The Myth of Talent
Talent is a concept that we hear a lot about in our lives. Talent is also an area that can be a sore spot for people as they beat themselves up over a perceived lack of it. For all the talk of talent, there have been some interesting studies on the subject and some good books that have come out recently on whether or not having talent is a myth. Last year I saw an interview on Charlie Rose with Geoff Colvin, Senior Editor at Large for Fortune magazine, who wrote a book titled, Talent is Overrated. In the interview and the book, Mr. Colvin talks about the idea that
Daily Morning Tips for Motivation
One of the systems that I use to stay productive is called a “power hour”. This is a daily morning routine that I use to focus on my mind, body and spirit. If you are looking to stay motivated on a daily basis, here are a few tips that you can utilize to make you “power hour” productive. Tip #1 Implement the power hour concept into your life and stay focused on it on a daily basis. Stephen Covey talks about this being his “sharpen the saw” time. Tip #2 Use your morning routine to work on your business. This is a great time to do the important things for
The Best Sources for Entrepreneurial Inspiration
Staying motivated is something that business owners have to keep their eye on. It’s easy to get overloaded with things and then lose site of what you are doing and more importantly why you are doing it. So where are some place that you can go for some inspiration as an entrepreneur? Because we don’t have a boss to get on us and keep us on track, it’s critical that you stay engaged in your business goals and keep your self upbeat. Here are a few things that I do to help keep me on track. 1. Talking with other business owners- What keeps me pumped up is sharing ideas
The Power of One Goal
I was doing some reading last week and came across a great piece by Zen Habits that gave 16 Ways To Get Motivated When You’re In a Slump. The key point in staying motivated that the post makes is their first point which is to focus on one goal. There is a lot of power in being able to have that singular focus. The reason that this post resonated with me right now is that I feel that I have personally been in violation of the one goal rule. I took a step back and looked at some of the different ventures that I am involved in and wondered to
The First Step of Your Marketing Plan
Most entrepreneurs are eager to start marketing their business and make sales even if they are not sure how to go about doing it. There’s a lot to be said about sell first, ask questions later when it comes to building your small business. Before you do anything with regards to a marketing plan for your business, make sure that you have the right foundation in place. The foundation for your marketing plan consists of a couple of items: your mission, vision and values and your overall business plan. Without this basic foundational knowledge of how you want your small business to operate and where it is going, your marketing
4 Components of Your Marketing Plan
Small business owners don’t put together a business plan let alone a marketing plan but if you ask these same business owners what their #1 concern with their business has to do with marketing and sales. I am not sure why we don’t put marketing plans together. Maybe it’s apathy, laziness or just the hope that the problem will work itself out on its own. A good marketing plan can be broken down int0 4 main components. Assess Your Business The first thing that you need to do to put together your marketing plan is take a look at where your business is. If you have a business plan put
Delegation Vs. Relegation – What Are You Doing?
When we are building high performance teams it’s not only important to set expectation for performance, it’s also important to be able to properly delegate certain assignments to your staff. Many entrepreneurs mistake relegation (the act of giving a task for action) with delegation (the assignment of responsibility or authority to another person). Why is this even important? Initially, if you are serious about building high performance teams, you want to have the people on your team take ownership for the assignments that they are given. When we relegate those duties to people they just do what they are told and that’s it. With delegation, you can give the assignment
Addressing The Marketing Needs of Small Business
Ask any small business owner with their primary concern is for their business and they will typically say marketing. Setting up our business is easy. Getting people to engage in our services and buy from us is another story. Because of the marketing needs to that small business owners have, my business partners and I have come up with a blog contest that we started last Wednesday to address the marketing needs of small business. You can view the contest details at: http://businessblueprintconsulting.com/blog/?p=80. In the spirit of small business marketing, today I wanted to post my top 5 posts on marketing. 1. So You’re Launching a Product? Now What? Part
4 Guidelines For Setting Expectations In Your Organization
One of the trickiest things for leaders and new business owners is to set the proper expectations for their team and then ensure that those expectation actually happen. We must think about what the end result is that we have in mind and how well we can follow up any actions that we implement. These are just a couple of concerns however and I am going to give my breakdown on how to set expectations for your organization. The are a few things to consider when you are setting expectations for your team as you look at what the end result will look like when everything is complete. Will you
The Entrepreneurial Curse of Knowledge
When you initially start a small business, you wear many different hats to keep things going. As your small business grows, you can’t do all of the things inside of your small business as you used to be able to. This is a great thing. The next step is to start hiring/building a team to help you run your business. The challenge is that a lot of entrepreneurs aren’t initially strong at the management aspect of their business. One condition that I see a lot of entrepreneurs suffer from is the curse of knowledge. We have all worked for or with someone who suffered from the curse of knowledge. This
