by Joseph Graves | Jan 21, 2014 | 30 Day Blog Challenge, Articles
A Small Investment in Time
There are many ways to improve how you operate a business. One of the easiest ways is to learn from others, it’s also the cheapest…especially if you use the library. Fortunately, most great business books don’t come from Harvard and many of them could be read in a weekend.
Obviously this list is only a start, but if you read just these three and applied just some of what they say, your business would be better for it. Heck, I’d even have your employees read them…but maybe that’s another post?
What books have changed the way you work?
by Joseph Graves | Jan 20, 2014 | 30 Day Blog Challenge, Workshed News
Ways to be Average
Todays post is a continuation of yesterday’s theme of being realistic. Really this is a 2-for-1 repost of a pair of posts by Zen Pencils, where he creates comics from inspirational quotes.
The first is a quote from Chris Guillebeau about 11 ways to be average. In it, he reveals the formula for living a boring and unremarkable life. For those unfamiliar with Chris, he is a Portland resident, author of “The Art of Non Conformity” and “The $100 Startup,” host of the annual World Domination Summit, and has nearly accomplished his goal of visiting every country on the planet.
Click the images to see the entire comic.
The Timing Always Sucks
It’s almost stating the obvious, but it’s true that for the most important things in life the timing can always be better. To put it another way, there will always be a reason not to do something; especially stuff that really matters. The second quote is by Tim Ferriss from his first book, “The Four Hour Work Week.” Tim is know for his “lifestyle hacking” (among other things), and like him or not, it’s hard to ignore his ability to distill things down to their essence. Be it a skill or life philosophy.
It’d be easy to dismiss what both of these guys are saying, if what they were saying wasn’t so important to living a life worth living. We are not automatons whose only function is to perform some mundane task with ever increasing efficiency.
Do something Interesting…then tell us about it. You never know who or what you might inspire.
by Joseph Graves | Jan 19, 2014 | 30 Day Blog Challenge, Articles
Get out of your own way
Sometimes we get in our own way and limit what we are capable of doing to what our perception is of what we should be doing. Often this is defined as being realistic or reasonable. But ask yourself, when has greatness ever been achieved through being realistic? Was it realistic for Edison to fail 10,000 times before finding a filament that would work in the light bulb? Is it reasonable to invest your entire (considerable) fortune to sell shoes online as Tony Hsieh did with Zappos? How reasonable was it for anyone that’s done anything of significance, to do so before they were successful?
Sometimes you just have to be unrealistic. Sure, failure is always a possibility and so is success, but only if you are willing to be a bit unreasonable once in a while.
Being realistic is the most common path to mediocrity.
-Will Smith
Always go with your passions. Never ask yourself if it’s realistic or not.
-Deepak Chopra
Today, let’s take a step away from rational thought and dare to be bold. What’s one thing you’ve always wanted to accomplish but have been afraid to pursue?
Write it down. Also write down the obstacles in your way of reaching your goal. Finally, write down a tangible plan to overcome each obstacle.
The only thing left is to, you know, actually go make it happen. What are you waiting for?
-Matt Cheuvront
I don’t think anything is unrealistic if you believe you can do it.
-Richard L Evans
You must do the thing you think you cannot do.
-Eleanor Roosevelt
What would you do differently if being realistic wasn’t holding you back?
Reply in the comments below or send me an email, I’d love to hear from you.
by Joseph Graves | Jan 18, 2014 | Workshed News
Deserve’s got nothing to do with it
From the Clint Eastwood western ‘Unforgiven‘. I don’t know why, but it’s always stuck with me. I think it means that you never should be satisfied with where you are. You have to prove yourself day in and day out. I think it’s particularly relevant in business. We need to always seek to provide value to our clients and never rest on our laurels. We aren’t entitled to success, we have to earn it.
http://youtu.be/dpDkYZWeeVg
by Joseph Graves | Jan 17, 2014 | 30 Day Blog Challenge, Articles
Letting Go
You may think of “letting go” as something that applies to you emotionally rather than in business, but that’s really not the case. Many people who have been dedicated industry professionals for years have a hard time letting go. They get comfortable in the way they do things and that can really hurt a business or at the very least, stunt it’s growth.
The fact of the matter is, in order to move forward in business – just as in any part of our lives – we have to be willing to let go of the things that don’t serve us anymore.
This applies to more than just policy and procedure…it applies to the way you position yourself in your industry as well. Forward thinking and innovation have cornered the market and if you can’t keep up you will be left behind.
It’s not always easy implementing new procedures, and learning to use new tools can be frustrating at first, but the reward is worth it. Streamlining your business will never be something that you regret and being open to new ideas, well…as Albert Einstein so eloquently put it:
The measure of intelligence is the ability to change.
