Gratitude and Goals for You and Your Business
Published November 24, 2011 | 
Today is Thanksgiving or Turkey day in the U.S. where flocks of turkeys everywhere are being prepared for this day’s traditions. Their time is definitely up today. If we’re all lucky in America, we will all enjoy the results of hours of preparation and eat those birds along with many other traditional delicacies. Most of us will be sharing precious minutes with our loved ones around the table or on the phone.
Now, if you haven’t already figured it out, then let me break it to you that the turkey, although nice, is not really important and what it’s all about today. Many thousands will be eating tofurkey, or even bologna sandwiches, and doing so with the same or even greater level of thanks.
Relationships are what powers us and makes this wonderful world go round. Clearly understand that you and I can’t possibly begin to know who we are, can’t possibly learn and grow, and can’t possibly 
experience the joys and sorrows of life, and pursue elusive happiness, without other people there to help us along our life’s journey.
We ARE the 100%
It doesn’t matter that we either agree or disagree with recent Occupy Wall Street protests that attempt to divide us into the top 1% of earners and everyone else. You and I, along with everyone who actually earns bazillions of dollars are in reality, ONE big living organism. The enormously important element to remember from all this, is what we do as individuals matters to the whole. And as an individual, entrepreneur and business owner, how you live and operate your business matters to the world.
You might think of yourself as small fish right now, but if you’re smart and innovative, can visualize what you want to do, with a little bit of luck mixed in, you’ll grow your business into something as BIG as you want it to be.
Be Grateful and Visualize
So understanding that all of us are affected by the state of the world today, are you totally grateful for the way things are? Would you like to change up a few things?
Most of us don’t start thinking about the tradition of setting goals until New Years. But why wait? There’s no time like the present to take action, right? So be sure to soak up all that gratitude today, and count your blessings!
You can even share your vision for what you’d like to accomplish. Have some fun and enjoy the day’s moments. Use the power of relationships to move forward with the understanding that collective visioning is one of the most powerful things unique to us. And answer questions like, “What would you like to be grateful for this time next year? And how will your business make a difference?
Great Web Entrepreneurs – Life Lessons for Entrepreneurs
Published May 6, 2011 | 
“Life is short and if you’re looking for extension, you had best do well.” – Ben Harper
“Life is short, the art long.” – Hippocrates
“Life is short, so enjoy it to the fullest.” – John Walters
Life teaches us so many lessons entrepreneurs use to successfully start and operate their businesses. We just have to observe and notice life events as they occur to determine what can work in the entrepreneurial business world. Here are just a few life lessons I have observed that entrepreneurs might be able to look closely at, and apply to business with success:
Make sure you always have the right tools. 
No matter what your task is you always need tools to accomplish what you set out to do. Of course, many times people begin a task unprepared with sometimes even no tools, and they have to stop and go through the process of determination of the tools needed and then gathering the tools before proceeding. This takes up valuable time and effort that we can never recover.
Delays caused by not having the right tools can and do ultimately cost the unprepared entrepreneur the success they want badly and are striving for. They should also clearly understand what’s needed and carefully include in the plan the right training, knowledge and skill-sets as well as actual tools.
Set goals. 
It is important to select only one to three important goals on which you can then focus greater attention. Understand that if you establish too many goals, in most cases you will be unable to dedicate enough energy, and more importantly time to each. The common result from too many goals may be failure to achieve some of them, or even worse yet – any of them.
So your understanding should be that if you limit the number of goals and are very specific in the details of each one, you significantly increase your chances to be more successful. The more often you experience success, the more committed you will become to the plans and processes you have developed to achieving success.
The achievement of success in both business and every area of your personal life will become easier if you use the same principles for the determination and establishment of goals. And when you are able to frequently enjoy consistent levels of success, you will take pleasure in a much greater sense of satisfaction.
Always practice your skills a lot in advance of the real business performance. Many times you will be unable to practice and perfect your business skills under the same circumstances as in the live business. A great example of this is when you are to make an important presentation in the very near future it’s hard to account for the same pressure of the live presentation in front of your prospective customers or clientele. 
But if you are able to practice your pitch enough times in front of a soft friendly audience, your presentation skills will improve.
I have always found it fascinating that the fear of speaking in front of any size group is the number one fear on any list of fears ranking survey. Believe it or not, most people fear public speaking even more so than the fear of death.
Make sure to always have fun. Success in life is all about working hard and having fun. I’m know there are countless people who want to own a business, but don’t. They create excuses that they can’t find time to develop many skills and the knowledge needed to be successful, and they are just way too busy with work, or school, or any number of other things they let take their valuable time.
You should understand clearly that while the journey to your success is relatively long, not only do you have to be happy when you get your destination of success, but even more important, you have to enjoy the journey as well. So work hard, but remember to make sure you have a lot of fun too along the way. As they say, life is short.
Most Important Business Questions – Pitfalls and Failures?
Published February 17, 2011 | How to Avoid Common Business Pitfalls and Failures?
Most of us are aware of one of the most common pitfalls that cause business failures, undercapitalization. But let’s look at a few other frequently overlooked common pitfalls important for you to be aware of and avoid.
Ill-considered business plans – Okay, it is extremely important to understand that there’s nothing as bad as entering a funding or money meeting unprepared. By “unprepared” I mean if you haven’t taken the time and put the effort into creating a complete or “full-blown” business plan.
If your plan is missing crucial essentials such as a convincing business description, coherent financial projections and a competitive market analysis, then the people you are meeting with, the ones with the cash won’t commit their valuable time to evaluate your proposal.
Focusing too much on the idea and not enough on the management – 
Although you might have the greatest idea since the light bulb, it’s not enough to simply persuade prospective backers and stake-holders that you’ve developed the next must-have gadget or greatest business concept.
You can never, never overlook the critical nature of the need for a team that can successfully execute the specifics of the business plan, generate the level of revenues required to fully repay a bank loan or just as important accomplish an exit strategy for an angel investor or VC. I find that many business neophytes or novices pay no attention to this vital element of the equation. Without question that can destroy their pursuit of funding and approval.
Understand that showing you have engaged a highly-successful salesperson, a skillful marketer, an accountant with startup experience, and other key personnel and professionals who can provide guidance, is essential to finding funding sources.
Failure to achieve the proper legal agreements and documentation – 
This is arguably more important than a prenuptial agreement for a couple with significant individual assets. Legal documents cover everything from agreement terms to time-lines and can avoid serious acrimony or bad blood.
Inadequate cash flow management – Way too many Entrepreneurs and new business owners burn through seed money too quickly, failing to reach positive-cash flow standing in a well-timed manner.
Some contributory factors, such as economic downturns may be beyond control, but you and your executive team are might be unmistakably at fault for others, such as unnecessary spending and overly optimistic forecasts. Financial stakeholders never look kindheartedly at mismanagement of that nature.
No Website – Simply put, if you have a business today, you need a website. Period.
At the very least, every business needs a professional looking and well-designed website that enables users to easily find out important information about their business. Later, additional ways to generate revenue on the website can be added including ad space, drop-shipping products, or recommending affiliate products. Remember, if you don’t have a website, you’ll most likely be losing business to those that do.
Of course, there are many more mistakes and pitfalls to avoid, and understanding how to both identify and prevent them greatly increases your chances of achieving the goals you set for business success.
The Zen of Success – Visualize the Achievement of Your Success
Published August 17, 2010 | 
Although most people understand this because the concept isn’t new, it can be difficult, if not impossible for some, the importance of being able to visualize not only your success at reaching goals, but how you are going to achieve them. Of course, it takes time for many to develop the level of understanding of the components of your success you need to see the success. After all, how do you know when you reach success if you don’t know how it is going to look?
Now unless you have had some experience with developing insight into success, a technique you can use to start the process is to begin by writing about the general idea you have for success, and don’t worry about writing much detail at this point, as you will start to think about it more and more. This is a direct result of you taking the first actions toward defining your success, and you might even make changes as your visualization becomes clearer before you go on to the next step.
To continue the process, sit down and write everything on paper in as much detail as you can possibly come up with, and should find that you will continue to add to the detail and it might even take you a few hours to a few days, or even a few weeks to complete. 
The length of time does not matter to the success of defining your visualization of success. You must understand that here’s what you’re doing…
By allowing yourself to get VERY clear, concise, exact and thorough, you are going through the process of complete immersion in this new reality. If you can relax and not try to force what you are trying to accomplish, you might notice that a deep spiritual ability we all share to make the real world match the reality which WE create for ourselves. The truth is most of us never realized or just forgot we have the ability within each of us, and some are able to develop it more than others.
You must understand the exterior world is a collection of illusions that our senses experience every day, but individually WE can create our own worlds that we can exert great control over, and through this extremely important exercise, YOU are creating your world and doing it thoroughly.
With time and will power to continue, you will begin to THINK in this new reality, and it will become a part of your spirit, who you are, and the tapestry of life YOU weave.
And then one day in the not too distant future, you’re more than likely to pull out that sheet of paper, read exactly what you wrote, and simply be amazed at just how much of it happened as you visualized. But, you won’t be surprised, and you will know very well it wasn’t luck, because YOU created the world around you, and you just did it according to a design spec which YOU made.