How I Will Be Rich

I want to talk for a little bit about the attitude of some of my employees. Before I do, I want to give a little background about what I do on a day to day basis. A few years back I developed a piece of software, specifically tailored for my company. It is a piece of software that is linked to a database that stores all of our customers, all of their contact information, when they’ve paid, how much they owe, if there was any problems with their job, etc. It’s basically a massive compiling of all of our customers and every last, little detail about each customer. I’ve trained my employees on how to use it and how to keep it up to date. When the program is updated daily, I can generate a huge assortment of reports. I can generate reports that tell me exactly how much we are spending, how much we are making, and get down to every last detail for analysis. It’s like Quickbooks but tailored around our company and exactly what we do.

A couple weeks ago I went to generate some of my usual reports and noticed that a few of the numbers that were coming up just weren’t making sense. It bugged the hell out of me. I just couldn’t figure it out. The data is updated on a daily basis and no one had missed any days. How can my reports be coming out wrong? I wanted to pull my hair out, I was getting so frustrated. I talked to all of my employees and they all claimed that they were getting the information updated on a daily basis. There was one employee in particular, however, that made a comment that really got to me. She claimed that she knew for a fact that she was getting the information in there accurately at least 90% of the time. This comment upseted me. If you only get your job done 90% of the time, my data is going to be 100% wrong.

Being 90% effective at what you do is not good enough. In my case, the reports that I generate are completely useless unless the data is entered correctly 100% of the time. I guess I just don’t understand the mentality of thinking that 90% is good enough. I believe that no matter what you do in your career, you should do your absolute best. Give 100% all of the time. I don’t care if you are in a job that you hate. Be the absolute best at that job that you hate. If I had a job at McDonald’s cleaning toilets in the middle of the night, I’d be the best damn toilet cleaner they ever had. Do you want to know why? Because that’s how you get noticed. That’s how you move up in your career. If you just give everything you do a partial effort, people will notice that too. You don’t want that reputation.
I had a professor in college that always used to make a statement about percentages. He used to ask us, “if you knew that a plane that you were getting on had a 90% chance of making it to its destination, would you get on it?” Of course the answer to that question is absolutely not! That’s a 1 in 10 chance that your plane is going down. Those are not good odds. Why is that acceptable in your career? It shouldn’t be. Give every job you have 100% and be the best damn person in that position that you can be. You will move ahead faster than anyone else and guarantee you a much more successful career.

-M

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I, in no way, condone dropping out of school. I do believe that school is necessary to make it far in your career. I recently found this article, however, that lists 15 Successful Entrepreneurs that didn’t graduate from college. Heck, the creater of Hershey’s didn’t even graduate from elementary school.

I love reading stories like this of entrepreneurs that have been successful and I will probably constantly point you in the direction of great articles that are both motivational and inspirational. Give this a read because stuff like this really gets those creative juices flowing.

Read the Full Article Here.

(By the way. That’s a picture of Steve Jobs back in the day. Yea… You remember. The Oregon Trail days…)

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Over at MS Money they posted an article about some great new businesses that involve food. There are some really great ideas over there. I really love reading articles like this because it really gives me inspiration for my future businesses. It’s great to see people taking their little ideas and making them realities and making them successful. Not to mention that I really want to check out some of these in real life. The number 2 business on this list combines wine tasting with a massage. All I can say is, “why didn’t I think of that?” That sounds amazing!

Read the full article here.

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Some sales people seem to be so good at grabbing your attention and getting your interest in what they’re selling. Some, on the other hand, seem to just make you angry and you have no problem turning them away. Why is this?

There are a lot of factors that go in to a good sales representative but I can almost guarantee that one of them has to do with the enthusiasm of the sales person. When someone is so interested and so excited about what they do, it’s hard not to pass that interest on to others. Enthusiasm in your work makes work easier as well. If you love what you are doing and you are genuinely interested in it, your days will go much quicker.

Since this site deals a lot with starting a business and entrepreneurship, I thought it would be a good idea to talk about this very vital point that goes in to a business. Enthusiasm can make all the difference in the start up of a new company. The fact that you love what you are doing comes across when you talk to your customers. Get excited about what you do and you will have no problem getting your customers excited as well.

The main thing to do when starting a company, a blog, a hobby or pretty much anything is to really get to know it. Do a lot of research on your subject and become an expert. If you’re talking about a company, look forward a little bit and see what you stand to make. Nothing can really garner up enthusiasm like the idea of how much money can be made in the future. I sure know that, looking in to the future of my companies, seeing the financial potential motivates the hell out of me. Become and expert, get to know your product and learn to enjoy all the aspects of that product.

Even if you don’t have a product or a company in mind, you can probably think of a subject and dig a little deeper in to it. You may find something that really interests you. For example, you may have absolutely no interest or knowledge in something like powder coating. If you really start to dig deep in to the subject, you start to learn the different types of customers you will be working with, the type of equipment that you work with, the process that goes in to it, the various types of powder, the weather conditions that are the most supportive of the technique and probably even the money that can be made in the industry. When you start really digging deeper in to a subject and become an expert, you will gain that enthusiasm that’s required to really get something rolling. That’s how companies get started that, seemingly, make boring products. Dig deeper and there’s a whole world within that industry that makes it exciting that most people never see.

You should hear Joe and I sitting around talking about our blogs or the company that we work for. We sit around for hours and throw ideas off each other. We get so excited about what we do and, hopefully, it shows through in the work that we do. Dig deeper, become an expert and gain the enthusiasm of every endeavor you partake in. I guarantee it will make you a more successful person.

-M

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Matt and I played a little flip-flop on the website writing today. So if you’re wondering where ‘Ol Matt ran off to, check out his post over at our other site, Be Healthy and Relax. Now on to what I have to say…

The name Parkinson’s Law may be one you have not heard of before, but I’m sure that you, along with the rest of us, tend to fall into the trap of its concept. Simply put, Parkinson’s Law is a theory that says, if given a task and a certain amount of time to complete it, you fill every living second until the completion time to finish the project. You will basically find mundane tasks until you feel the time pinch to complete the task. We have dealt with this theory since grade school. This is when we developed and learned to exercise Parkinson’s Law’s largest contributor: Procrastination. We cannot deny that procrastination has taken control of us from time to time. There are a lucky few out there that are more apt to taming their procrastination, but knowing and understanding how to conquer Parkinson’s Law is definitely one of the most beneficial steps to becoming more productive and allowing you to control your own life.

The most common place that Parkinson’s Law is put to test is in the workplace, during 9-5. Each day we are allotted this socially accepted time to complete the various tasks which are assigned to us. Why 8? Who was the genius that told us that we needed to mull around for 8 hours to complete tasks that could be easily shortened into 2 or 3? Of course this example does not relate to everyone’s working situation, but it can definitely shorten the time we believe a project takes to be completed. Being stuck in the 9-5 can make you feel like there is no incentive to work more diligently, but doing so will free your time to become more effective within the company while possibly opening doors to learn qualities of a higher position. With this ability you are becoming a greater treasure to your company, as well as gaining the entrepreneurial skills that you’d like to have for the future. Here are a few tips that should help us all get over the evils of Parkinson’s Law…

• On a personal level, keep your to-do lists more concise and meaningful. Don’t clutter it with unimportant tasks that just fill time. Set deadlines to your meaningful tasks to times that seem almost impossible. You’ll find a way to complete them if you try.
• On a working level, break down the 8 hour day into a bunch of smaller deadlines. Control as much time as you can within your given workday. Doing this will force you to complete those previously long and drawn out projects.
• On both a personal and a working level, use the 80/20 law I pointed out in my post, The 100 Year Old Golden Rule. Once again, separate the important from the unimportant. Use this to free up more of your day so you can feel like you have that huge load off your back.

Hopefully putting a name to the struggles of procrastination and time management has helped you learn to take more control of them. The key is to bang out all of those daily tasks with the most efficient methods so you can spend the rest of that lost time on yourself, and with family and friends. Good luck!

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