Direction Needs Motion

Seems like a lot of folks are looking for a new direction these days. More and more unintentional entrepreneurs are trying to find their way through an ocean of choices. Too many choices, though, can be worse than too few. Faced with, apparently, an infinite variety of options for the future, paralysis sets in; our hero or heroine feels rudderless, trying to decide which direction to go.

But it’s not a rudder they’re missing. It’s motion.

A sailboat is a fine thing, even sitting at the dock. But sitting at docks is not what they’re designed for; they’re designed to use the wind to push against the waves and, between the two opposing forces, create forward motion.

And now, once the sailboat is under way, the rudder starts working.

You can sit at the dock ’til the cowfish come home, swinging the rudder from side to side, and you’ll never find direction. It’s only in movement that we can measure our progress against any kind of standards to see if we’re heading somewhere we want to go.

Feeling rudderless? Get away from the dock. Head, first, into the safety of a nearby harbor. Check out your rigging and stock the galley with supplies. Do what you reasonably can to prepare for the journey.

And then go. ‘Away from the dock’ is automatically ‘toward something new.’ Keep one eye on the compass to see where you’re heading, and one on the horizon, to see where you want to go.

And now, now that you’re moving, you’ll find direction.

The Ever-Moving Target

Goals are rarely set in stone. What’s important, even vital, for your business today, isn’t necessarily so tomorrow, and almost certainly won’t be next year. We have to achieve the paradox of investing mentally, physically and emotionally in a goal as if it were eternal, while recognizing that it may cease to have value, even before it’s fully achieved, but will most certainly stop being a goal once it’s achieved—after all, it makes no sense to chase something you’re holding in your hand.

I’ve been in the chaos between two Sigmoid curves lately. My consulting, speaking and coaching business was originally called ‘The Commonsense Entrepreneur’, which is also the name of my first full-length business book. Lately, though, that name has come to mean the book, specifically, and not necessarily the business.

My speaking gigs and my coaching have leaned more and more toward two things: building a business based on the trust that comes from communication that’s more human, and being a career renegade; making a great living doing what you love.

Those aren’t best conveyed by the phrase ‘commonsense entrepreneur’ so I’m changing that.

For now, ‘The Commonsense Entrepreneur’ is the book and its accompanying website. My business is me; Joel D Canfield. (If it doesn’t have the ‘D’ it isn’t really me, and you might note the lack of a period after the middle initial.) Until a brilliant new name strikes me, I’ll be presenting myself as author, speaker and business mentor Joel D Canfield, co-founder of the Northern California Association of Entrepreneurs.

What are you changing today?

Don’t Depend on Your Memory

There’s a marvelous tool that will help you free up mental energy, while ensuring that you’ll remember important ideas, facts, and feelings.

It’s a notebook.

I’ve spent an hour this morning trying to remember the details of a conversation I had with a client, so I can write an outline for our next coaching session. I feel like I’m not providing the real value I want to deliver when I can’t get back in the emotional moment that sparked a very clear picture of our next chat; our direction for the next session.

Thing is, I really was taking notes—but on what my client was saying, not on what I was saying. I mean, I’ll remember my own words, right?

As a matter of fact, no; I don’t.

I’m planning on recording these calls, strictly so I can go back and review what was said and how it was said, to recapture the emotional impact. My benefit comes from changing how people feel based on what they think about, not just sharing facts for them to sort out in their own head.

My dad never went anywhere without a little thirty-nine cent notebook in his shirt pocket (he write in it with a fountain pen, in green ink—but that’s another story.) When he needed to remember something, he just wrote it down. Not only did he actually remember things later (reviewing the notes) but his mind was free to concentrate on the moment instead of spending part of its energy remembering the three simple little things he needed to remember—they were in the notebook, not his head.

Business Advice—Two Centuries Old

I’m reading the Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin, partly for historical interest, and partly because of the business lessons in it. Franklin was a serial entrepreneur, regularly seeing huge success implementing ideas which others thought were impossible or pointless.

At one point, an acquaintance asked Franklin’s advice about who he should ask for donations for a worthy cause. Franklin replied, “I advise you to apply to all those whom you know will give something; next, to those whom you are uncertain whether they will give any thing or not, and show them the list of those who have given; and, lastly, do not neglect those who you are sure will give nothing, for in some of them you may be mistaken.”

There’s quite an array of good advice just under that suggestion’s surface.

First, begin with success. The initial step in developing a new idea, selling a new product, or beginning any project, should be one you know you can finish quickly and easily. Get a single success under your belt, and the rest of the process will be less formidable. Fail in that first baby step, though, and you’ll be forced to step back and analyze your position, process, and goals.

Next, defuse fear by showing prospects and suspects that others have already taken the plunge. Joining a group of folks we respect or trust or just know is much less risky than being the first to jump into the pool.

Finally, never assume you know who’s interested. Ask them all. I remember the story of two boys walking to school. One told the other “Today, I’m going to ask every girl I see for a kiss.” His friend replied “You’re gonna get slapped a lot.”

Walking home, the second boy said “Get slapped a lot today?” to which his friend replied “Yeah—but I got some kisses, too!”

Don’t assume. Within the bounds of personal, anticipated and relevant communication, ask ‘em all.

What do you get from Franklin’s advice?

Bit-by-Bit Reading

I don’t own a copy of Franklin’s autobiography. I’m reading it by email.

DailyLit is a web service which emails you books, from the brand new to classics, in short sections you can read every day. Franklin’s autobiography is 75 sections, which I’m getting only on business days. By the time I finish, it will have taken me 15 weeks to read a book I might not have read at all if I wasn’t being nudged every day.

There are loads of free books available. Seth Godin’s “Bootstrapper’s Bible” (http://www.dailylit.com/books/bootstrappers-bible) for instance. You can sign up for this free service, and read all the free books you want. If you prefer something more popular, the prices are about the same as buying a paperback, with the advantage of a simple tool to read in bits and pieces.

What do you think about reading like that? If I serialised my books, would you want to get a free copy, bit by bit, every day or once a week by email, or do you prefer to have the physical book in your hands to read in your comfy chair?

We Want You to Fail

Bolaji Oyejide shared these questions, the genesis of a book he’s writing. I’m not in the same league as the folks he’s targeting, but I know to be successful I have to act like I’m successful, so I’m going to answer these questions five years in the future when I’m where I know I’ll be.

1. Tell us of a time or two when you felt at your lowest. What caused it, how did you feel?

2. Who knocked you down, stonewalled you, or overlooked you, before you became famously successful? And what effect did it have?

3. Tell us of a time that a monumental failure got the best of you.

4. In times of self-doubt, where did you draw the strength to persevere from?

5. How did you build up your perseverance “muscle”?

6. How did you combat fear, uncertainty, or feelings of not being good enough?

7. How did you believe you could achieve the unachievable? could do things no one had ever done before? There was no precedent for it. What made YOU feel so special to think/know that you would succeed?

8. What three failures most contributed to who you are today?

9. What audacious thing do you fail at today that you know you will succeed at in the future?

10. Who’s a person of perseverance you think we should add to this book?

Seth Godin: Good Guys Finish . . .

I try to avoid ‘me, too!’ posts, but Seth says what I’m thinking so I’ll just point you to him.

How to Make a Great Living Doing What You Love, Part 1

Have I mentioned Marcus Buckingham’s book “First, Break All the Rules” ? I have? Good.

Marcus talks a lot about how we put ourselves through so much nonsense when we work. We assume, as my father told me in virtually the only bad advice he ever gave, that ‘work is work, not fun; stop looking for something fun to do for a living and settle for a real job.’

Well, that’s not how it works. At least, it doesn’t have to. Except nearly 90% of the working people in this country don’t like what they do for a living (I was astonished to discover that this statistic includes the self-employed. Why on earth would you hire yourself to do a job you don’t like?)

Buckingham offers a couple simple useful tools I wanna talk about, but first, a book I just read on the same subject that really expanded my thinking about doing what you love for work.

Jonathan Fields just released his first business book called Career Renegade. It is, as the subtitle says, about how to make a great living doing what you love. I’ll quote my Amazon review:

“An excellent read even for those of us already firmly in the entrepreneurial world. Fields knows his stuff and doesn’t gloss over the hard parts. He does, though, deliver on the title. Even though I already love what I do, the book started me thinking about other paths as well.

Absolutely packed with practical information and resources. The success stories are much more than feel-good ’see? it can be done!’ They’re usable examples.

The list of Career Renegade paths is a tool I’ll use the rest of my life.

I wanted to write this book. Probably best that Jonathan beat me to it; he’s done an excellent job.”

If you’re one of the 87% who aren’t happy at work, consider Jonathan’s book. It will make you think and help decide if you’re ready to move or bluffing yourself.

Ah; those Marcus Buckingham tools. How ’bout next week?

Three Free eBooks from Tribes

Seth Godin’s book Tribes spawned an online community, leading to two fairly hefty ebooks, both free (here and elsewhere; the video below by the illustrious Paul Durban has a web address for the Q&A.)

Seth’s Change This manifesto is a thought-provoking introduction to his excellent book. The casebook is a series of anecdotes illustrating the thinking endorsed in the book. The Q&A is shorter and more didactic. Well worth reading.

How to Sell a Book
(or Any New Idea)

Tribes
Casebook

Tribes Q&A

Why Don’t Seagulls’ Feet Freeze?

Seagulls spend quite of bit of time standing on ice. They don’t wear fleece-lined booties or even warm socks. Why don’t their feet freeze? Or worse, why doesn’t the ice melt from the heat in their feet, then re-freeze, trapping them?

The answer, and the reason this question comes up in a business discussion, is countercurrent heat exchange.

The arteries (carrying blood away from the heart) and veins (carrying blood toward the heart) in the bird’s legs lie next to each other so warm blood coming from the bird’s 104 F interior gives its heat to the blood returning from the feet.

Here’s what interested me: if you have two liquids flowing the same direction, about half the heat is exchanged from the warmer to the cooler.

If they’re flowing opposite directions, though, as much as 90% of the energy can move from the outgoing to the incoming.

And that’s where it relates to business.

Old ways of doing business are dying. Traditional record deals for musicians, for instance. If you’re creating or promoting an alternative, it can be a long slow grueling climb.

It’s almost instinctive to shy away from the traditional when we’re trying to be ‘the new thing.’ But there’s still energy in the collapsing empire. Make use of coutercurrent energy exchange. Work close to the traditional lines, but in the opposite direction.

As they spiral downward and you spiral upward through the middle, you’ll absorb energy. Folks who are tired of the traditional and can foresee its demise will jump ship and join you. Folks who had no idea there was something else will to the same. That proximity makes the difference between the old and the new much more obvious; instead of a new version of the old thing, you can become a new thing. (I’ll write about ‘anchoring’ and how it gives you the advantage another time.)

It can be cold out there. Don’t make your own heat when you can get it ready-made.