Archive for Motivation
What’s your relationship with money?
Posted by: | CommentsIf you are in business you must focus on making a profit. Without profit, without earning descent money, you don’t have a business, you have a hobby.
Putting your focus on profit doesn’t make you a Ferengi. It is a necessary part of the business world. When you have a j-o-b, someone else is responsible for marketing, office space, administration and designing a business plan. You show up, do your job and get paid for your time.
But when you own your own business, even if you have employees, you are ultimately responsible for every part of your business. That’s why you charge a higher hourly rate than you would if you worked for someone else. Very few entrepreneurs bill 40 hours per week.
But in spite of this, many entrepreneurs have an uneasy relationship with money. And it is a relationship, as I was reminded by Iyabo Asani in a teleseminar I attended last night. In this teleseminar she said that money represents an exchange of energy. You provide a services (expend energy) and the customer gives you money in exchange.
However, if you have a problem relationship with money, it spills over into other parts of your business life. If you always feel there is never enough money, then it is often because you lack value in yourself. This can manifest itself in a lack of clients or in attracting clients who can’t or won’t pay what you’re worth.
What Iyabo said made a lot of sense to me. I know in my own life, my relationship with money hasn’t always run smooth. I don’t come from an entrepreneurial background so making money isn’t always seen as a good thing. This makes for some interesting thought processes when you’re in business, let me tell you.
However, when I focus on money, when I focus on cleaning up my relationship with money, things improve.
How? Read More→
Seth Godin says Real Artists Ship. Do you?
Posted by: | CommentsThe other day I was listening to the Marketing Over Coffee podcast featuring an interview with Seth Godin, talking about his new book Linchpin.
While the entire podcast was interesting – as always – there was one section in particular that stood out. Godin said, “real artists ship.”
By artists, he didn’t necessarily mean people who put paint on canvas. He broadened the term to mean anyone who is creative and bringing something new to the market, in particular entrepreneurs. What he really meant is successful entrepreneurs finish what they start and bring new products (or services) to market. They don’t spend forever making it perfect. They get it close enough, then release it.
During the interview they discussed a few well-known cases of companies taking forever to get a new product to market. In some cases, they never quite manage to release.
This got me to thinking about Read More→
Can An Entrepreneur Ever Really Take a Vacation?
Posted by: | CommentsI was chatting with my accountability partner on Monday. We were both coming off a week where we got little done. And neither of us felt particularly guilty or frustrated.
As Helene said, “We Canadians have such a short time with good weather we need to take advantage of it.”
It’s not just Canadians. All small business owners need to give themselves permission to have some down time. I know I tend to be a bit of a work-a-holic. If you’ve been reading this blog for a while you’ve seen me write about going two or three days without even leaving the house!
Even when I leave my home office I don’t always stop working. I have a habit of taking my laptop with me when I want to watch the Jays game or a movie and checking email, reading other people’s blogs or catching up with social media.
Now I’m all for multitasking. I do it all the time. But there comes a time when Read More→
Mindset – Whether Business or Baseball It’s All the Same
Posted by: | CommentsThis past weekend the Toronto Blue Jays had a reunion weekend celebrating the two World Series wins in 1992 and 1993. In the weeks leading up to the weekend, Joe Carter gave a ton of interviews promoting the event.
Any Blue Jays fan remembers Carter leaping with joy after he caught the final out to win the World Series in 1992. And there are few moments more exciting in Canadian sports history than Carter’s walk-off home run to win it all in 1993.
What fascinated me about the interviews Carter gave was his discussions about the mindset Read More→
Don’t Put it Off
Posted by: | CommentsWe’ve all heard the saying, “Don’t put off until tomorrow what you can do today.”
This saying isn’t always applicable. I’ll never get the Martha Stewart good housekeeping award because I firmly believe vacuuming, dusting and laundry should always be put off as long as possible (unless I’m down to my emergency underwear).
But when it comes to business, this is a good adage to follow. There’s nothing worse then having a great idea for a new product or marketing strategy then seeing your competitor implement it.
Now I’ve noticed many entrepreneurs are “idea people”. They come up with far more ideas then they can possibly implement in one lifetime. So it’s inevitable that some of your ideas will be used by others first.
However, if you have an idea that you intend to implement, you create an action plan for this idea but you never Read More→
