Complacency Is For The Dogs

Complacency Is For The Dogs Ive been in Chicago for three days Im attending a conference for association professionals (that is, this is an association for associations ;)) The trip has been excellent, but Ill confess that Ive been nervous about this meeting for a while I have to stretch my brain, learn how my business will apply in this environment, and get out of my comfort zone. But Im here for a purpose, and theres a news clip I saw on Saturday at the airport that I keep thinking about that reminds me of my purpose. Tiger Woods was being interviewed. I missed the question but his response was something like: I came here to win. I didnt come to hit a few balls, or to walk around on a nice day, or to drop a few pounds. I came here to win. It really made me think about why I came to Chicago. I came to win. Winning is fun, but getting there is hard. I will have to do things where I hear no, I will have to introduce myself a ton of times to people who will look at me as a vendor and automatically try and figure out how to get rid of me. I dont really like rejection, and even though every no is one step closer to a yes I still dont get a kick out of hearing it. But I came to win. So Im going to the meetings. Yesterday, I wanted to leave a little early. But I stayed, and I met amazing contacts after the last meeting. I cannot be complacent about this. Tigers thoughts are in my mind while Im here Im not here to walk around the expo floor just to look around. Im here to win. What about you? What are you doing and why are you doing it? Are you getting complacent? If your work is boring, unfulfilling or not headed in the right direction, think back a while ago when you had big goals and dreams for where you would end up. Its going to be hard, and there will be uncomfortable growth phases, but getting through them will make it all worth it, wont it? If you are in a job search right now, you have to play to win. Its not a casual thing, you need to be the best game in town! Play to win! Have an excellent resume. Really, really prepare for the interviews, prepare your personal branding statement (aka, elevator pitch, aka, me in 30 seconds) so that it is captivating and natural. Are you playing to win? Complacency Is For The Dogs Ive been in Chicago for three days Im attending a conference for association professionals (that is, this is an association for associations ;)) The trip has been excellent, but Ill confess that Ive been nervous about this meeting for a while I have to stretch my brain, learn how my business will apply in this environment, and get out of my comfort zone. But Im here for a purpose, and theres a news clip I saw on Saturday at the airport that I keep thinking about that reminds me of my purpose. Tiger Woods was being interviewed. I missed the question but his response was something like: I came here to win. I didnt come to hit a few balls, or to walk around on a nice day, or to drop a few pounds. I came here to win. It really made me think about why I came to Chicago. I came to win. Winning is fun, but getting there is hard. I will have to do things where I hear no, I will have to introduce myself a ton of times to people who will look at me as a vendor and automatically try and figure out how to get rid of me. I dont really like rejection, and even though every no is one step closer to a yes I still dont get a kick out of hearing it. But I came to win. So Im going to the meetings. Yesterday, I wanted to leave a little early. But I stayed, and I met amazing contacts after the last meeting. I cannot be complacent about this. Tigers thoughts are in my mind while Im here Im not here to walk around the expo floor just to look around. Im here to win. What about you? What are you doing and why are you doing it? Are you getting complacent? If your work is boring, unfulfilling or not headed in the right direction, think back a while ago when you had big goals and dreams for where you would end up. Its going to be hard, and there will be uncomfortable growth phases, but getting through them will make it all worth it, wont it? If you are in a job search right now, you have to play to win. Its not a casual thing, you need to be the best game in town! Play to win! Have an excellent resume. Really, really prepare for the interviews, prepare your personal branding statement (aka, elevator pitch, aka, me in 30 seconds) so that it is captivating and natural. Are you playing to win? Complacency Is For The Dogs Ive been in Chicago for three days Im attending a conference for association professionals (that is, this is an association for associations ;)) The trip has been excellent, but Ill confess that Ive been nervous about this meeting for a while I have to stretch my brain, learn how my business will apply in this environment, and get out of my comfort zone. But Im here for a purpose, and theres a news clip I saw on Saturday at the airport that I keep thinking about that reminds me of my purpose. Tiger Woods was being interviewed. I missed the question but his response was something like: I came here to win. I didnt come to hit a few balls, or to walk around on a nice day, or to drop a few pounds. I came here to win. It really made me think about why I came to Chicago. I came to win. Winning is fun, but getting there is hard. I will have to do things where I hear no, I will have to introduce myself a ton of times to people who will look at me as a vendor and automatically try and figure out how to get rid of me. I dont really like rejection, and even though every no is one step closer to a yes I still dont get a kick out of hearing it. But I came to win. So Im going to the meetings. Yesterday, I wanted to leave a little early. But I stayed, and I met amazing contacts after the last meeting. I cannot be complacent about this. Tigers thoughts are in my mind while Im here Im not here to walk around the expo floor just to look around. Im here to win. What about you? What are you doing and why are you doing it? Are you getting complacent? If your work is boring, unfulfilling or not headed in the right direction, think back a while ago when you had big goals and dreams for where you would end up. Its going to be hard, and there will be uncomfortable growth phases, but getting through them will make it all worth it, wont it? If you are in a job search right now, you have to play to win. Its not a casual thing, you need to be the best game in town! Play to win! Have an excellent resume. Really, really prepare for the interviews, prepare your personal branding statement (aka, elevator pitch, aka, me in 30 seconds) so that it is captivating and natural. Are you playing to win?

12 Fails Top CEOs Overcame Before Building Their Brands - Personal Branding Blog - Stand Out In Your Career

12 Fails Top CEOs Overcame Before Building Their Brands - Personal Branding Blog - Stand Out In Your Career What was your biggest fail as a new founder or CEO, and how did you overcome it to focus on building your brand and business instead? The following answers are provided by the Young Entrepreneur Council (YEC), an invite-only nonprofit organization comprised of the worlds most promising young entrepreneurs. In partnership with Citi, the YEC recently launched #StartupLab, a free virtual mentorship program that helps millions of entrepreneurs start and grow businesses via live video chats, an expert content library and email lessons. 1. Waiting to Get Big Enough One of my biggest failures was thinking we should wait until we were big enough before we start doing something. The analogy I use is a professional baseball pitcher waiting to throw an off-speed pitch until hes in the major leagues. That would be ridiculous. You have to practice doing everything you plan to do once you make it, or else youll never have the necessary skills. Phil Frost, Main Street ROI 2. Sweating the Small Stuff I focused on things that didnt matter. I stressed out about our phone system and our logo, and I ended up setting up ridiculously complicated systems. I took a step back and stripped away everything that wasn’t needed. I had to get out of my own way in order to move forward. Brent Beshore, AdVentures 3. Too Much Customer Trust I trusted my customers too much. Everybody wishes that we were in a business world where you can take everybody at their word; however, we aren’t. Now, I make sure that things are in writing, and I am very clear about expectations. John Hall, Digital Talent Agents 4. Good Apple, Bad Taste We hired an incredibly talented team member and let their negative energy bring down the rest of the team because they were talented. This went on for months until we finally had to part ways. In hindsight, we should have let them go after a week. Ben Wagner, LifeKraze 5. Making Too Many Assumptions I’ve made poor assumptions in the past on go-to-market strategies. As a first-time entrepreneur who’s just getting started, you can foolishly think you’re right because an idea originated with you. Just because something is working doesn’t mean you’ve found the best way to do it. Overcoming this took seeing someone else do the same thing better, and seeing how to emulate that. John Berkowitz, Yodle 6. Saying Yes to Everything I was ecstatic when I closed my first client deal; unfortunately, the client wasnt paying, but I didnt care. A successful case study was all that mattered in my mind. But the client completely consumed our energy and attention because we said yes to every new feature they wanted. I overcame this failure in client-management by firing my client. It was the only way to focus on the big picture. Jay Wu, Best Drug Rehabilitation 7. Jack of All Trades, Master of None Early on, we took on projects that were outside of our core focus because we were afraid that other opportunities wouldnt come along. As it turned out, some of those projects took too much time and energy away from our main business focus and set us back by months on our core goals. Once we started focusing, our business became much more successful. Allie Siarto, Loudpixel 8. Not Listening to Those Whove Come Before You One of the biggest mistakes I made was not putting more weight on the suggestions of experienced professionals when I asked their opinions about our website, product, price, etc.. As CEO, sometimes you try to please by taking action on everyones suggestions, when you should put the most weight on the suggestion from the person who failed and learned from it thousands of times. Derek Capo, Next Step China 9. Poor Pricing Strategy With a recent venture I opted for a recurring billing structure, rather than a one time fee. It turns out this particular product didnt suit itself to that type of fee structure, so I worked the product into a new package and put a flat price on it instead. By not being afraid to change what isnt working, the product is now much more viable and successful than it was initially. Sean Ogle, Location 180, LLC 10. Hiring for Sales, Not Execution At the beginning, my responsibilities included customer service, website content, managing relationships with our manufacturer, walking to the post office and more. I focused our hiring on senior people, as I thought we needed more big ideas. The reality is that execution is paramount as a start-up. Only when we hired a junior team member did we free up time for bigger thinking and more growth. Aaron Schwartz, Modify Watches 11. Getting Too Comfortable My biggest fail was getting too comfortable with my success and holding back in areas where I needed to be more aggressive. It was easy to overcome when the competitive landscape got more challenging; it forced me to step up my game and get more creative. Charles Gaudet, Predictable Profits 12. Putting Skills Over Fit We had high turnover in our first year as we struggled to find the right people. In subsequent hiring, it has been helpful to benchmark candidates’ against the qualifications of people in similar roles at organizations we respect. As we have grown from a team of 5 to a team of 13, it has also helped to analyze the culture within among our core team of leaders to identify people who will fit. Garrett Neiman, CollegeSpring