Courage

One word keeps popping into my head this week and it has everything to do with the way I motivate myself.  I hear this word and I feel it makes a connection with me on a level unknown to most.  The word is courage and it has been thrown out the door in the modern times.  We have all been taught to be courageous in battle and to have courage under fire, but what about the everyday Joe Schmoe.  What do we do to be courageous?  Is it courageous to go to work, work hard and feed your family?  Do you have to be a soldier to have courage?  The answer is simple and two letters, N-O.

I hear this word in my head when times are tough, when times are stagnant, when things are slow and when things are fast.  It reminds me that there are millions of people that would love to have the problem of going to work to feed their family.  So many people lose sight of courage and forget that it is a guiding light to the things you want in life.  It isn’t easy to open a business or raise kids or help others, these things take real courage.  Reward and motivate yourself with this little word every day.  Remember that what you are doing, whatever it is, is for a reason!  Even if you hate your job and boss and have gone through some tough times, it has a purpose.  The first step to having courage is finding what makes you tick.  For me, it is my family; I work for them and live for them.  It takes courage to work 17 hours a day to build something to hand to them if I pass away.  I didn’t always know this, I was often times embarrassed that I didn’t spend more time with them.  I thought that I was being selfish in the things I do for a living and in the end, I am fighting a fight that they cannot.  Find what makes you tick, then be courageous enough to make it happen, today!

Courage

Since the moment I could speak I learn not to communicate.  This may sound funny but more than 70% of you reading this have the same problem.  We can all speak, but few people actually talk to each other.  I notice it in my own life and see it in the world daily; we have been trained, especially as men, to not express ourselves until the time is too late.  I see women leave men and when they do the first thing I hear is, “I am just like my Dad”.  The concept is easy, whatever bothers you, talk to the other person about it and get it off your shoulders, right?  This is one of the hardest things to do in the world.  Forget hitting a round ball with a round bat squarely, running a marathon, slaying a lion with a spear, skydiving, and public speaking or beating cancer, the hardest thing for people to do these days is to communicate.

It all looks so easy; we have cell phones, text, email, video phones, Skype, computers, webcams and even old school landline phones.  So why can’t we talk about what bothers us in time?  Why can’t we express the things that concern us until it is too late?  Here are some thoughts from me:

1. We have been taught, my generation at least, that expressing yourself is weak and even a nagging activity by our elders.  This is the main problem in my eyes.  We are insecure and feel weak if we have a problem that needs to be addressed, wow.  This is the reason for insanity right off the bat.  We have to be able to challenge ourselves to face the fear of being us, forget jumping into shark infested waters!
2. We use way too many things that remove being human.  By this I mean that we have gone electronic and don’t know a way out.  How many times have you gotten pissed from an email and confronted the person about it and heard, “I didn’t mean anything like that, chill out”?  It happens to me all the time.  I am better at writing what I feel than saying it.  This next generation is truly screwed and they have no idea what this is going to do to them.  Divorce rates will be at 80% before we even know what hit us and this is only good if you are a lawyer.  Text, IM, email and all forms of non-human communication kill what we do when we sit down in front of each other, no false in that statement.
3. We don’t want to hurt each other.  This is the best of these reasons and it is the easiest to understand.  However, it is also the most devastating of them all.  Hurting another person with what you say is not generally the case if you are telling the truth and saying it with tact.  But how would anyone know this, we text each other all day!?  Don’t be afraid to say what you think and feel for one week and tell me your life doesn’t get better.  Don’t be a jerk and insult people, but be a human and approach it as problem solving and use your better judgment in the way you deliver the message.

So what is the answer to these riddles?  What can we do as a people to get better at expressing ourselves and communicating?  Here are some things I am going to try, maybe you join me maybe you don’t.  I hope you do:

1. Take time every day to say what you feel.  Write down the things that ticked you off that day and face them with a clear mind at the end of the day.
2. For every 5 texts you get make one phone call to your friends.  I see this, especially in young businesspeople, as being the number one deterrent from success.  WE HAVE FORGETTEN HOW TO CRAFT A CONVERSATION!!!  Unless we have a delete button or cut and paste we don’t know what to say, at all.  Start calling again; it is better for relationships all the time.
3. Write a handwritten letter.  I did this last year and it was nerve racking.  I told myself that I needed to do this as some form of therapy or something and the only person I knew the address of was my Dad.  So, I wrote him a letter, by hand, and sent it off to him.  He was so happy it was unreal.  Try it out, it is fun.  Just fill a page with the same things you write in email and see the reaction.

I write this blog as an apology to anyone I have ever reacted poorly to, or pissed off with an email or just confused from the things I did.  I am sorry; the dehumanizing started a long time ago and is coming to an end, by choice, today!  I love you all!

Eric Rice

5 Things Every Entrepreneur should be prepared to do For the            New Year 2010

As we approach the new year of 2010 we sit in one of the most interesting times in human history.  As Entrepreneurs we have the opportunity to change the course of the U.S. economy, with a little help for the administration of course.   The New Year 2010 will be what you, as an entrepreneur, make it. Going in to this New Year know that there are some things we all need to be aware of.   Social Media and its presence in the world of marketing and promotions, regulation changes, tax changes (not for the good with our current administration), the availability of talent in the marketplace and cheaper money are just a few of them.   So, in order to be ready for this upcoming New Year we all should be prepared to do the 5 following things:

5. Work Hard- It is plain and simple looking into a crystal ball and seeing the trends of 2010I see that money will be cheaper and it won’t matter to entrepreneurs any way.  We have been thrust into a world of pain and confusion and the only way out is to work harder than the person next to you.  This is OUR TIME to shine because we have the grit that others don’t and it will pay off greatly.  Personal lives and “4 hour work” weeks will not exist during this time.  Entrepreneurs have to be able to separate themselves from their business and remind themselves they still have a family these days, suck it up this year and work right through all the hardship.  Also remember that this will be the era of handshake credit, no question on that.  Build out an in house credit solution for your clients to use to pay later.  This will increase the amount of payments you receive by allowing more people to buy your product.  Get more buyers, not more margin.

4. HIRE, HIRE, HIRE, this will be the time of all times to make a move on talent.  People all over the country are losing talent because they cannot pay enough and people are losing jobs where the businesses cannot sustain the payments they are making.  In the New Year 2010 we will see a great increase in layoffs and a struggle to pay bills, this means any stupid human could tell you that there is a huge talent pool out there right now, so use it and free up some time for you to grow even faster.

3. Train like never before- There will be a high precedence set on training in a world like the one we are about to see.  If we have $80,000 a year people looking for jobs and taking $50,000 a year jobs this tells us they came from a much larger shop and need the major training to be reminded of big dollar corps of yester year.  Be professional even if you are small, it will attract more talent than you can possibly imagine!  Training can work like a recruiting tool if done right.  Just remember that your time is valuable and find ways to save time in 2010.

2. Save Time, Use Technology- because money will be selling at a premium to you in 2010- The ways to save time are simple and need no explaining what they do.  So to make this useful to those that are reading it I will make it simple by explaining how to use this new technology.  Use video, ALL THE TIME!!! Record every training session, every board meeting and every client meeting, it allows to be played over again at your leisure.  It also allows you to be able to prove things that may take up your time later with no proof.  Use lots and lots of webcasts and save on flight money.  By a good version of some speech to text software and experiment with it to see if it is worth the time saving.  Get yourself the newest Neat Works scanner and go to town; you will never have to input info again!!!  Use CRM’s and Project managers religiously, they will be the big heroes for you.  The more technology you use the more money and time you save.

1. SELL YOUR PRODUCT YOURSELF- There is a very bad trend that exists in the “Entrepreneur World” and it is the trend of being too good to sell.  Owner need to be on the phone 2 times more than the best salesman in the firm. You, as a CEO, have the responsibility to make calls all day and find a way to sell somehow.  What I have done in the past is hire a full time assistant and let her do a lot of the smaller things I was doing, just so I could sell again.  Think as though you weren’t the owner and you saw the owner working harder than you on the day to day and then out selling you in the end of every month, what a cool thing!  There is no bullshit in that statement, only truth.  If you are running a company and can find an hour a day, make calls and try to sell, you keep the commission and prove yourself to the crew right away.  Selling the plan is the most important thing anyone can do all day, make sure you fit your time right.  Use Social Media, Text Campaigns, New Software, and an electronic newsletter to save some funds and some costs.  Hire a Social Media firm and let them take a listen to what you plan to do, if they can help, let them and start to build in an implementation schedule.

This is not a “get ahead” idea; this is a must for you.  You can either be brought in now, or forced in later.  The New Year of 2010 will be one that makes new legends and keeps some people poor, the choice is yours.  Often times we see that most people that do not succeed have the same excuse, I just didn’t have enough time.  Start finding that time over the rest of 2009 and by the time the New Year 2010 comes in you will know exactly how to get this done.  There will be many more posts to read, so please feel free to send me a comment.

By Eric A. Rice

San Diego, California

People ask me all the time, “How do I advertise on social media?” Advertising is part of the equation, but if you go into social media with an advertising mentality, you may set yourself up for failure.

Social media is about relationship building. Developing strong relationships with your customers, clients, referral partners and employees is more important than advertising. Social media also provides innovative solutions and amazing professional development opportunities because it allows you to connect with the collective wisdom of the world.

Napoleon Hill coined the term “Mastermind Group” while interviewing the most successful Americans 100 years ago. The general concept is to bring 10 to 12 like-minded individuals together to brainstorm and create solutions. It is a setting where people feel comfortable in sharing their business vision and challenges.

Some of us already know perfect candidates for our own mastermind groups. There are also excellent organizations here in the Chicago area such as BNI, ABN, DWPN and chambers of commerce that may provide these forums.

Despite all these opportunities, many people don’t always find the ideal candidates for their own mastermind groups locally and sometimes, they prefer not to. Social media can help you create mastermind groups with people you may have never been able to meet until now.

There are two different approaches to creating a successful mastermind group. One is to create a group where every member comes from a different industry to generate unique perspectives. If you belong to a group like this, do you regularly tap into the collective wisdom of the members? Sometimes the knowledge of the group can be more valuable than leads.

The other approach is to create a mastermind group within the same industry. This style of group can be the most difficult to put together, as the only other members are most likely a business owner’s competitors. Usually, the owner can’t just walk across the street and ask a competitor, “Why are you so successful? Can you help me?”

Salespeople are often put in a setting where bonuses are tied to competition. People in this scenario aren’t always willing to help each other. Social media helps find the right people for collaboration and those people are often in another state and thus, not competitors.

Social networking sites like Facebook and Twitter offer amazing opportunities to create virtual mastermind groups. Facebook has recently upgraded their search feature. Use the Facebook search window and type in a word that is relevant to your industry. Until recently, Facebook only found people with that word in their profiles, but now it finds people that mention that word in their updates.

This search tool can help you find like-minded people from other industries as well as your own. A detailed profile helps you find the right people and it helps them find you.

Facebook also has thousands of groups users can join to connect with each other. These groups can be based on actual organizations or they can be groups created exclusively for Facebook. Join them and find innovative people like you.

Twitter also has an advanced search feature. You can find people talking about topics relevant to your business. An excellent tool is Twellow (www.twellow.com), which is a twitter directory. You can find people within this directory based on industry, interests and geography.

You should also list yourself in this directory so the right people can find you. Once you find the right people, no matter where they are in the world, you can collaborate virtually to reach your goals and overcome your challenges.

When I encourage people to share their business challenges, they usually resist. Quite simply, they don’t want to admit their business is struggling. 2009 has been a difficult year for many business owners and entrepreneurs. Many of us are like ducks on a pond: calm on the surface but churning our feet frantically underwater.

If you let your guard down and share your business challenge, you will be amazed at how many people step forward to help you overcome it. They may have recently overcome that challenge or specialize in solving your problem. When you share your challenges with the masses on social media, you can create a mastermind group of thousands.

I use Facebook and Twitter to tap into the collective wisdom of my network all the time. Challenges don’t always have to be major. Every time you have a question, you have a challenge.

I have asked for help finding dependable services, buying the right product and finding good meeting locations. Every time, I found people willing to help. On the other hand, I have found people asking for help with Facebook and Twitter and I was able to help them.

A man in Atlanta posted his four slogan choices on Facebook and people from around the world offered suggestions. A man in New York needed to hire a company to design his logo. He used Facebook and Twitter to offer a prize for a new logo. He quickly received outstanding designs from around the country.

Whether forming mastermind groups or posing questions to the masses, social media may be exactly what you need to reach your goals and overcome your challenges big or small. Remember, no one is as smart as everyone. The collective wisdom of the world is at your fingertips. Tap in.

By Brian Tomkins