your blog post, you might be better off using a platform like LinkedIn. It’s much easier to put yourself in a community platform that has active commenters rather than starting a blog from scratch and trying to get comments. Think Reddit, Medium, LinkedIn.

Use your voice: I mean, really use your own voice, make each post you write personal. By doing so you are likelier to get friends and family and coworkers and colleagues to hit the comment button because they respond to you as a person, not as some robot spitting out information.

Make blog posts completely question based: Mental Floss does this in a great way with their Friday Happy Hour. This way it is less about you trying to interact with someone and more about getting your tribe to interact with one another.

I’m thinking of a number between 1 and 30. Guess it right and I’ll send a free PDF version of my book Transformation: The seminar that saved me from myself. Leave your guess in a comment below or tweet at me @thegarthbox

 

Stay Positive & Go Curate Some Conversations

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Become A Remarkable Business Owner

Garth Beyer

“Instead of caring about everyone and taking what you can get, embrace a subset, find the weird, and love them more than anyone else ever could.” – Seth Godin 

Great Business Owner

Great business owners

… are determined to get it right even if it calls on them to change their worldview or do what they previously said they wouldn’t. No matter what the cost is, they will do it right.

… are in complete awe and fascination for the remarkable impact little things done just right can have on people. It’s not just noticing the little things, it’s being the source of them.

… are in cahoots with the requirement that to reach a higher level of achievement, they must focus their attention on systematizing the plethora of (what many see as) insignificant, banal, grunt work that makes up every business.

… are working more than they should for the monetary return they are receiving on their investment. But the intrinsic value they receive from working with passion is priceless.

… are providing the people who they work with and who work for them an idea that is truly worth working for. They tell a story worth believing in.

… are always imagining, dreaming, visualizing; are always in wonder.

… are absorbed by the people, and not the work. You will only ever love the game if you love the players.

… are seeing their business as a product and treating it accordingly. Yes, that means treating it as a system, defining all its pieces, and writing out a strategy, people, marketing, etc., plan.

… are treating all customers in a way that makes them feel right, even if they are not.

… are working to be the best they can be, to learning what they don’t know, to acting more human than their competitors.

… are aware of Lippmann’s and so many others similar conclusions that reality only exists in someone’s perceptions, attitudes, beliefs and conclusions. It is not subjective or definable to the mass. To understand a customer you must understand the images in their head.

“The problem with most failing businesses is not that their owners don’t know enough about finance, marketing, management, and operations, but that they spend their time and energy defending what they think they know.” – Michael Gerber

 

Stay Positive & All You Do Is A Reflection Of Who You Are

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