Partnership had Power

I'm a solo-preneur. I work alone. My 'business' is a one-man operation and I am rarely afforded the luxury of having someone else to talk to, bounce ideas off of and encourage me to push myself.

This has advantages and disadvantages. Certainly it's nice to be able to set my own schedule, make my own decisions, and otherwise be my own boss. The downside is that it can get lonely all alone and without someone to push us, challenge us and critique us, it can be very easy to get settled in our ways and cease to grow and improve.

That's why this year, I have taken an active decision to partner with people, both in and outside of, my industry, in order to help me grow, change and improve. I'm working in a master-mind group with other speakers and though leaders to share ideas, bounce ideas off each other and hone my skills.

I'm working with a group of other speakers/authors on a joint-venture project so that we can mutually promote each others' ideas, products and services to each others' clients and thus spread our reach beyond our personal sphere of influence.

Finally, I'm also working with a mentor who is where I want to be, to help guide my actions in order to achieve the success that I'm seeking.

Today I want to ask you, what are you doing to partner with others to raise your level of success? Are you employing the wisdom, experience and contacts of others to help you grow and improve? If you're not, I encourage you to take that step. Seek out other like-minded people and start a master-mind group. A group of people who are all interested in self-improvement and professional development. They might be from the same field, but they need not be. All that matters is that they are all interested in getting better and that they are willing to invest time and energy to achieve those results.

Call a few people who you think would make good mastermind group partners and schedule a meeting. You can meet once a month, once a week or a few times a year. What's important is that everyone be invested in improving, both themselves and the other members. You will find you can help each other and collectively you will achieve much more than you could have alone.

Good luck! And keep me posted. Let me know how it goes.

Get Out of Your Own Way

This week I wanted to write about one of the greatest obstacles you will ever face on the road to success. It’s an obstacle that is especially frightening because it can be so stealthy, you won’t even realize that it’s impeding your progress. That obstacle, is you! Whether your goals are personal or professional, whether you’re working at becoming a better partner or a better golfer, one of the biggest keys to your success is getting out of your own way.

Have you ever been set a goal or yourself, and been ever-so-close to achieving it, only to fall short? Have you ever experienced the frustration that comes from reaching a plateau where you just can’t seem to make any progress in whatever you’re doing? More often than not, the reason for these road blocks is that you’re getting in the way of your own success. Sometimes the best thing you can do to help yourself succeed is to get out of the way and let success happen.

I’m a runner. Everyday, I see the power that we have to help or hinder our personal performance. When someone starts running for the first time, they notice great gains in fitness and speed almost instantly. Within weeks they are able to run farther, faster and with less effort than when they began. This rate of progress continues for different periods of time for different people, but eventually, everyone reaches a plateau. Progress slows down, or almost stops entirely. It can be a very frustrating time, especially for those who are very competitive.

The mistake that many people make when they reach a plateau is that they begin to train harder, farther and faster thinking that more effort will produce better results. However, what often happens is exactly the opposite. Rather than getting stronger and faster, they stagnate or in some cases, their performance gets worse. Why, because these people are getting in the way of their own success.

The same principal applies in all aspects of life. Whether you’re a student studying for a test, a young executive trying to climb the corporate ladder, or an independent business person trying to grow your enterprise, sometimes the best thing you can do, is just get out of the way and let things happen.

Am I saying that hard work isn’t necessary? Absolutely not. Success doesn’t just happen without working at it. You can’t just sit in a chair ad think about your success and expect it to find you. Success requires action. That’s one of the central flaws with “The Secret” that’s gained such great popularity is that it seems to imply that action isn’t necessary (but that’s another article).

While action is necessary to create your success, too much action can be as detrimental as no action at all. It can be tempting to get in the drawn in by the idea that we should always be doing something to create our success. With that attitude we can begin to feel like if we aren’t doing something all the time, we’re failing, but sometimes the best thing you can do to succeed, is to not do a thing.

Cooperation. Amazing things happen when we work together.

This past week I had the opportunity to do some professional development training with a colleague. I learned a lot, but the most powerful lesson was the reminder about the power of cooperation. By having someone who knows my field, to bounce ideas off of, I was able to come up with new strategies and outlooks that I could never have created alone.

You've probably heard of a principal called "synergy". Synergy has became a major buzzword a over the last decade or so. In fact it's been used so much that it's probably lost it's meaning for many, but it's a powerful concept that anyone who wants to succeed in business, in school and in life, should understand. Synergy is defined as: 'two or more agents working together to produce a result not obtainable by any of the agents independently'. In other words, in math 2 + 2=4 but in synergy, 2+2 might equal 10.

"Pyramid" or Multi-Level Marketing businesses employ this principal very effectively. Say what you will about these types of businesses, they understand the concept of exponential growth and synergy. They understand that four people working together can accomplish more than double what two people can.

So where could you be employing synergy in your life right now? Who should you call to talk about a project? Make this the week you start to think cooperatively!