Anne is bright and easily sees the big strategic picture for growing the business.  But she is also judgmental and holds grudges.  When co-workers do things she doesn’t approve of, she stops speaking to them.   Instead of seeing her potential and what she contributes to the success of the company, people see someone who is “moody”.

When a mentor recently took her aside to speak to her about this perception and made suggestions on how to improve her professional reputation, instead of listening and taking the advice on board, Anne went on the hunt to find out who had “ratted” on her.  She missed the whole point of the lesson the mentor was trying to teach her.

If you constantly blame other people  and point out their faults, you are only hurting your own chances of success.  Highly successful business people focus on what they can control and work hard to create success for themselves and the team around them.  They take responsibility for building a strong reputation for themselves and realize that working well with others is a key component for good leadership.

– Warren Buffett, Berkshire Hathaway, CEO

Are you patching the same leaks in your life or business over and over?  Too many of us turn a blind eye to stuff that isn’t working well for us, chronically thinking that if we just work harder, try harder, get better at ________, things will change.

This kind of approach doesn’t work.  If I dropped you right now into a leaking rowboat, chances are you would immediately jump out of it and find a new boat to journey in.  Why is life any different?

Use that survival instinct to your advantage.  Take a long look at stuff that isn’t working for you any longer and jettison it.  Life is brief and too many of us waste precious days putting up with stuff that isn’t good for us.  So take action today, and get rid of one thing you’ve been trying to patch for too long.  Go float a new boat!

What is a Dumbwaiter pitch?  It’s the one-word description of your business that tells people what you do.  He has some great examples of what doesn’t work.  And some that work extraordinarily well.  Have a read and see what you come up with for your dumbwaiter pitch!

Regardless of how busy you are, make sure you are spending time doing business development.  For example, your time may currently be divided amongst the following activities:

• Money-making/Billable Activities
• Business Development Activities
• Skills/Personal Development Activities
• Administrative Activities

How much time are you spending in each area?  I’ve found that a 60/20/10/10 respective percentage split works well in a business-as-usual state.  You spend 60% of your time on activities that contribute to your bottom line, 20% of your time on business development and strategic planning, 10% polishing or acquiring new skills, and no more than 10% on administrative tasks like paperwork, invoicing, and e-mails.

You may decide to have a different allocation, which is great.  The important thing is to know where you are and where you would like to be, so you can make the necessary changes to ensure you are leveraging your time intentionally.  What do you need to do to get to where you want to be?

As a young entrepreneur working with other entrepreneurs, I am constantly studying their business tactics and strategies. As the saying goes, the bricklayer never gets around to finishing his chimney and the seamstress rarely sews for herself. Similarly, I’ve noticed that some people in business don’t always take personal advantage of their own expertise.

Whether it’s managing, organizing, arranging, consulting or selling – customers or clients may glimpse into an  entrepreneur’s personal life and see a disconnect. Most of us are aware of this and I believe it is a big source of stress.  That nagging feeling of “I’ll get around to it,” is an unnecessary burden to carry through the day.

For the rest of the week, treat yourself like your own client, take the advice and wisdom that you give others – finish laying the bricks on your chimney or complete your unsewn dress.

Into every life comes those tasks that are unpleasant and IMPORTANT.   Just because you don’t like doing them doesn’t mean you should postpone them indefinitely.   By doing that, they often grow in size and become big issues with serious consequences attached if not dealt with.  But even more importantly, don’t you get sick of that nagging voice in your head that keeps reminding you that you need to deal with that issue?

To me that’s even worse than simply sitting down and taking care of that unpleasant important task.  Then it’s over and I can get my peace of mind back.

For a variety of reasons you have decided that prospecting is a horrible task, so you grudgingly find a few prospects or perhaps they stumble across you. However it happens, you hang onto those prospects forever, waiting for them to buy. Because as long as you are focused on waiting for an answer from them, you do not have to find other prospects. Because if you do, and they all buy from you, how will you ever manage all that new business? (I actually had a business owner say that to me.)

STOP! To survive in business today, you must get rid of the clutter of old prospects who are hanging around tying up your time and energy. For every old one you hang onto, you are missing the opportunity to find a customer that is likely to buy from you. Show me a business owner who is not making money and I will show you someone who is doing very little prospecting. Dust off that prospect list – clean off those prospects who are dragging their feet on buying. Focus your time and energy on finding ones who will.

I have come to realize that time management can make or break the success of a business. When is busy being productive? The trap I see for entrepreneurs is that productivity creates administrative busyness. It is easy to fill time by looking after the administrative duties of a business; that’s why many hard working people watch as their incomes drop.

A simple approach to evaluating the productivity of your work is to list your business related activities over the period of a week. If administrative tasks take up more than 20% of your time, these should be delegated to an assistant. The value of your hired help can be calculated by figuring your own hourly wage when you do only what is productive. Look at where your time is most valuable and aim to delegate out all the other daily tasks that just need to get done.  Don’t get busy, get productive.