Fear is the path to the dark side. Fear leads to anger, anger leads to hate, hate leads to suffering. ―Yoda

In Star Wars movies and positive thinking manifestos, we are told to banish fear, anger, and other negative emotions in order to be successful. Modern American society has cast into us a belief that the most successful people are always positive, do not get angry, and live in some transient meditative state where everything is happy all the time . . .

What a load of crap.

In order to truly get what we want from life, we need to harness what we are told to avoid. We need to use the fear and anger that exists within us to empower us to get want we are seeking in life. You must, as Yoda warns you against, go to the dark side.

The Dark Side and Why It Will Motivate You

We are often told that we need to eliminate fear and do it anyway. Why is that? Because the last time I checked, fear keeps me from playing in traffic, avoids me from walking in front of loaded guns, and from trying to jump off of the top of buildings to see if I can avoid the ground. Fear is what has kept us alive as a society.

When you fear something, it makes you take the time you need to investigate if what you are doing is the right thing for you. I see too many people that are told to, “face your fear, but do it anyway,” and are now broke because they quit their jobs to follow the advice of a charismatic charlatan who convinced them to join a pyramid scheme.

Fear will protect you, but it can also motivate you to create a wonderful future for yourself. When you fear losing your job, being stuck with a company you hate or being in a damaging relationship, your fear can set you free on a path of discovering a way out of your situation.

As the Dark Jedi teach, your fear can set you free.

Fear Leads to Anger

As Yoda teaches, fear leads to anger, but is anger a bad thing? We are taught that we should be happy and not allow anger to rule our lives. But consider this, if it was not for anger, would we be seeing the changes we are seeing in Egypt, Libya, Tunisia, and other nations that were ruled by oppressive regimes?

The truth about anger is that anger can set you free. When you are angry, you do not give into the status quo. Anger motivates you to seek change in your life as well as society. Instead of sitting around focusing on your navel all day, you are motivated to get up and be the change that you want to see in the world. Your anger gets you moving.

In my personal experience, it is anger more than anything else that motivates me to action. Many of my best writings have come from being angry about something or at someone. The anger allows me to channel my energy into a page and my writing tends to be more inspired and have a greater voice.

What about you, are you motivated by anger to get things done?

Fear and anger are emotions that many people want us to avoid. I say that like the Dark Jedi, you should embrace your anger, give into your fear, and come to the dark side.

You might just find some insight that your anger and fear will set you free.

Do you agree or disagree with me?

Let me know in the comments, on Facebook, or Twitter.

The Dark Jedi Guide to Getting What You Want From Life is a post from: As A Dude Thinketh
As A Dude Thinketh is written and edited by Chris Elliott. Chris helps small businesses figure out what their big idea is, how to get it to market, and how to get people to notice their wonderfulness. He is also a dynamic speaker and trainer in personal growth and public speaking. Do you need help with your next big idea or speech? I encourage you to talk with me to see how Chris can be of service.

If you liked this post, then you should also check out:

1. Are You Living Life On If . . . Then . . .
2. The Greatest Moment in Your Life
3. Stupid People Making Money

I don’t care about the size of my list, because that’s not how I do business. I am more social in the way I sell product. I hate long sales copy. I don’t buy from long sales copy so I am not going to subject anyone to it. I don’t need to pitch my readers, because I will lose them if I seem too sales-ey.

Do you know anyone that has uttered statements similar to those?

The statements above came from me three years ago when I first dipped my toes into marketing my speaking, coaching, and products. Do you know how much money I made during that time period? Zero. Sound familiar?

If you aren’t marketing anything, maybe you have said,

I don’t need to kiss up to the higher ups to get ahead, I don’t need a college degree to get ahead because I am a rebel, or I don’t need to save money for my retirement because I am going to get promoted soon then I will start saving.

Does anything in that statement sound familiar?

I am not surprised if it does, and I would be less surprised if you followed it up with saying, “Why am I not succeeding? Bob is a freaking idiot and he is making a killing online, moving up the corporate ladder, and spends half his week playing golf. Why is that idiot making money and I’m not?”

Why Are Stupid People Making Money?

Here is an example from one of my mentors, Darren Lacroix as he talks about his experiences running a Subway franchise into the ground.

I thought I knew it all. I was 22 years old and fresh out of business school. A dangerous combination. Subway told me that the most successful franchisees were farmers. Farmers? And the worst franchisees? Business graduates.

Think about it . . .

• Why are people that know next to nothing about running a sandwich store succeeding at running a sandwich store?
• Why are people that know little about technology making money selling products online?
• Why are people that have no knowledge of manufacturing running billion dollar manufacturing companies?

Do you want to know their secret?

They stupidly follow the rules.

Why Being a Renegade Can Hurt Your Chances of Success

Renegades, Rogues, and Rebels make for great characters in novels and movies but are not ideals if you want to succeed in life.

Browse the business section of your local bookstore or pick up an entrepreneurial themed magazine and you will find plenty of books and articles that will tell you to, “Break All the Rules, Play Your Own Game, or March to the Beat of Your Own Drummer!”

So what happens when you don’t suck up to the boss, don’t ask for a sale from potential customers, or make up your own lesson plan in school?

YOU FAIL!

What does someone that is stupid do? They spend time sucking up to the boss to figure out what they want them to do, they ask for the sale, and they read the lesson plan to figure out what the teacher wants them to do.

The stupid person learns what rules are in place and they follow them, because they know they are too stupid to make up their own. They succeed because they don’t try to reinvent the wheel, annoy people by doing it their own way, or trying to build something from the ground up when they don’t have to. They make stupid an advantage over the rebels that try to over think everything.

Become Stupid

In order to succeed in many endeavors, you need to be stupid. Give up on your knowledge of how to do something and start from square one. Read the instructions, ask someone what they did to be successful, or figure out what has worked for someone else and implement it in your life.

Many times we are too smart for our own good and just need to be stupid to get ahead.

How can you bring a little stupid into your life?

Let us know in the comments.

Stupid People Making Money is a post from: As A Dude Thinketh
As A Dude Thinketh is written and edited by Chris Elliott. Chris helps small businesses figure out what their big idea is, how to get it to market, and how to get people to notice their wonderfulness. He is also a dynamic speaker and trainer in personal growth and public speaking. Do you need help with your next big idea or speech? I encourage you to talk with me to see how Chris can be of service.

If you liked this post, then you should also check out:

1. 5 Reasons Smart People Fail at Creating On-line Businesses
2. That is Not How This Business Works
3. Good is the Enemy of Great

Author’s Note: Scott Ginsberg a.k.a. Scott the Nametag Guy is celebrating the launch of his new book, -ABLE: 35 Strategies for Increasing the Probability of Success in Business and in Life, by challenging his readers to come up with their own –able word and write about it in a blog post. Reading Scott’s blog post announcing the challenge, I realized the one –able word that I would use to describe what I strive to be, and what Scott has nailed, is transferable.

What Does It Mean to be More Transferable?

Transferable is more Memorable

Think about all of the knowledge you gained in High School. What ideas, concepts, or principles stand out most in your memory? If nothing stands out, what events during high school stand out in your mind?

Unless you have a perfect memory, the most memorable ideas or memories are attached to a concept presented in a surprising way or were highly emotional. One idea that I remember is the “Mole scream” from Chemistry class, which was a high pitched scream that our teacher let out when anyone correctly used the concept of a mole in discussions.

Since the Mole Scream was memorable, it caused me to remember the concept of the Mole and the teacher’s knowledge was transferred to me.

What are you doing to make your ideas, products, and services more memorable?

Transferable is more Understandable

To be more memorable, you could stand on a busy sidewalk and yelling random equations at the top of your lungs for a few hours. While that would make you very memorable and possibly get the video of you screaming a few hits on YouTube, like many Internet Memes, the effecive lifespan of your demonstrationwould be short.

In order for you to be transferable, you need to make yourself more understandable. I recently heard about Danica McKellar, an actress turned author who was writing math books for girls by using stories and examples from a young girl’s life to explain concepts in math. These books are understandable because they link familiar concepts to new ones.

Since these books are more understandable, they transfer the power of mathematics to people that might not have taken as much of an interest.

What are you doing to creating understandable products, services, and ideas?

Transferable is more Actionable

Let’s go back to High School (OK, I don’t want to either so let’s just go back to what we learned in High School).

While someone might have presented a quote out of the Federalist Papers in period costume so that you remembered the passage, what good did it do if you were not able to apply that knowledge in your daily life?

When you are transferable, you are able to provide information that is actionable. While many business classes provide a wealth of information, many professionals turn to public seminars, coaches, and consultants in order to bridge the gap between knowledge and execution.

When you are transferable, you are able to help people turn their knowledge into operational improvement, life enhancement, or monetary gain. From a product perspective, this is accomplished through actionable checklists, process diagrams, and worksheets that help people grasp the concepts that they need to take action on.

Though college is a great way to gain knowledge, it does not always provide actionable tools that transfer the knowledge to people that will use it.

Are you providing great knowledge with a heavy does of actionability?

Transferable is more Marketable

When you are transferable, your transferableness is more marketable. 

Which business book would you be more apt to read?

“The book contained a lot of good information, but I had to wade through ten long chapters of extraneous self promotion, archaic terms, and unnecessary definitions to get to the material that was actionable.,”

Or

“This book was great? Using the knowledge in the first chapter alone, I was able to save my business thousands of dollars.”

I would prefer the second. What about you?

When you, your products, and your services are transferable, that transferableness becomes marketable.

Transferable is more Compatible

When you are transferable, you are more compatible.

I could talk about the chemical reasons that oil and water doesn’t mix, but I am afraid I wouldn’t be transferring understandableness in my description. Instead, think about relatives you might have that don’t get along. For some reason they are just not compatible!

What happens when those relatives get together during the holidays? They usually end up bickering, making snide comments, and not listening to what the others person has to say. If there was an important message that had to get from one of them to the other, do you think it would get there with the right intention?

When you are transferable, you are compatible with your surroundings, people, and the technology in your life that allows you to be a superhero.

What are you doing to be more compatible?

Of all the –ables that I can think of, to me, being transferable has the most potential to help someone achieve success. When you are transferable, you are more memorable, understandable, actionable, marketable, and compatible than your competitors which will lead you to amazing successes.

Are you transferable?

Make Yourself More Transferable is a post from: As A Dude Thinketh
As A Dude Thinketh is written and edited by Chris Elliott. Chris helps small businesses figure out what their big idea is, how to get it to market, and how to get people to notice their wonderfulness. He is also a dynamic speaker and trainer in personal growth and public speaking. Do you need help with your next big idea or speech? I encourage you to talk with me to see how Chris can be of service.

If you liked this post, then you should also check out:

1. How to make your speaking, e-mail marketing, and blogging more effective.
2. The Cake is a Lie
3. Good is the Enemy of Great

It has nothing to do with their current financial situation, their upbringing, or their intelligence.

The reason that someone else is succeeding and you aren’t is that they are working their ass off while you are sitting at home watching Lost.

I didn’t have to work today. Actually, I wanted to sit at home and watch reruns of Lost, but I got up and went to the library at 7:00 AM, because I had a goal of getting a product created and available for sale by the end of the week. I am almost there, but it is because I did what many others don’t do . . . I got up and started working toward my goal.

What did I get done today that moved me forward?

Since 7:30 this morning, I have:

• Set up a personal VPN
• Wrote, edited, and posted this blog post
• Drafted three other blog posts
• Edited three additional blog posts I have been working on
• Edited a 39 page workbook
• Set up a new website
• Wrote the draft of my sales page
• Read 50 pages of Alan Weiss’ new book
• Sent a draft of my product to my accountability partner
• Had lunch with my girlfriend

I don’t say this to brag. I say this because I think it is important to demonstrate how much you personally can get done when you put your mind to it. The problem is the people that think that sitting around doing nothing is going to get them rich. They believe that they can think their way to riches or outsource their product creation to someone.

The Problem with the 4-Hour Work Week

I have nothing wrong with Tim Ferriss or the success he has had with the 4-Hour Work Week (Amazon Affiliate Link). I am actually a huge fan of what he has accomplished and what he strives to inspire others to do. What I have a problem with are the people that think that creating a product or service is about outsourcing everything on elance for as cheaply as possible then sitting around on a beach while the money rolls in.

What outsourcing knowledge and product creation does is create a large volume of cookie cutter products devoid of originality and value. If you sit down and read4-Hour Work Week (Amazon Affiliate Link) and other books that have copied Tim’s idea, you will see that working 4 hours a week is not done on the front end. It is done after you have built a portfolio of knowledge and products that can be developed into an automated system for delivering that knowledge and product to your customers.

Are you looking at the amount of work you are putting in?

So if you are wondering why your boat hasn’t arrived, maybe you need to look at the amount of work you are putting.

Are you actively learning and developing new products and services as much as possible every day?

If not, don’t you think it’s time to get off your butt and get to work?

Stay tuned and hold on tight, because I am gong to have some more on this topic and how you can get off your butt and create a product in the coming weeks.

The Reason for Success is a post from: As A Dude Thinketh
As A Dude Thinketh is written and edited by Chris Elliott. Chris helps small businesses figure out what their big idea is, how to get it to market, and how to get people to notice their wonderfulness. He is also a dynamic speaker and trainer in personal growth and public speaking. Do you need help with your next big idea or speech? I encourage you to talk with me to see how Chris can be of service.

If you liked this post, then you should also check out:

1. Good is the Enemy of Great
2. 5 Reasons Smart People Fail at Creating On-line Businesses
3. How Not to Do Free Content

My reaction was to change lanes, take my foot of the accelerator, and coast up to the light until it turned green, which allowed me to sail past the asshat lovely person that had to jam their accelerator to hurriedly pass me again when the light turned green.

If you would have stopped the other driver and asked him who better at driving, him or me, more than likely he would have said that he was the better driver. As a comparison, if I asked you to rate your driving in comparison with everyone on the road, you would likely tell me that you were a much better driver than most of the asshats other drivers on the road.

You Are Not Alone

In a famous research study done way back in 1981, Ola Svenson found that 46.3% of Americas believed that they were in the top 20 percent of safest drivers. Other surveys have show similar results when it comes to intelligence, social behavior, and other measurable activities. There is even a term for it in social psychology, Illusory Superiority.

You Are Not As Good As You Think You Are

The effect of this belief is that many of us tend to believe that we are better at something than we are. This could be driving, writing, creative pursuits, management, business, or any number of activities in our daily lives. The truth is that we are not as good as we think we are, but we can change that.

How to Find Out if You Are Not As Good as You Think You Are

There is only one activity that I know of that allows me to understand how good I am at something . . . asking someone else in a very specific manner that allows you get feedback on how to get better.

I learned this from, “Jack Canfield’s Success Principles (FTC Guide Disclaimer: Amazon Affiliate Link)”, and it was reinforced my Marshall Goldsmith in his book, “What Got You Here Won’t Get You There (FTC Guide Disclaimer: Amazon Affiliate Link).”

The exercise is simple. When you have driven someone around for awhile, been in a relationship or provided a service, ask them, “On a scale of 1 to 10, how would you rate my performance at X.”

Where X is the activity you want to get feedback on. Add on to that, “If it wasn’t a 10, then what can be done to make it a 10 the next time?”

Now here is the tough part. When someone tells you how you can improve, don’t try to defend yourself. Just sit there, listen, and try to understand what you are doing that can be improved, and then say, “Thank you“.

This is an amazingly simple exercise, but one that many people fail to do. Whether it is ego, pride or an inability to take feedback, you have the opportunity to understand what you are doing well and what you need to improve. The trick is asking someone to find out what you don’t realize about yourself, that you are not as good as you think you are.

After reading this, what activities in your life do you think you are better at then you really are? Who could you ask that would help you see where you need improvement? Can you be open to that improvement?

Let me know in the comments.

Why You Are Not As Good As You Think You Are is a post from: As A Dude Thinketh
As A Dude Thinketh is written and edited by Chris Elliott. Chris helps small businesses figure out what their big idea is, how to get it to market, and how to get people to notice their wonderfulness. He is also a dynamic speaker and trainer in personal growth and public speaking. Do you need help with your next big idea or speech? I encourage you to talk with me to see how Chris can be of service.

If you liked this post, then you should also check out:

1. Good is the Enemy of Great
2. Why Being Great Matters
3. Stupid People Making Money

You can either:

A. Escape into a World Others Have Created for You

This means getting a job that gives you the means to survive. You have a roof over your head, use some sort of effective transportation, and don’t go hungry. You spend whatever excess you have on cable television, computer games, movies, clothes, music, drinking, and the like. You watch a lot of TV, read a lot of fiction, or spend a lot of time trying to have fun before you have to go back to work. Work is a drag and you spend a good part of your day dreaming about what your life could be like doing nothing.

Occasionally when you have had too much coffee, you find yourself watching  infomercials about losing weight, making money from real estate, and blending all of your meals into a healthy pulp that makes you younger, gives you energy, and makes your colon squeaky clean.

Your dream career is anything where you can get paid to do no work or winning the lottery. You might even spend a lot of money on products that are supposed to make you money while you sleep or invest a portion of your paycheck in the lottery. You might even have a stack of those products sitting in the corner next to all your losing lottery tickets.

Or maybe you have another choice . . .

B. Create Your Own World to Live In

Creating your own world means having a goal for your life. Whether it is creating a business or doing something good for society, you have some idea of a vision for the future. You might be working for someone else, but the entire time you are planning, saving, and creating a network of like-minded people that are pursuing similar goals to your own.

For you, watching TV is a rarity, you absorb non-fiction, and your residence is the launching pad for your business or organization.  Your dream job is doing something greater than you are now. It is exciting to think about what you are going to be creating in the next few years.

You are either stressed out because you need to break free and do something great, or you are happy with the knowledge that you are moving towards your dream. You know that the right path is out there, you just have to push a little harder to get there.

Which Path Are You On?

You might be saying, “I am on the second path. I am creating my own dream.”

Are you?

I see many people saying that, but then turn around and give someone else tens of thousands of dollars to help them learn what they are supposed to be doing with their lives. They have given up a large portion of their lives and money for what? They spend all of their time and money trying to create something that just makes money, rather then create something they are passionate about. That is just the first choice, but rather then creating your own life, you are trying to buy someone else’s.

Creating Your Own Life to Live

When you are creating your own life to live, you are free from worrying about exchanging time for money. You are exchanging value for money, so even if you are earning a large amount of money for little work . . . it is because of the value you are creating not any system you are following.

When you are creating your own life, you are living by your own rules. This allows you to break free from the daily grind and do something great in this world. It means living your own life and not the life that others want you to live.

Are you up to the challenge?

You Have Two Choices is a post from: As A Dude Thinketh
As A Dude Thinketh is written and edited by Chris Elliott. Chris helps small businesses figure out what their big idea is, how to get it to market, and how to get people to notice their wonderfulness. He is also a dynamic speaker and trainer in personal growth and public speaking. Do you need help with your next big idea or speech? I encourage you to talk with me to see how Chris can be of service.

If you liked this post, then you should also check out:

1. How to Create a Value Mindset
2. Stupid People Making Money
3. Good is the Enemy of Great

I hate the monotony of doing the same report day after day, so after learning how the reports are constructed, I will spend eight to twelve hours building a new spreadsheet or database that generates the reports in less than five minutes.

When a boss or coworker wonders why I am rebuilding the reports, I will often get asked, “Why are you wasting your time redoing the report when it only takes 20 to 60 minutes of your day to run?”

I want to say, “Because the monotony of this report is sucking the life out of my body!” but normally I would respond, “it just makes sense for me to do it this way.”

People that see the report as a daily task to do are in a certain mindset.

Most are Task Not Value Focused

What I realized, is that many of the people I encounter in corporate America are task focused and not value focused. They see a report as one of a series of tasks they have to perform in order to get paid, so they don’t care about how long it takes to get completed. These people expect to come to work, perform a series of tasks, and get paid for their tasks. This mindset applies to hourly employees, salaried employees, and trained professionals such as Doctors and Lawyers.

The result is a mindset that you have a certain number of tasks you have to do in order to get paid. I equate this to a rat in a maze having to run a certain path in order to get a standardized food pellet. Remember, “The cake is a lie” and you need to focus on the value you produce and not the tasks that get you the same pellet week after week.

Creating a Value Mindset

Looking at the example of my reports, spending ten to twelve hours making the reports more efficient frees up 15 to 50 minutes a day for me to do other activities. The time I spent creating the new report is made up in two months and the process for teaching others how to create the reports is greatly reduced, making it easier to move the reports from employee to employee. One day of work gives me hundreds of additional hours a year to work on higher value tasks.

Anyone that is looking to start a business should adopt a value not task mindset. What are you going to do for your customer that adds value to their business or life? How are you going to create a system, a product, or a service that reduces their workload so they can focus on value added activities?

Exchange Value for Money not Time for Money

When you are working for money by the hour, you always have to press the task bar to get paid. When you create value for your clients, you are able to trade money for value instead of time for money. This has the opportunity to increase your future earning potential dramatically.

How to Create a Value Mindset is a post from: As A Dude Thinketh
As A Dude Thinketh is written and edited by Chris Elliott. Chris helps small businesses figure out what their big idea is, how to get it to market, and how to get people to notice their wonderfulness. He is also a dynamic speaker and trainer in personal growth and public speaking. Do you need help with your next big idea or speech? I encourage you to talk with me to see how Chris can be of service.

If you liked this post, then you should also check out:

1. The Cake is a Lie
2. Mindset Moves Mountains
3. Good is the Enemy of Great

When you watch Sherrie and Sonny on Diners, Drive-ins and Dives, you have to wonder how much of the excitement for their business is real versus an act for the camera. . You might be wondering, how two people can be that excited about hot dogs after 10 years. After spending an hour there, I saw that it’s not just about the hot dogs. It’s about serving people and having fun in a relaxed environment.

What Bothers Me About Most People Trying to Make Money Online

When you listen to the advice that the “Make Money Online” gurus regurgitate, you hear terms such as: SEO, Keyword Research, Niche Marketing, PLR, Sales Letters and other techniques they have sold people on about making money online. These “gurus” are trying to sell you a dream of no work income and many people fall for it hook, line, and sinker.

A man of no understanding has vain and false hopes, and dreams give wings to fools. – Sirach 34:1

The Truth of Any Business Online or Offline

To succeed in any business, you have to have a passion for what you are doing. No matter what blueprint you have been sold, no matter what road map you are following; in order to be successful, you have to put in a lot of hard work to be successful.

Here is the kicker, if you have passion for the work you are doing and the people you serve, then it won’t seem like work. Yes, there will be some things that seem like work, but if you have a goal of serving others and having fun, then the work will be a necessary evil.

No matter what business you are in, if you are not passionate for that business, then you are going to fail. It is from the passion that you grow and in growing, you will be a success.

You Will Fail if You Are Not Passionate About Your Business is a post from: As A Dude Thinketh
As A Dude Thinketh is written and edited by Chris Elliott. Chris helps small businesses figure out what their big idea is, how to get it to market, and how to get people to notice their wonderfulness. He is also a dynamic speaker and trainer in personal growth and public speaking. Do you need help with your next big idea or speech? I encourage you to talk with me to see how Chris can be of service.

If you liked this post, then you should also check out:

1. 5 Reasons Smart People Fail at Creating On-line Businesses
2. That is Not How This Business Works
3. Why Your Business is Like Most Chinese Restaurants

Imagine for a moment that you are standing at one end of a very long hallway and want to get to the other end, because someone told you there is cake for you if you make it to the end. You really want the cake and want to get there as quickly as possible.

How do you propose getting to the other end?

• Do you take one giant leap for mankind?
• Do you make a mad dash for the end of the hallway, running out of steam, and then collapsing?
• Or do you take one small step for man (and woman) and then another until you reach the end of the hall and get cake?

Stop Trying to Take Giant Leaps

Why when attempting to start a business, learn a new skill or attempt something greater than ourselves, do many of us see our goal, the end of the hall, as one giant leap or a mad dash to exhaustion instead of a series of small steps? To make that leap, many of us spend thousands of dollars on products that are supposed to make us money while we sleep, teach us a new language overnight, or let us lose 50 pounds in a month. Those are some huge leaps that you just have to stop taking.

“Most people overestimate what they can accomplish in a year – and underestimate what they can achieve in a decade!” – Tony Robbins

The Myth of an Overnight Success

“But Chris”, you say, “I see all these people on television, in books, and writing blogs that were no one yesterday and now they are household names. You can’t tell me there is no such thing as an overnight success. I have seen it!”

(Disclaimer: To Comply with FTC Guides, I have to disclose to you (my intelligent reader) that the following links are affiliate links. You have been disclaimed . . . but I think you might have known that already.)

If you have read Outliers by Malcolm Gladwell, Talent is Overrated by Geoff Colvin, The Success Principles by Jack Canfield, or watched this video by Chris Brogan, then you might have picked up on the idea that the term “overnight success” is misleading. Studying the history of successful people in business, sports, and music, you will find that their success didn’t come from one giant leap. Their success came from focusing on the end of the hallway, their goals, and taking one step at a time to get their cake.

Focusing on the goal at the end of the hall takes a lot of patience, faith, and skill . . . but others have done it.

Will you?

Are You Looking at the Giant Leap When You Should Focus on the Little Steps? is a post from: As A Dude Thinketh
As A Dude Thinketh is written and edited by Chris Elliott. Chris helps small businesses figure out what their big idea is, how to get it to market, and how to get people to notice their wonderfulness. He is also a dynamic speaker and trainer in personal growth and public speaking. Do you need help with your next big idea or speech? I encourage you to talk with me to see how Chris can be of service.

If you liked this post, then you should also check out:

1. The Cake is a Lie
2. You Have Two Choices
3. Why You Are Not As Good As You Think You Are

Complacency is the Disease in Business

There is a disease in business and that disease is complacency. When I blogged about shopping for a couch with my girlfriend, I gave a great example of an industry where many of the players say they can’t have more colors available, speed up customization, or provide an unforgettable sales experience. Why can’t they? IKEA does, but then they say, “That would never work for my business?”

Do You Want to Stay in Business?

If that is not how your business works, then you might not be in that business much longer.

If you are a student of business, you will see this scenario play out time and time again. An outsider to an industry will see a need for a different way of doing business, will be told that the business doesn’t work that way, and then will go on to dominate the industry until someone comes along and changes they way business is done again.

Be the Outsider . . . Do What Others Aren’t Doing

An example is Dell. Before Dell, computers were sold in showrooms with the salespeople making huge commissions on computers that were obsolete before you walked out of the door with them. Dell changed the model and allowed you to buy a custom computer direct from the assembler. Michael Dell created a fortune by doing something that others said wouldn’t work.

Then along comes Apple. When selling direct and in limited retail outlets wasn’t driving the sales that Apple required, they started opening Apple Stores. The industry slammed Steve Jobs and said that the retail store was a dead idea. Instead, the Apple Stores are a Mecca for Apple fans and people that want to try out the products before they shell out a premium for an Apple.

You Just Might be on to Something

If you see a need for something different in the marketplace, then fulfill that need. If your competitors tell you that it is not done that way, you might just be onto something.

What businesses have you seen succeed when others said that it was not supposed to be done that way?

That is Not How This Business Works is a post from: As A Dude Thinketh
As A Dude Thinketh is written and edited by Chris Elliott. Chris helps small businesses figure out what their big idea is, how to get it to market, and how to get people to notice their wonderfulness. He is also a dynamic speaker and trainer in personal growth and public speaking. Do you need help with your next big idea or speech? I encourage you to talk with me to see how Chris can be of service.

If you liked this post, then you should also check out:

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2. Good is the Enemy of Great
3. Why Being Great Matters