Working smart as well as hard…

Don’t let anyone convince you that making your first million is easy. Sure you can win the lottery or receive an inheritance and yes, we have all read stories about how someone made a million quick and easy – because the media will seek out those newsworthy stories because it is everyone’s dream of doing so.

The fact is that every self-made millionaire that I have met – and I have met a lot – works hard! Some may well indeed spend time by the pool or on the beach with a computer – but they are still working – and they have organized a team of sub-contracted individuals that do all the backroom work.

Inevitably there comes a time when you will not have to work, as your investments from the capital that you have generated deliver a passive income. Most successful entrepreneurs I know, myself included, continue to work very hard because it is their nature to do so. But we work hard at what we enjoy doing – in which case, do not so much consider it as work, but more a way of life.

The true entrepreneur never actually stops ‘seeing’ opportunity or ‘thinking’ about how to extract value from it – it is the nature of being an entrepreneur.

However, the frustrating fact of life is that most determined, ambitious people that work hard, very hard, never actually get to enjoy a 7-figure income. They work hard in the genuine belief that they will get rich but they don’t, even though they enjoy a good lifestyle. So there has to be other factors involved than working hard.

Most people spend their whole life believing that no matter how hard they work they do not deserve riches. Others think that to have money you need to be frugal – a very effective inhibition to wealth.

You need to understand the concept of working smart as well as hard.

You know that, but let’s be honest, the reality is that for the most of the time, even though you know it’s the wrong way, you are too busy spending your working life not working smart. For me working smart is knowing, metaphorically speaking…

The right destination that it is absolutely essential to reach.

Having the right vehicle that will take us on this road to riches – without breaking down!

Having the right fuel essence that ensures that the vehicle will get us there.

And, finally, being the very best driver we can possible become – while actually driving – to get through all the inevitable and frustrating hazards.

http://www.TheMonacoMentor.com

Positioning v. Prospecting

Customers are of course the life-blood of a business – for without them there is no business – without customers it is impossible to get rich.

And to get customers what is the best thing people in sales are taught to do? Prospecting. Every new business that seeks new customers will be advised to go prospecting.

Prospecting is what you must do, everyone will tell you. Yet, here lies the biggest fallacy of all – Prospecting always will be, the weakest link in the chain of selling.

Prospecting is horrible! I personally hate it. Prospects hate being prospected. But for 20 years I was prospecting like an obsessive old ‘forty-niner’ in the California gold-rush up to the armpits in sludge looking for a scrap of gold until I realized it was the worst, most demeaning methodology for winning new customers, new business and earning money through selling.

From 1975 to 1995 I would actively prospect. I was good at it, was told I was a natural at it. As a young Estate Manager (actually a Man Friday, but I had a boss that believed in great titles!) of 20 years old I had to prospect for new tenants.

As an Estate Agent (which actually was a step up) I would regularly prospect new vendors and clients. As a Property Developer (at last my own boss!) I would prospect the proverbial horses to water desperate to dunk their bewildered heads in it. As a deal-maker I would prospect banks for finance, sellers and purchasers. In the early nineties, when empire building, I would prospect every night of the week. I would prospect to the point of exhaustion – to get another client.

I finally had an epiphany: A moment of utter realization that what I was doing was utterly misguided – that there was a far better way of building a business that ensured profitable and sustainable growth – without ever having to prospect again! 

I finally realized that Positioning beats Prospecting every time.

You see when you focus on positioning yourself as the very best at what you do and discipline yourself to ensure you can deliver then prospects will seek you out because they want the expertise you can deliver for them.

If I had continued prospecting I would have continued to waste my time (or my life) in talking to people that were either not interested in talking to me and unable to actually make a decision even if they were interested or people that could not hide the fact that I was wasting their time and wanted to defend themselves against me persuading them (i.e. trying to bamboozle).

Ultimately people buy people, not products or services and all of us want the assurance that who we are dealing with will deliver on their promise.

Irrespective of what business you are in, because every business is ultimately the same – it relies on prospects/leads being converted into one-time buyers that in turn choose to become life-long customers. So forget about prospecting ever again – start positioning yourself as the best at what you do, make or supply.

http://www.themonacomentor.com/

 

Identify what your strengths are…

At school I was good at history. To make the grade of being ‘a good all rounder’ my teachers decided that I must concentrate on math – which I really was bad at – at the expense of history. The result was that I was mediocre at both!

We seem to have become a society with an obsession for fixing what’s wrong. Current practice in society and business is routed in the belief that weakness is the opposite of strength –  as illness is to health, failure to success. Wrong. They are not. Each has its own pattern of behaviour and follows its own particular configuration. In which case studying weakness will not lead to us to improving strength.

In the UK, for example, in researching what keeps families together, emphasis is placed on resolving the weaknesses that cause break up, rather than on developing the strengths that bond them.

The common practice of fixing weaknesses to make an individual, a family, team or company, stronger and better does NOT work. It is a practice that creates average and created on the misnomer that if you can identify all the weaknesses in an individual, team or company, you can then dissolve them by developing them into strengths.

The principle, however, is very clear:

Just for a moment think about your greatest mistake or failure.  OK got it?

Now think of your greatest success or achievement.  Harder isn’t it?

Why? Because our whole mindset is programmed to root out weaknesses in ourselves and in others.

We have been well conditioned at school to listen critically – for what we don’t agree with. Our fine-tuning is centered on the weaknesses in the argument.

I say it is far better to Find Out What You Are Good At And Do More Of It. 

Find Out What You Are Not Good At And Don’t Do It.

When you identify what your strengths are and focus solely on them, your weaknesses do not count. In excelling in what you are brilliant at, your weaknesses become unimportant.

Learning to recognize our strengths and developing the courage to channel our energy into developing them, will transform us into the leaders and achievers in our specific fields.

 

http://www.themonacomentor.com/

We need a new level of thinking…

OUR PERCEPTIONS MAKE US see things that simply are not there. They make us cynical, skeptical. But what if our fundamental perceptions are wrong and we are not prepared to test them because we have always done something in a certain manner? Much of our heritage has conditioned us to respond in an historical, rather than a functional manner.

When asked why we have done something in a certain way, we tend to reply ‘because of this’ or ‘because of that’ rather than ‘in order that we can achieve this, or that’. The consequence of this way of thinking is that, at detriment to ourselves we tend to view the future merely as an extension of the past.

Anything that does not fit in with our preconditioned way of thinking is rejected! The way that we see the world, not in the visual but in the perceptive sense, is the way it is. In order to change our world we have to change the way we perceive it.

The process of perceiving involves matching external jigsaw pieces with an internal picture that has been created from previous memories, experiences and conditioning. Each of us does not actually see the world as it is; we actively construe it to fit our perceived expectations.

We react to situations with our own rules that, though often prejudiced, are in accordance with our expectations.

We must learn how to respond to situations, rather than react, because:

Our inherent challenge is that new ideas invariably cause change, inevitably cause uncertainty, and often cause more work. The fixed mindset that regards the future merely as an extension to the past must be reset. (A fixed mindset means a predominant way of thinking and seeing, that continuously strengthens itself as we make sense of our world in ways that support established assumptions or beliefs).

Our attitudes and behaviours are the outgrowth of our assumptions to the point that the way we see the situation ‘is’ the situation. Each of us assumes that the way we see things is the way they are. How appropriate that this word breaks down into ass, u and me.

A change in our ideas is usually brought about not solely by our ‘will’ but by other ideas, different levels of thinking.

An experience such as this occurs when new light is suddenly shed on something familiar.

As soon as this happens, new boundaries and new horizons can be viewed, because when the rules change everyone goes back to the same point. The past guarantees nothing if the rules change. Until we are able to drop unwarranted assumptions about others and prejudices on new ideas, we cannot expect to bring about lasting improvements in our wealth or life.

IF WE ARE UNAWARE OF OUR particular mindsets, how do we change them? In order to change them we must recognize that we have them.

First it is important to accept that your mindsets do affect you – that you can suffer as well as grow with them, and that they can be an impediment to development and achievement.

Next you have to look into areas of your life where you experience a discomfort. Wherever there is a discomfort in either your personal or business life, you are suffering from a fixed mindset, and unless you address the mindset that formalizes the process you will continue to have a recurrence of that discomfort.

WE NEED A NEW LEVEL OF THINKING.

Because if we carry on doing what we have always done we will carry on getting what we have always got. We have got to stretch our boundaries to reach greater horizons.

With new thinking our horizons can be constantly stretched providing greater opportunities for  Turning our Potential into Prosperity…

Ideas are worthless unless they are correctly executed

Thomas Edison, the most prolific entrepreneurial inventor in history said: “Nearly everyone who develops an idea works it up to the point where it looks impossible, and then gets discouraged. That’s not the place to become discouraged…many of life’s failures are people who did not realize how close they were to success when they gave up… ideas don’t make you rich, the correct execution of ideas is what makes you rich.”

Edison was the founder of 14 companies, including General Electric – still one of the largest publicly traded companies in the world even 80 years after his death and the holder of 1,093 US patents in his name.

He invented world-changing appliances including the electric light-bulb, the motion picture camera and phonograph. Yet Edison only ever did 3 months of official school! He suffered a hearing impairment and, as the seventh and last child of his parents, had to develop entrepreneurial characteristics to supplement his income as an impoverished youth. What Edison learned above all was that even the greatest ideas, inventions, products or services are absolutely worthless unless they are correctly executed.

Fact of Life:

The worst idea properly executed will make more money than the best idea left alone.

Fact of Life:

A pathetic book properly marketed will enjoy more readership than a great work.

Fact of Life:

The life-changing invention will not be life-changing without correct execution.

Fact of Life:

The product that has the potential to make you a million will make you nothing and may even incur great loss without correct execution

Fact of Life:

The best service talked about will never be experienced or recommended without correct execution.

Fact of Life:

Correct execution demands correct Marketing.

Fact of Life:

Right Product, Right Service, Right Execution = Right Rewards!

Fact of Life:

Without correct execution of your ideas, products or services you fail. And when you fail to do so, you literally execute your ideas, products and services. You do not reap rewards. You do not become rich. Execute or be executed!

 

http://www.themonacomentor.com/

Serve Yourself Through Your Customers

Good business involves putting emotional value in what you do. Customers can make or break a business – and they increasingly know it. No longer will they tolerate being treated like just another transaction; they will vote with their feet and become a competitor’s customer.

What customers need, want and now even demand, is to be valued. When they feel valued they appreciate it – really appreciate it. At that time they become Ambassadors, recommending you and your service or product to others. Now, here is the key that most people never use to open the door and let in increased revenue and profit and no extra cost:

Ask your customers to recommend you and thank them for doing so.

Morris Sharizi is the founder of AeroToyStore – the exclusive provider of jets with Pininfarina tailored interiors. The world famous Italian artisan of luxury cars was attracted by Sharizi’s reputation for delivering outstanding service. Shirazi serves wealthy individuals, from private equity moguls and corporate bosses to celebrities and sultans – some waiting up to five years for new jets and everyone becomes an ambassador, recommending Sharizi to new clients. Sharizi is self-made, purchasing a car from his earnings selling pizzas, customizing it and selling it on. He asked customers to recommend him and they did so.

Customers are your best assets so use their testimonials – they will build your business better than you and at zero cost. It costs a lot of money to get a new customer – so stop losing them and turn them into ambassadors instead. All you have to do is to make sure that your service is outstanding, that you deliver what you promise. Then ask. And then reward them and the best way to reward – though it is a good idea to develop a motivating reward system – is to thank them for doing so.

That is why…the best way to serve yourself is through serving your CUSTOMERS!

http://www.colinturner.com/books/41/secret-service

The Harsh Reality of Life…

I was born in 1954, the same year that Rationing came to an end, 9 years after World War II. Rationing, first introduced in 1940, had an inhibiting influence on many young people, people like my parents.

During those 14 years of rationing they went from being teenagers to meeting each other, to courting, to eloping, to marriage, and then to having 3 children. They had been conditioned ‘to make do without’ – it had been instilled in to them during those all-important years – so the end of rationing did not make much difference to their thinking.

The caravan I was born in, just North of Inverness in The Highlands of Scotland, had no running water, or electricity and relied on paraffin for heating, lighting and cooking.

At meal times all of us squeezed round the table and no-one was allowed to leave an empty plate. Often the topic for discussion was about money, how it was important not to waste it, as it was a scarce commodity: ‘Money did not grow on trees.’

I was brought up to believe that there was a limited amount of wealth in the world. If someone was lucky enough to have something, it involved another having to go without. One person’s addition was the result of another’s subtraction. If a person was lucky to get rich, it was at the expense of another’s poverty.

I developed an inhibition toward money believing that if I were good I would receive my fair share. That money was hard earned and if you needed more then you worked harder. If it came easy then it had been made unjustly or immorally.

This thinking stayed with me until I was helping out at a large charity event. In the hubbub of idle chitchat a moment suddenly appeared when I found myself alone with the philanthropist who was making the huge donation.

I remarked to him what a wonderful thing he was doing to donate so much of his hard- earned money. He looked at me, smiled confidently and said:  “Wealth is not hard-earned young man, it is smartly earned.”

I must have looked puzzled, yet intrigued, because he added: “Change your thinking and it becomes smartly earned. Let me tell you a little secret: Everyone has the power to attract money, they just never work out how to use it.”

Before I could ask why, the philanthropist was whisked away by one of the organizers and I stood there for a full minute without moving.

From that moment on I promised myself to change my thinking – though, to be honest, I did not have the least idea how to go about it. Yet there are times when someone says something or you read something, and though you are unable to substantiate it and have difficulty in accepting it, something resonates deep inside you as a profound truth.

I persistently searched and studied and I finally understood what the philanthropist had shared with me. Within 12 months my income had gone from a paltry £1,000 a year (this was 35 years ago – the equivalent today of £12,000) to £15,000 (the equivalent of £150,000 today).

I discovered that THE HARSH REALITY OF LIFE is that most people have been conditioned to have a wealth inhibition – The very opposite  of the force vital for wealth attraction!

It is your inhibition that makes the difference. I do not say to my children what was said to me – ‘Money does not grow on trees’, or ‘Make certain you get your fair share.’  I want them to understand that the moment you let go of your inhibitions toward money, you turn on your full power for it to begin flowing toward you.

To attract wealth you must find it attractive – like it – want it.

When you have it you can give it away however you wish. – That is entirely up to you.

The Power of Choice

Did you know that YOUR POWER OF CHOICE, your ultimate freedom must be your greatest power… and that you have the power to think whatever you choose to allow into your head? The freedom of choice is your birthright; your circumstances have nothing to do with your destiny, they are merely the result of past choices or non-choice.

Using your power of choice to make decisions determines your future. Successful people choose to make decisions. Unsuccessful people choose to prevaricate.

Your thoughts are your own, uniquely yours to keep, change, share or contemplate. No one else can get inside your head and experience your own thoughts. When you command your thoughts you determine your feelings and you can choose how you respond in a particular situation. It follows that you can choose NOT to react to situations. This gives you command over yourself.

This means that you can no longer blame circumstances for any situation you find yourself in.

People are always blaming their circumstances for what they are. I don’t believe in circumstances. The people who get on in this world are the people who get up and look for the circumstances they want, and if they can’t find them, they make them.

When we start to examine our lives in the light of choices we have made or, more significantly, failed to make, then we can start to see that we are the person responsible for how we feel.  Right now it is important to accept that you are the sum total of your choices made to date from your current thinking. It follows that, with new thinking and new choices, you can decide to be, have or do anything you want for the future.

Admittedly, it is hard to think in new ways. Consider, for example, when you learned to drive. There were three pedals but only two feet and getting to grips with letting out the clutch slowly and pushing down the throttle at the same rate as you released the clutch seemed a real problem when the same foot was needed for the brake. Suddenly, a million mental signals later no thinking is necessary – driving is just second nature. When did you believe that you could drive? A thought becomes a belief when you’ve worked on it repeatedly, not when you simply try it once and use your initial inability as the excuse for giving up.

It is important to also know that though you do have the freedom in your choice of action you don’t have the choice of the consequence. These are always predetermined by the principle of cause and effect where thoughts are causes and conditions are effects. The only way one can make a choice of results or consequence is by making the right choices of actions and attitudes. When you pay for a bad choice you usually pay for it later, but the good that comes to you must be paid for in advance.

Frustration is experienced by wanting to have our cake and eat it; also, by wanting both the pleasures and prestige of one choice and the consequences of another. This is, of course, not possible but many people spend their lives trying to ‘beat the system’ and when it doesn’t work their way they will blame bad luck, fate or someone else for the outcome. But you can stay in command by choosing again if the original outcome is not to your liking. For example, if you are following a route and you choose a wrong turn you can choose to make a detour to get back to where you want to go – you don’t have to accept that the first road is the one you must stay on, or moreover abort the journey. Yet many people after having made the wrong choice will just give up. The choices you make must be your own.

We are much more powerful than we choose to believe and this sense of personal power is sometimes difficult to cope with. It is much easier to believe our conditioning that tells us that situations outside affect us inside, that dreams don’t come true and that we must accept our lot. You must realize that you can choose and must choose. It must be better to attempt great things even if sometimes we risk failure, than to stand on the sidelines of life.

When it comes to our power of choice my motto is:    Right Choice, Right Outcome; Wrong Choice, Choose Again

That Decision Will Serve You Well

That decision will serve you well because it is decisions that finally generate turning points in our life.

Turning points that make the difference to increasing both monetary net worth and personal self worth. And the two are certainly linked.

Each of us has the power of decisive choice and indeed it is our decisions and never our conditions or circumstances that direct us to attracting money, opportunity, the right people, the right know-how and the right direction.

One of the prime secrets to attracting wealth and money is to know how to apply our decisive choice. I learned this the hard way and paid millions for the lesson.

Almost 20 years ago, in 1991, I went from owning a portfolio of £6 million with an income of £20,000 a month to being personally bankrupt. A knock on the door of my Edwardian Mansion overlooking the river on a Christmas Eve was the first signal that a joint- venture partner – a national building company with 130 year heritage – had collapsed and was about to bring me down with them.

Why? Because I had made the wrong decision and as I discovered much later, I didn’t have to make that choice.

I could argue that I DID NOT HAVE all the information I should have had, nor would or could not get the right advice. Ultimately, however, it was because of my decision.

I ALLOWED it to happen to me. Such a decision was MY responsibility.

One can also argue that you learn more on the way down than on the way up and indeed the only way we really get to succeed is through increasing our mistakes. And one thing I did learn is that: when you feel good after making a decision, then it is the right decision. When you feel heavy-hearted after making a decision, then it is the wrong one.

Perhaps being wiped out was the catalyst for making a firm decision to do something about re-attracting money towards me again and within 12 months I attracted back my lost million.

Most people – at least 90% of the population, do not make a decisive  choice (and non-choice is actually still a choice) they do not have a definite purpose… because they cannot decide; do not take proactive action… because they do not know where to start; and not take responsibility… preferring to blame their situation on another, on the economy, on the government or on bad luck.

The 5% that do actually make a decision do so only on the basis of: “let’s see  how it works out.” Commitment to attracting money and success will not work whenever and wherever there is hesitancy.

That is one of the secret laws of success.  Without commitment to seeing a decision through, laws actually work against you. They detract wealth AWAY from you.

There are 3 Important Points…

FIRST: It is ALWAYS your decisions that count; it is NEVER your situation that makes the difference.

SECOND: You Must ALWAYS makes a concerted effort to be FULLY INFORMED so that you can be confident about making the right decision.

THIRD: Irrespective of what happens there MUST be a definiteness of purpose.

http://www.TheMonacoMentor.com

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′Colin’s been there and knows what he is talking about′
Success Today

http://www.TheMonacoMentor.com

“Europe’s Foremost Teacher For Business Success” Business Age