What motivates us to take action? What motivates us to pursue our dreams?
I’ve been thinking more about motivation this week. And, specifically, what motivates us to pursue our dreams.
A couple of weeks ago, I listened to Dr Jason Fox share his learnings on the 99U conference.
One of the key things that resonated with me was that to take action, you need:
Motivation + ability + trigger
This is the behaviour model of Dr. BJ Fogg who founded the Persuasive Tech Lab at Stanford University.
Dr Fox was discussing this in the context of emailing someone straight after you meet them (essentially when you’ve been ‘triggered’ and the motivation is high).
However, this formula is also highly relevant to making a big work change.
1. Motivation: you are motivated to do it
2. Ability: You feel it is possible (ability + inspiration + real world examples)
3. Trigger: An event or circumstances prompt you to take action.
What are the triggers for you regarding seeking change at work? For me, it is long drives in the country, long breaks from work (holidays or maternity leave), or a great coaching session or development opportunity. How many of us reimagine our life over the summer holidays? Other triggers may be conflicts with managers at work, personal illness or injury, illness or injury in our families, or redundancy.
For me, these triggers make me think that life is too short not to do what I love. They make me think anything is possible. I see new ideas and opportunities. I get excited about the possibilities.
However, if I don't act on it, the motivation to change fades away. I go back to ‘work’ and work becomes the norm. And I forget my ‘pie-in-the-sky’ dreams.
And I know I’m not alone.
With that in mind, the find my niche blog focuses on:
1. Discovering your personal motivation
2. Providing inspiration and real world examples to show what is possible
3. Challenging commonly-held fears and excuses
4. A strengths-based approach to work and wellbeing
5. Supporting you to take action when you’ve been ‘triggered’
So, take action and sign up now to our weekly newsletter. And you will also go into a draw to win a $50 book voucher from Booktopia (if you sign up before 26th May 2015).
Which things trigger your dreams of doing something more?
A little while ago, I interviewed Tony Nash, the CEO of Booktopia. Tony provided fascinating insights into the beginnings of Booktopia and its phenomenal growth over the past eleven years.
Booktopia is Australia’s fastest growing online bookstore with an annual revenue of $52 million. They commenced operation in 2004—incidentally on the same day as Facebook. Booktopia is the only company to have made it on to the Australian BRW Fast 100 list of fastest growing companies SIX years in a row—an amazing achievement.
Here are the eight key business lessons I took away from our discussion. These are relevant whether you are in business now or are contemplating starting your own business.
1. Start small
If you have a business idea, how can you start small, trial it and see what works?
Booktopia started as a side project on a marketing budget of $10 per day. Tony and his family were working on other businesses at the time.
In the beginning, Booktopia didn’t hold any stock. They were essentially a website storefront that employed another company to fulfil the orders. They did not start fulfilling their own orders for three years. This enabled them to start in a way that was manageable and achievable and that didn’t require a huge investment.
Key takeaway: You do not need to make a huge upfront investment to make a start.
2. Test and get feedback
You need to take action and learn from it. Test and get feedback about what works. You won’t always know what will work.
Booktopia started as a side project—as a test project. If it hadn’t worked, we wouldn’t hear about it today.
Booktopia continue to test and get feedback every day. They launch a product and learn quickly—what works?
Key takeaway: Take action and see what works.
3. Focus on growth
Focus on the growth of your business. If you’re constantly growing, that becomes the status quo and people accept it. This allows you to continue to hire people—people who can allow you to focus on growing your business and not get burnt out.
At Booktopia, they ask themselves each month, what do we need to do to be 40 per cent more successful than this same month last year?
Key takeaway: Define what growth looks like and stay focused.
4. Focus on the cash
To make the point even more clearly, Tony suggests focusing on the cash. He hears people talk about business ideas and his question is “will people keep paying money for that?”
He also talked about how it is easy to get distracted and focus on systems and other areas of the business. But without a focus on the money, the business does not grow. It’s the cash growth that has also allowed Booktopia to implement a significant philanthropic program.
Key takeaway: Money enables growth and keeps you in business. Stay focused.
5. Go with what works
You won’t always know what will resonate with people, but if you listen carefully, you will work it out.
Booktopia is promoted as the Australian alternative to Amazon. Buying through Booktopia supports an Australian-born, Australian-owned company that employs 90 Australians.
This was a point of difference compared with Amazon—the dominant player in the online book market. But it wasn’t what motivated Tony to start Booktopia.
However, Booktopia found that is why Australians chose to buy through Booktopia, rather than Amazon. I know it certainly works for me! And this is now how Booktopia is marketed.
Key takeaway: Find out why people do business with you and focus on it.
6. Work out what motivates you
This was my observation and not something Tony said, but I think it is important.
Tony is a numbers man. During our interview, he could tell me his revenue in his every month for the first few months of his business – which he started 11 years ago!
He could tell me how many books stocked in his warehouse.
He could tell me how many books are available on his website.
He could tell me the percentage in growth of his business, year on year and month on month.
The lesson here is to work out what motivates you and keeps you going. For me, it is about people. About helping people. Inspiring people. For Tony, it was about the numbers.
Key takeaway: Work out what motivates you and reinforce it.
7. Build trust
This was especially important as an online business, but there are lessons in this for everyone.
Tony focused on building trust through the Booktopia website. The website provided a phone number you could call and a physical address. He incorporated what he calls ‘trust icons’ into the website. These trust icons included the Telstra Business Award logo and the Australian Booksellers Association logo (which is a whole other story in itself!).
Key takeaway: Trust is essential in any business. How can you build trust?
8. Promise more than you can currently deliver
Okay, this one scares me too—but these are Tony’s lessons, not mine. Tony told a story of pre-Booktopia days when he submitted a proposal to a company in New Zealand for $18,000 to help them attract visitors to their website—essentially to get them to the top of Google.
The only problem was that he had basic knowledge of Search Engine Optimization (SEO).
The company accepted the proposal so he worked from daybreak to midnight to learn more about SEO—and his company quickly became a leading SEO consultancy.
By setting his own ‘stretch assignment’, he found what was possible.
Key takeaway: Set your own ‘stretch assignments’ by offering beyond what you can currently deliver.
Tony generously and frankly shared his insights into the establishment of Booktopia as one of Australia’s most successful businesses.
There was much more to our interview. However, I’ve tried to distil it down to the eight key takeaways.
Tony Nash has also generously provided a $50 Booktopia voucher for one lucky reader of my weekly newsletter.
If you would like to go into the draw to win the $50 Booktopia gift voucher, subscribe to my weekly newsletter here or use the subscribe box at the top of this page.
The winner will be randomly selected on Tuesday 26th May and announced in the Find My Niche newsletter on that day.
Note: I am an affiliate partner with Booktopia. If you buy a book from Booktopia after clicking through from my website, I receive a small percentage of the sale.
I purchased books through Booktopia long before I began this website and I continue to do so. I only support businesses that I truly believe in.
Photo credit: Kathleen Landells
What is your motivation? And how does understanding your motivation help?
For each of us, our motivation is different. Understanding your motivation can assist you in all aspects of your life—work, relationships, and health.
It’s a funny thing starting your own business. No bosses. No deadlines. No supervisors. No program calendars. No weekly newsletter. No staff asking for help. You are 100% responsible for motivating yourself.
In the past week, I have been struggling to keep things moving. I have been questioning myself. I have been struggling with my PhD and questioning whether I should continue. In short, I have been driving myself crazy.
However, this has made me reflect on my motivation. What motivates me to keep striving? To keep going despite obstacles? And then, how can I use this understanding to keep moving in a new direction? To keep progressing despite obstacles?
A really important motivation for me is helping others. I need to work for something bigger than myself. I realised that I had been struggling because I felt a bit like I was shouting into the wind. Putting things out there and not getting anything back. I had also been procrastinating about a really important part of my business, but knowing that a friend needed it gave me motivation to begin.
How else could I use this motivation? For example, how could I carry out my work so that I am receiving more feedback from clients? I also realised that I could use my motivation to help others in a very practical way—I could imagine that I am writing each post for a specific client. I could also post about other people in a way that is helpful to them and their new businesses. This week, the photo accompanying this post is one taken by my mum. I was motivated to write the post to share her beautiful work.
Another motivator for me is achieving things and overcoming significant challenges to deliver things. I hate to give up on things. I hate to let myself down. How can I use this motivation? I can commit to writing a blog each week. I can set a deadline for launching my 8-week online program to help people find their niche. I can write an annual calendar of events. I can set small achievable goals to keep myself moving.
Learning motivates me. I love to learn about people. I love to learn about how people can work better. I love to learn about what motivates, energises and inspires people. How could I use this motivation? This morning I went to a presentation called ‘Clever Happenings’ by Dr Jason Fox. Learning ignites my brain. It crowds out the negative feelings and reminds me why I’m doing what I’m doing.
What are the things that motivate you? And how can you use this knowledge to help you keep moving in a new direction?
I’d love to hear your thoughts.
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What are the 3 most important things to do today to achieve your dreams?
They're surprisingly easy.
1. Take action
2. Learn from it
3. Be creative
1. Take action
When it comes to so many things, we know have to take small steps to achieve our goals. For example, if you want to become a professional golfer, you need to start playing golf. If you want to play the piano, you need to start practicing. It sounds obvious, doesn't it? In our hobbies and sports - even in our relationships - we understand that we have to take one small step at a time.
Yet when it comes to starting our own business, changing career, writing a book, etc, we are hesitant to make a start.
We feel we need all the answers before taking action.
We worry that failure will make us look silly.
We hope for a tattslotto win so we can start doing the work we love.
We look forward to retirement so we can start doing the things we love.
We delay, delay, delay.
Yet without taking action, our work dreams will always stay in the future.
We stay in jobs where we are frustrated, then when we reach boiling point, we try and find another job that we hope will suit us better. Until we get frustrated again.
Yet if we invested time in understanding what type of work makes our heart sing, what type of work allows us to be ourselves, and what type of work allows us to use our strengths every day, we could then take intentional steps towards our dreams.
We don’t have to have the best ideas in the world. We just need to make a start and take action. Start a blog. Start your book. Write an article. Make a video.
Which leads me to the next important thing. That action must be accompanied by the ability to learn…
2. Learn from action
If you talk to successful business people, many of them have stories of the companies they started and abandoned before their current success.
Tony Nash of Booktopia used to have an internet SEO company (Search engine optimization).
Janine Allis started Sejuice before she started Boost. She also started a salad bar (Tossers) that she abandoned.
Is this failure? Or is it the ability to learn?
The first thing to do is to take action. The next thing to do is to learn from it.
There is no magic formula for success. There is action. And there is learning.
There are so many opportunities to learn these days. For example, I can post this post on LinkedIn, and then I can see how many people view it, and how many people like it. This post that I liked, no-one else liked! (perhaps the weight-loss analogy made it an awkward thing for people to ‘like’ as it comes up in their feed—maybe it was just bad!). My most viewed and liked post was this one. The backend of my blog allows me to see whether traffic to my website increased as a result of posting this on Linkedin (or Facebook). Technology provides so many learning opportunities.
Customer feedback also provides an excellent learning opportunity if you’re willing to listen. Founder of Boost Juice, Janine Allis, in her book The Secrets of My Success, talks about how she always responds to customer feedback within 24 hours.
Learning can also help you understand what motivates you to take action. Have you been procrastinating about something? What strengths do you have to help you take action? For me, helping others always motivates me. I had an important action on my to-do list for quite a while but other things always took priority. Then a friend needed it, and that motivated me. Also, a commitment always motivates me. If I commit to writing a post once a week, I feel I have let myself down if I don’t do it. Observe yourself and learn how to keep yourself motivated to take action.
Listening goes hand in hand with learning. If you don’t listen, you won’t learn. I love watching Shark Tank and seeing the ‘Sharks’ get annoyed with the people who don’t listen.
3. Be creative
The third important thing to do today is to be creative. When we are young, we embrace our creativity. Yet, as adults, we are quick to say ‘I am not creative’. Creativity can be defined as “the use of imagination or original ideas to create something” or “a phenomenon whereby something new and in some way valuable is created.” Creativity is essential in achieving your dreams.
If you want to make a living doing what you love, you need to start with many ideas. Then take action. And learn from it.
James Altucher talks about writing down 10 ideas every day. The ideas may be good or bad; the point is to exercise your creativity. Write 10 problems you want to solve. 10 businesses you want to help. 10 ways to make a living from .. (insert your interests here.. sailing? writing? reading?). 10 things people ask you for help with. 10 ways you deliver value in your current role.
And then take action. And then learn from it.
And then begin again. Generate ideas. Take action. Learn from it.
That’s it.
Oh, and one more thing to do today to achieve your dreams —sign up to my newsletter at the top of this page www.findmyniche.com.au!
Photo credit. Ben Harnett. Sailing Shack Photography.
The top 1% of what, you ask. The top 1% often refers to the mega-wealthy—where the top 1% of people own 40 per cent of the world’s riches.
But I’m not talking here about wealth. I’m interested in the 1% of people who are leading their chosen field—who are making a living doing what they love.
This may include sportspeople who make a living from their sport—in the US, it is estimated that 1% of athletes become professional athletes
Writers who sell millions of copies of their books
Golfers who make a living from golf
Competitive sailors who are paid to sail professionally
Gamblers who make a living gambling
Actors who make a living acting
LinkedIn users whose posts on LinkedIn are actually read, liked and shared (I couldn’t find the actual number of LinkedIn users who post – but I’m guessing it’s lower than 1 per cent – there are only 500 LinkedIn Influencers out of 300 million LinkedIn users – that’s 0.000166 if you’re interested)
People who make a living from blogging
People who make a living from YouTube
I could go on…
Do these percentages inspire you or depress you? Do these figures bring out the achiever in you? Do your dreams seem exciting and challenging? Or the doubter in you – do these figures seem impossible and unachievable?
Does your critical, analytical side come out? Let me see those figures! Where did you get that data?
For many of us, when we see these figures, or we hear that 90 per cent of small businesses fail (read my post on that here), we see it as a reason not to try. We hear another reason not to make a living doing the work we love. We hear another reason to stay in our safe, secure jobs.
But what if we could change our thinking?
Dr. Jason Fox suggests using two highlighters when you’re reading something – the ‘Yes! and…’ highlighter and the ‘yeah, but..’ highlighter. What a great way to analyse and capture your thinking!
If you want to make a living doing the work you love, what about trying ‘yes, and’ in response to each of these figures, rather than ‘yeah, but’.
“Only 1 per cent of writers sell millions of copies”. Yes, and … they too were rejected many times before they were published. Yes, and they started writing books whilst working full-time. Yes, and they also have three children.
“Only 1% of sportspeople are making a living as a professional sportsperson.” Yes, and ... other people who are passionate about sports might make a living from commentating, reporting, organising, and coaching sports.
Edward De Bono talks about ‘yes, and’ thinking as a way of extending and generating ideas rather than halting a conversation. ‘Yes, and’ enables you to be creative and see opportunities. ‘Yeah, but’ shuts ideas down before they’ve had a chance to grow.
How can you apply ‘yes, and’ thinking to help you make a living doing what you love?
Recently, I asked James Altucher whether he had completed the StrengthsFinder® assessment*.
He said he hadn't and that people naturally know what they are good at.
I understand what he is saying, but there is more to the story.
When people learn about their strengths through a StrengthsFinder® report, they begin to embrace as strengths those things they may have considered weaknesses. The strength of 'Empathy®' is a classic one. As a person high in empathy, you may have been told that you wear your heart on your sleeve or that you need to control your emotions. The strengths-based approach allows you to claim empathy as one of your greatest strengths and to apply it to every situation.
'Deliberative®' is another good one. People high in ‘deliberative’ may have been told they are too slow to think or contribute. They now claim their ability to think things through carefully as one of their greatest strengths. And when others in their team learn it is one of their greatest strengths, they make sure they give them time to think and highly value any contribution they make.
People high in Analytical® may have previously questioned whether they were the only person in the room that could see these problems or issues—and try to contain their ‘black hat’ thinking. They now see this analytical strength as something they should bring to these situations. Others in their team appreciate this strength also and know they can ask this person to critically evaluate a proposal.
Many strengths can be viewed as both a weakness and a strength. The ability to make things happen by turning thoughts into action (Activator®) can be viewed as starting things but not finishing them….
What strengths do you have that could also be viewed as weaknesses?
*I am a Gallup Certified Strengths Coach. The Clifton StrengthsFinder® is an on-line assessment of 34 strengths and provides a report of your personal strengths in order. The most commonly used report is the Top 5. You can complete your StrengthsFinder® assessment for $9.99.
According to Gallup, Inc® research, only 13% of us worldwide are engaged in our work. Americans and Canadians have the highest levels of engagement with 29% of workers described as engaged. Workers from Australia and New Zealand have the next highest percentage of engaged workers at 24%. Compare this with China where only six per cent of workers are engaged.
So somewhere between 8 or 9 employees out of every 10 are not engaged at work. Does that surprise you? Shock you?
What is engagement?
Gallup, Inc® talk about engagement as employees being emotionally invested in and focused on creating value for their organizations every day. I like William Kahn’s (2010) description of engagement as putting our real selves into work. Engagement is when we deeply care about what we are doing and are committed to doing the best we can. When we are engaged, we express our real selves, rather than defend or withdraw them from view.
Gallup, Inc® measure engagement with twelve questions (the Q12) including “At work, my opinions seem to count”, “I know what is expected of me at work”, “At work, I have the opportunity to do what I do best every day” and “In the last six months, someone at work has talked to me about my progress.” Do these seem like fairly reasonable expectations? It doesn’t seem like the benchmark is too high.
Why bother with engagement?
Research has shown that engaged employees make the difference between thriving and struggling companies. Companies with engaged employees have higher profit, better safety, less employee turnover, and less absenteeism (and that’s just the tip of the iceberg). People who are engaged feel that their contributions have meaning and that their perspectives matter.
On a personal level, engaged employees are more than three times as likely to be thriving in their overall lives. Engaged employees are less angry and less stressed than disengaged employees. Dr Simon Albrecht from Deakin University in Australia and Editor of the Handbook of Employee Engagement argues there is good evidence to support the much-touted benefits of employee engagement.
What if you’re not engaged?
If you’re reading this and thinking that you’re one of the majority of employees who are not engaged at work, what can you do? There are a number of pathways to engagement.
1. Understand why you are not engaged. It is important to understand why you are not engaged. Why are you feeling frustrated or disengaged? Because your opinion is not heard? Because of long hours? Travel? The inability to get things done. Feeling that you are not making a difference? Not enjoying interacting with customers all day? Not able to focus on your projects? Love your organisation but not your current manager? You’re not enjoying work as much now that you are a manager? Being clear about why you are not engaged is a crucial step in increasing your engagement.
2. Focus on your strengths. Focusing on your talents or strengths can help you understand why you are not engaged. A client of mine was not sure whether she should look for another job or whether she should stay in her current role. As we talked, she realized that she did enjoy her work but that building relationships was a strength of hers, and that she didn't have the strong relationships she'd enjoyed in previous roles. She set about making changes to build stronger relationships in her current role. Job crafting is changing your current role so you are doing more of what engages you. What aspects of your current role do you love? Could you do more of this?
3. Change your environment. Another client of mine is a great teacher. She was not sure whether she wanted to leave teaching as she was not engaged at work. As we talked, she realized that she loves teaching but that the current environment and culture was disengaging. We brainstormed options for how she could apply her passion for teaching in different settings.
4. Increase your activities outside of work. Work does not have to meet all of your needs. Increasing your activities outside of work could enable you to feel more engaged at work.
5. Change careers. Perhaps you’ve always secretly wanted to be a graphic designer? A nurse? Hiding your true self is a certain path to disengagement. What steps could you take towards your dream role?
These are just some of the many actions you could take to increase your engagement. Investing time in reflecting on your own engagement and taking action to increase your engagement is a worthwhile investment of your time. Make time to understand your strengths and think about how these are being utilised in your current role.
It is my mission for Australians to be the most engaged employees in the world. Will you join me? Check out my website at www.findmyniche.com.au.
Have you had dreams of starting your own business?
What do you think is the number one reason people don’t start their own business?
According to Gallup, Inc, 25 per cent of American adults have dreamt of starting their own business but have not yet taken the plunge.
You can probably guess the most common barrier.
People like the security of a steady income.
Second on the list was a lack of personal savings.
And third was worry that the success of a new startup is very low.
Let’s look at the possibility of success. Have you heard the statistic that 90 per cent of all small businesses fail within the first 12 months? I recently researched this fact and found that the failure rate in Australia of small businesses (1-19 employees) is actually 40 per cent over four years. And this failure rate is not that different for medium sized businesses (25 per cent failure rate; 20-199 employees) and large businesses (25 per cent failure rate; 200+ employees). In America, the failure rate is similar with 50 per cent of small businesses failing over four years.
Challenging fears with actual research is a key to starting your own business.
Are you worried about the security of a steady income and lack of personal savings? If you currently earn $100,000 per year, did you know that this breaks down to about $50 per hour based on a 40-hour work week?
Do you need to quit your job to start something new? Can you start something on the side? Many of the biggest businesses started as a side project with a minimal budget.
Yesterday I spoke with Tony Nash, the CEO of Booktopia, about how he started his business. Booktopia, Australia’s biggest online book retailer, has been listed on the BRW Fast 100 list a record six years in a row – and it started as a small side project on a budget of $10 per day. This year, they expect to generate revenue of $52 million.
There are many more examples of highly successful businesses that started as small side projects.
Have you had dreams of starting your own business? What held you back?
I’d love to hear from you.
Australians spend about $800 million each year on quick-fix weight loss schemes, despite research showing that 95 per cent of people who lose weight on a crash diet return to a similar or heavier pre-diet weight within three years.
And yet how much time and effort do we invest in understanding our strengths and interests - and finding the work we love?
As I reflected on the key principles that we need to understand when we want to make big career changes, I found that trying to change your work life follows similar principles to losing weight.
Principle 1. You really need to feel the tension between where you are now and where you want to be. With weight loss, we may see a photo where we are shocked by the sight of ourselves and we think ‘that is not who I am. The outside does not reflect the inside.’ Or we jump on the scales and think ‘I am not a person who weighs more than 100 kilograms’. And we fast forward to the future and we realise that we are not heading in a direction we like.
It is the same with your work. It is important to really feel the tension between what you are doing and what you want to be doing. Are you working to your strengths at work? How are you feeling at work? Energised, motivated, enthusiastic? If you stay in your current situation, what will you be doing five years from now?
You need to feel the tension between where you are now and where you want to be.
Principle 2. Think about personal themes or ways of being, rather than specific goals. Weight-loss goals don’t work. Or, they may work in the short-term, but they are not sustainable. Sixty-five percent of people on any diet return to a similar or heavier pre-diet weight within three years. And, as I mentioned earlier, if it was a crash diet, make that ninety-five percent.
The sustainable way to lose weight is to change your perception of who you are. To frame your goal as a life theme. ‘I am a healthy, fun-loving, energetic person who eats food that nurtures her body’ is more sustainable and motivational than ‘I have lost 5 kilograms by 30th October’. With weight-loss, you might have an inspiration board with photos of healthy people, healthy food, outfits you want to wear, and wonderful holiday destinations. These all reinforce your themes.
This is exactly the same when changing careers or even starting your own business.
You need to think about your themes rather than a specific goal. Goals are tricky to define in the first place. You might deviate from your goal. Goals have their place—but when you are first thinking about starting your business, you are much better to frame your goals as themes. ‘I help people do the work they love’ is easier to keep moving forward with than ‘I have delivered 20 workshops and written 20 blogs.’ It also allows you to be open to different ideas and paths that help you live your themes—rather than strictly sticking to one specific job or business idea that may or may not work. And same for the inspiration board.
You want to think about people who are doing the work you love and the effect you might have on people—not hard business goals or one specific role.
Principle 3. You need to address the beliefs, assumptions and mindsets that are holding you back.
With weight-loss, you need to reflect on what mindsetsvyou have that are holding you back. For example, I have no time for exercise, it’s impossible to make a healthy meal every night, I don’t have time to cook, it’s really hard to get healthy takeaway food, I have three kids and no time for myself, I have an addictive personality. The list goes on.
With your own business, or changing your career, what assumptions are holding you back? I know one of my beliefs was that I had to come up with the best business idea and a full business plan before I took the plunge. Not true. One of my beliefs was that if another business was doing what I wanted to do, that idea was taken. Clearly rubbish. Booktopia have started a bookstore to compete with Amazon, an American-based alternative. And they provide an amazing service.
Principle 4. Supportive others make it easier.
With weight-loss, the actions and reactions of the people close to us play a significant role in whether or not we succeed. If we have a close friend or family member supporting us, and even taking the journey with us, we are much more likely to succeed.
Again, this is the same with starting your own business or making a career change. If the people around us are supportive, reassuring and encouraging, it is much easier to succeed. In contrast, if they are negative, questioning, and potentially sabotaging us, it is difficult to succeed.
So, surround yourself with supportive friends and family.
Principle 5. You just need to commit.
There is always a reason to delay another day. For example, with weight-loss, excuses might include ‘it’s the silly season and I’ll need to attend a lot of functions’. Or ‘I have a lot of birthdays in the next few weeks so I want to be able to eat what I want’.
With changing careers or starting your own business, excuses might include ‘I might have another baby so I want to stay for maternity leave. I’m too old to do something new. I’m two years away from my long service leave—I’ll wait for that. I’ll be giving up my full-time income. How will I make money?’
But with business, as in weight-loss, you just have to commit. It helps to think about the worst-case scenario, once you’ve accepted that—in the words of Nike, ‘just do it’.
These five principles—feel the tension, themes not goals, challenge beliefs, supportive others, and commit—will serve you well with any change to you want to make. Now is the time to invest time and effort in doing what you love!
I love to read inspiring autobiographies and motivational individual and business books. The Happiest Refugee by Anh Do. Mao's Last Dancer by Li Cunxin. Fair Cop by Christine Nixon. Now, Discover Your Strengths by Marcus Buckingham and Donald O Clifton. Flourish by Martin Seligman. The list goes on.
Even though I have wanted to start my own business for a long time, none of it has ever motivated me to really take the plunge.
But then I found a secret key.
In the past, I would think of something I want to do - then, aargh, I see someone who's doing something similar. And I think, oh well, think of something else. That idea is taken.
Or I would think, well I really want to help people work out what they love to do, but how on earth could I make a living from that?
They sound like excuses, right?
But I discovered what is beneath those excuses or fears. I had been operating from a win-lose, limited resources mindset. That is, there is only so much to go around.
So here's the key. Really successful people have a win-win, abundance mindset.
The abundance mindset prompts you to say 'So what if someone else is doing something similar? There's room for everyone.' And ‘yes, I want this, and you want that – how can we arrive at a solution that benefits everyone?’
Okay, so it’s not a new concept. Stephen Covey talks about this concept in his classic book, The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People. But I think you understand things when you are ready.
Ruslan Kogan wrote about this exact thing in his blog. Haven't heard of Ruslan Kogan? He is a Melbournian, the founder of Kogan.com, a consumer electronics company, and is one of the top 200 richest people in Australia with an estimated worth of $349 million - all at the age of 32.
So I'm really taking the plunge. I'm committing to doing something myself. Because there's room for everybody. I want to help people do the work they love. I want to share stories of inspiring Australians that are creating their own life, not doing what others expect of them. People like Shane Jacobson, a.k.a. Kenny – an actor, producer, director and speaker. People like Anh Do - a comedian, author, and artist. People like Kate Weiss - founder of Table of Plenty, mother of two and 2014 Telstra Businesswoman on the year.
And I’m reminding myself of what Jim Collins says - 'a core business that meets a fundamental human need- and one at which you've become the best in the world- rarely becomes obsolete'. (Yes, another motivational business book! 'How the mighty fall - and why some companies never give in')
