I rarely do this. I’m pointing you to an incredible blog with an incredible message.
I’m an avid reader of Chris Brogan’s blog and tweets — he is THE guru of social media and tours the world helping organizations efficiently and effectively employ it in their marketing. Well . . . he hosted a guest post from Tommy Walker that knocked my socks off.
I went through all 106 excuses and to be honest — I find many of them creep into my head from time to time. This information is a great way to stop that from happening and ensure you stay on your chosen path to greatness.
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P.S. What excuses do you use to keep you from being great? Let’s talk. I’ve worked with thousands of business owners and executives and have helped them manage their ‘de-motivational’ behaviors — call or email me to schedule a complimentary session.
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These are fun! And they are about choice. Two struck me because of a current experience:
Failure would destroy you.
A few years ago I worked as a freelance consultant under the umbrella of a man whose business acumen I respected. You know the drill. I paid a desk fee and invoiced under their Terms and Conditions etc. We fed ideas to and from each other and built up a sizeable business. The market changed, he chose to diversify, I chose to retire. He earned money, I earned a lovely lifestyle. I have no regrets, but he, it seems, did. He surrounded himself with the trappings of wealth and lived the lifestyle he believed a successful man leads. He over reached himself and his world came crashing down. He saw himself as a failure, and took his own life a couple of weeks ago.
It was not his alleged failure that destroyed him, so far as those of us he worked with can assess, it was his image of what success was. He was perfectly capable of rebuilding from where he was, but his failure was to see that, not the huge financial catastrophe that he allowed to happen to him. In my eyes he was a successful man. In his eyes he had reached the end of everything.
Perhaps the idea of failure destroying you depends on whose eyes behold the current status as failure. If I perceive I am a failure, then i am. If you perceive I am a failure, I am damned if I won’t prove you wrong.
It’s not financially sound.
I know all this because I was asked if I wanted to pick up the consultancy he was doing. My immediate reaction was to agree. Then I looked at the reality of what he was doing. His work was to delivery what is tantamount to legal advice to large corporations who would then rely on that advice. I stepped back and checked the legal position with a few folk.
To pick up this work would require many steps to insulate myself, personally, from the risk of law suits should my putative advice lead to a failure by one of my yet to be signed up clients. That I can do the work and do it well is not the question. It’s work I’ve done often, under his old umbrella and under his Ts & Cs and, presumably, under his PI cover. But, the more I looked at it, the more it came to me that this is work that only a practicing lawyer should perform. It’s not a qualification thing so much as a PI and liability limitation thing.
For the right potential reward this is a non issue. We spend money in order to earn money. I can obtain PI cover. I can re-incorporate, but the return on this work, the more so since I’d have ben coming out of retirement to perform a favour, was simply not worth the serious financial investment, et alone the risk if the Ts & Cs and PI cover weren’t watertight.
For my friend, the qualified practicing lawyer, to whom I’ve introduced the work, this is a non issue. She has all the cover she needs as part of her firm anyway. For her the business is financially sound. For me it was not.
So the argument about financial soundness also depends upon where you stand.
Tim, that is a very sad story. To me the choice is about reinventing oneself while we endure the Great Recession more than 106 excuses. Your friend, me and you — all of us — have done our best to combat the 106+ roadblocks to the ongoing challenge of reinvention of our personal brand. It’s exhausting and debilitating. To say “He was perfectly capable of rebuilding from where he was. Perfectly capable… who are you to say?
“It’s fairly well established that upwards of 90% of those taking their own lives suffer from a diagnosable mental illness at the time, with the overwhelming majority not being in active treatment,” says M. David Rudd, dean of the College of Social and Behavioral Science at the University of Utah.
The toll of suicide in this terrible economy is vastly underestimated. It is about choice — and I suggest choosing compassion — beginning with yourself for losing a respected colleague.
Sad? Yes. Worthy of a lecture from you to me? No. You have no idea whatsoever about whether I am compassionate or not. You may assume I am, or am not at your free choice. Of course he had a diagnosable mental illness. At the very least he was suffering form clinical depression. None of that was the point of my comment. I have a feeling you focussed on the wrong part, somehow.
“This terrible economy” was caused by greedy US bankers who somehow decided that sub-prime mortgages could be ‘securitised’ and whose greed infected global banking systems. There is plenty of profitable work to be had, if one looks for it.
Great food for thought (and action) Rich. Thanks for sharing!