“I’m too busy for you!”

(Translated: I’ll never be a leader because I don’t really care about anybody else!)

Is “I’m too busy for you!” the verbal or nonverbal message you might be putting out to others?

I just read a promotional endorsement written by someone I know who, years ago, I used to respect. He starts out his explanation of why the particular newsletter he raves about is one of a very few that he actually makes time to read. He opens his statement by saying:

“I’m busy — painfully busy, so

I’m stingy with my time…”

Pull-eease! Who cares? The source, though, may want to know that comments like this scream of the kind of personal frustration known to have led many to depression and isolation.

It would be viewed by not a few psychology professionals as the monolithic signature of an individual who has deep fears of experiencing any forms of intimacy with others.

“Intimacy,”defined by ground-breaking Gestalt Psychology authors James and Jongeward, “is free of games and free of exploitation. It occurs in those rare moments of human contact that arouse feelings of tenderness, empathy…genuine caring…and affection.” 

Businesspeople are not immune to these kinds of connections and cannot hide behind “business” as if it were a protective shield. But many don’t know that they’re doing it. It may be going on for so long, that it feels natural to be a “workaholic.”

Some may say, why interrupt my career mission to get close enough to someone who will want me to pat their hand when they have a crisis? Dealing with other people’s crises slows me down and forces me to sidetrack.

Much has been written in the literature of Gestalt and Reality Therapy about those who play the “Harried Executive” game in life and business.

These are people who define themselves as “overwhelmed” and “overloaded” and “swamped” and “up to my ears…”

They make themselves too busy to have to spend any genuine quality time relating to others.

This is not a healthy mindset, but it is often masked by offering token attentions and participating in general socializing. It frequently requires professional counseling and coaching to move this type of behavior beyond the personal relationship barricade the person has set up for her or himself.

That you might be conveying to others that you are too busy for them, means you are close to the edge of the abyss that forecloses on many of life’s most valuable opportunities.

“I’m too busy” type statements can also be taken by many to mean:

“You’re worthless to me; get out of my way!” 

(Can there be any more insulting an attitude to communicate?)

Can you, or anyone who works with you, actually afford to practice being too busy, never mind flaunting it as in the above example?

Time is our most precious and cherished commodity. Of course we need air and water and food and clothing and shelter, but time is what drives those needs.

One of your grandparents no doubt once told you that “Time and tide wait for no man” (a statement that predates modern English and whose authorship is ascribed to St. Marher in 1225) and that “No man is an island” (attributed to the Englishman who was proclaimed the greatest of all metaphysical poets, John Donne, 1572-1631). 

Surely you’ve heard those statements somewhere? Maybe they are worthy of re-considering from time to time.

What kinds of nonverbal “I’m too busy” messages could you be sending out? Arms and/or legs crossed defensively in meetings? Parentally looking over the tops of your glasses at other’s suggestions that seem too time-consuming?

You keep checking your watch, the clock on the wall? You keep checking for text messages? You keep reading emails while someone is speaking with you? Do you walk ahead of others you’re speaking with, or shoulder to shoulder?

Do you pick up the phone and dial when someone approaches you? Do you put off invitations to family gatherings and neighborhood events, or show up to smile and handshake a few people and then slide out the side door when others seem preoccupied?

You may want to listen to yourself more . . . and  

check out that great smile of yours in the mirror once in awhile!

www.TWWsells.com or 302.933.0116 or Hal@BusinessWorks.US  

Thanks for visiting. Go for your goals! God Bless You.

 “The price of freedom is eternal vigilance!” [Thomas Jefferson] 

Make today a GREAT day for someone!

Not all work is labor.

Not all labor is work.

(A short post for bosses to copy and leave anonymously at certain workstations)

Is it true that some of us are lucky enough to be working for pleasure as well as pay, and that some of us labor for love alone?

If you fit either of these categories, like keeping your eye on the ball when you’ve got a beer in one hand and popcorn in the other, or finding out that your closest relatives are all in jail, it’s sometimes hard to realize that the vast majority of workers reportedly hate their jobs. 

Certainly more people could be happy at work, don’t you think? It doesn’t take a teenage Blackberry txtmsg scientist to recognize that those who are miserable with their jobs need only make the choice to click the channel in their brains to another station, and refuse to choose to get themselves “downed-out” about the tasks at hand. Check your misery level: http://bit.ly/bdNJxb

Motivational guru Zig Ziglar always used to point out that when you have a job –any job– odds are pretty good that you also are getting paid for your time and effort, that you likely have some kind of benefits, that you can usually count on heat or air conditioning and a roof over your head, that you get lunch time off and possibly a coffee break or two, that you can usually socialize a bit with others, and that you get some kind of recognition for exceptional performance. Well?

So, what’s the bottom line?

If you think your job is strictly labor, think again. Could it be that you are perhaps choosing to see it that way? If you’re bored or fed up with work that is no longer challenging, have you brought that to any one’s attention?

Does your boss know that you are on cruise control? Does you boss know that you are capable of more responsibility? Speak up woman! (or man!) Take the risk to say how you feel. 

What’s the worst that can happen? Do you think any boss in the world would fire you for asking for more responsibility or a more challenging workload? It’s not going to happen. Get the thought out of your head.

Choose instead to see that a request like this will light a fire of awareness under your boss and prompt you to earn the consideration you deserve. Don’t package your request with a pricetag!

As much as business owners love hearing employee requests for added responsibility, they hate hearing requests for more money. Let the compensation issue go with the flow.

Present your ideas for how and why you can and should be allowed to do a better, more productive job . . . and leave the salary/benefit issues up to the boss. Your performance will get you recognition and added pay. In case it doesn’t, consider connecting with my friend Angela Current, professional resume writer and career and interview coach at www.classicresumes.com for help!

Performance goes MUCH further than bitching.

Choose to perform. Watch what happens!   

www.TWWsells.com or 302.933.0116 or Hal@BusinessWorks.US  

Thanks for visiting. Go for your goals! God Bless You.

 “The price of freedom is eternal vigilance!” [Thomas Jefferson] 

Make today a GREAT day for someone!

Is There a Crack in Your

Business Liberty Bell?

Dear Ship Captain:

Maybe your people were never at liberty to learn how to hold on to customers when economic seas got rough? No, bungee cords are not the solution! Giving your people the freedom and incentive to learn is the solution. Why now when every penny counts? Because every customer counts! And the bigger the waves, the more widespread the sense of panic — for your customers and customer businesses as well as for your own.

Your customers may not be in the same boat 

. . . but they’re in the same boat!

This of course doesn’t apply if you’re working in a cushy, tax-dollar-supported government position — one of those newly-created jobs we hear about that are simply adding to our catestrophic national debt. (Sorry, had to get that dig in because, regardless of who did what to whom or who blames whom, the fact remains that those artificial “new jobs” are a large part of why things are the way they are.)

Bottom line is that you have to know that being in the same boat as your customers (and your neighboring and affiliated businesses) translates to the need for teamwork in order to survive in storms, and help ensure that every one’s rowing in the same direction. (You’ve seen the Olympic motivational poster: TEAM…Together Everyone Achieves More. It’s true in business too!)

What can you do about weathering this storm

beginning first thing Tuesday morning?

How can you take a firm foothold of quiet leadership? How can you promote and foster teamwork between your own unsteady business and your nervous or floundering customers who may be on the cusp of giving up their loyalty to you, in favor of less expensive products and services?

The first answer: SET AN EXAMPLE. Show your employees and your customers (and other businesses) how to lead your common interests out of the darkness. Sure you have a vote in November, but that’s 60 days away and, even with sweeping changes, it maybe another year before any entrepreneurial-job-creation relief surfaces. (This may help you get started: http://bit.ly/bo3ZJy)

The second answer: FIRST AID. Give your staff a “refresher” crash course on how to trip over yourself trying to delight every customer and every prospect. Keep reminding them to treat every business visit and contact the way they would want their closest family and friends to be treated. Make sure that “The Customer Is Always Right!” is not just a token expression.

Check out an A-1 classic customer service training video entitled “Give ‘em the Pickle!” with Bob Farrell http://bit.ly/gD1b6

Develop an incentive planor program that rewards exceptional customer care efforts. Keep in mind that cash is not always the best or most sought-after reward. Read up on Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs motivational theory; it works. Start with Net MBA:  http://bit.ly/mKk7D Scroll to “Implications for Management.”

The third answer: LONG-TERM CARE. There are many competent training organizations that specialize in customer service and customer relationship development and management that you can contract with for ongoing or quarterly session programs. Annual and semi-annual efforts are a waste of time and money. Here are two of the best resources to contact: 

Consider a customer-centric “Train the trainer” style leadership program from an organization like TBD Consulting (contact Jonena Relth) www.TBDConsulting.com for options that can bring your designated human resource person up to speed to be able to run ongoing in-house programs.

Another strong alternative –and one that can work independently or in concert with a program like Jonena’s– is Pro-Star (contact Meredith Bell) www.ProStarCoach.com –an exciting new way to provide every employee with their own individually customized computer skill development training and follow-up program, one that also allows for each participant to communicate regularly with her or his hand-picked skill development support team. 

www.TWWsells.com or 302.933.0116 or Hal@BusinessWorks.US  

Thanks for visiting. Go for your goals! God Bless You.

 “The price of freedom is eternal vigilance!” [Thomas Jefferson] 

Make today a GREAT day for someone!

First and third OR

first and reverse?

Given the enviable place to have runners when you’re up (first base and third base), you might think tonight’s post is another baseball story, or first down and a reverse hand-off in football . . . Sorry, sports fans: This one’s about an unusual car, and your unusual business decisions . . . but that’s getting a step ahead; let’s get back to the car. 

I once had a choice of gear combinations for a car I was purchasing. I needed something to get back and forth to college, back and forth to work, and back and forth to parties (some things never change!). A friend of mine, Joe, had THE car for me!

It was an all-black 1954 Sunbeam Talbot 90. Now you may think that sounds like it should be on  the kitchen counter for blending your okra and lima bean smoothies, but it was a car – a classic luxury vehicle in England in its heyday.

It had a sunroof, leather interior, rumble seat, running boards along each side, a hidden pull-out bar in the back, fog lights, six hidden compartments, and barely a mark. It was only a few hundred dollars “because it had a little gear problem,” but ”had to be seen,” Joe said. He was right. It was a dream car. Almost.

The “little gear problem” meant I would have to make a decision. I could have only first gear and third gear, OR only first gear and reverse gear. Hmmm. First and third meant revving the thing up to 20-25 mph (which sounded like a dozen weedwhackers in flight), and then quickly “pop” it into third gear (it had “Synchromesh” for gear shifting with some ease) and cruise along, having completely by-passed the missing second gear.

OR . . . I could have first gear and reverse gear – always a good thing, said Joe, in case I ever needed to back up! I asked about speed, but was advised that “something had to go” and I could only have one or the other. With first and reverse, I would of course be able to parallel park, and get out of sticky situations (a date’s driveway?) without having to get out and push.

I could floor it in first and get to the weed-whacker noise level, then pop it into neutral and coast to a crawl, then pop it back into first and floor it again, etc. I took first and reverse. My decision didn’t please a lot of other drivers, but I couldn’t imagine never needing to go backwards.

Has your business been forced to go backwards in this economy? Were you prepared for it? Were you barreling along going forward when you first saw the telltale signs of government incompetence rewarding big dumb companies for doing everything wrong instead of smart small businesses for doing things right? Did you have to shake your head like a wet dog? Are you still?

Decisions that plan for future disaster (building an underground bomb shelter, investing in emergency crank-up radios with every news item about increased awareness of terrorist “chatter,” taking a loss on eBay for your world series ticket options for the Cubs and the Mets) are not always the best to actually implement, but thinking through contingency arrangements is always a good thing.

Developing an exit strategy for a brand new business is like having a pre-nuptual agreement. It seems like a stupid negative influence at the moment of highest positive attitude. It flies in the face of gut instinct. But it is not a bad idea, and it will almost always be of primary concern to any person or entity who is investing in the new business. 

Leave your self and your business “wiggle room.” You may not need to build a bomb shelter, but you’d better know where to go  and when if the business/market/industry or profession you’re involved with, or your state/region/nation continues to step deeper into an economical abyss. Have a plan. Keep it in your pocket. But have one. You might need to back up a little some day. 

Failing to plan is planning to fail.

 www.TWWsells.com or 302.933.0116 or Hal@BusinessWorks.US  

Thanks for visiting. Go for your goals! God Bless You.

 “The price of freedom is eternal vigilance!” [Thomas Jefferson] 

Make today a GREAT day for someone!

What you target

for your business

may not be healthy!

Think of it this way: You really want a bacon-wrapped sausage smothered in melted cheese on a slice of buttered white bread with side orders of scrapple and syrup, chili cheese fries , Buffalo wings and onion rings with ranch dressing, finished off with deep-fried cream-filled chocolate cookies and a glass of buttermilk . . .

Uh, if that description makes your mouth water and you decide to head out to some nearby junk-food drive-in, make it one that’s very close to the Arizona, Indiana or Pennsylvania Heart Institutes, or the Mayo Clinic, and be sure your health insurance is paid up! “C’mon, Hal,” you say, “nobody is that dumb who would eat like that.” I have 2-words for you: Observe People!

Not only does stupidity find it’s way to the dinner table (or car-hop tray…yes, there are still car-hops!), but it’s also often used as an excuse for not knowing better because the excuse-giver is too preoccupied being a workaholic to worry about stuff like tumors, and fat, and stents, and clots, and cancer. But being smart doesn’t mean being worried. Worry only achieves stress.

Why all of this banter? Because many small business owners and entrepreneurs who do take care of themselves and who at least make an effort to eat and sleep right, fail miserably when it comes to sizing up what’s best for their businesses. Some who do a nice job of being realistic enough to recognize their own mortality seem to think their businesses are invincible.

“Whaddaya mean this is a bad time for a bank loan? Can’t you see that this idea of mine will revolutionize the whole wind-shield wiper blade industry?”

“These services my family and I have been providing have worked like a charm for a hundred small businesses. Now it’s time to go get those corporate giants with the bailout money. Business is business, right? Just because they’re bigger doesn’t mean they can’t benefit as well.”

I spoke recently with restaurant chef/ owner partners who decided to be able to outdo the competition and market “farm to table” freshness, they would get up at 4 am every day and drive around to nearby farms themselves to hand-pick what they would cook for each meal. Considering they weren’t getting to bed until midnight, you can imagine the rest of that story. . .

                                                                     

If any of these examples causes you to think: So what’s wrong with those ideas?, you should maybe consider going back to the opening paragraph and head on out for one of those tasty meals. If you think these are all nut case examples, you should probably join the guy in the last sentence.

If it’s time for you to get with it, and adopt a more realistic attitude toward your business pursuits, then do it! It’s a choice. Behavior is a choice. You need to “stick to your knitting” when business times get tough. Rushing into anything is not generally a productive way to cope with an economy as catastrophic as this.

Use the time and energy instead to plan for when things get better (hopefully after November) and to make the most of what you have right now. Give customers more for their money and bite the bullet. Give employees increased responsibility and recognition instead of pay raises. Give suppliers consolidated orders you put together with other businesses to get better rates and discounts.

Switch your marketing emphasis from high-priced media buys to free social media and news release opportunities and find people who can help you make those work. Dress up and upgrade your website instead of trying to expand or add locations. Stay tuned into your industry, profession and markets on a day-to-day basis. Outsource tasks that take time and attention away from selling. 

 www.TWWsells.com or 302.933.0116 or Hal@BusinessWorks.US  

Thanks for visiting. Go for your goals! God Bless You.

 “The price of freedom is eternal vigilance!” [Thomas Jefferson] 

Make today a GREAT day for someone!

Sounds like a plan . . .

There’s something in your mind that you

want to go after and try to make happen?

You’ve been dreaming about it for, it seems, forever. You’ve been careful about not telling too many others, but those you do mention it to give you the same 3-way response: a “that’s nice” smile, an agreeable nod of the head, and a pointed effort to steer the conversation in a different direction. They humor you. They don’t get it.

If you’re in big business or government work, those responses are enough to douse your fire. You get second and third thoughts and then back away and abandon your idea. You’re too invested in your own job security to dabble with ideas that will preoccupy your mind and lead you too far astray from your 401k and pension plan payoffs when you retire in twenty years.

If you’re an entrepreneur, you don’t much care what anybody says, nor with whether they “get it” or not. You’re going to make your idea work regardless of the odds, the opinions, the financial insecurities associated with developing things to a startup stage, and beyond. Retirement and payoffs –even profits from sales– are the farthest thing from your mind.

The corporate executives and government administrators measure their innovative thinking in terms of whether the ideas they come up with fit into the grand scheme of long-term and strategic plans that blanket the organizations they serve. Entrepreneurs innovate without plans. Entrepreneurs have goals. They seek only the “end-result” of making their ideas work.

The odds for reaching a destination point are dramatically increased when goal-setting meets certain requirements and, once acknowledged, the focus is on each step that leads to the goal —- instead of on the goal itself.

For goals to be meaningful, they must satisfy all four of these criteria:

 they must be realistic, specific, flexible, and have a due date.

Many people give up on goal-setting because they don’t want to feel like failures if a goal is not achieved. If it’s flexible, that won’t happen. Flexible goals can be redefined and be given new dimensions and new due dates. A goal in concrete is not a goal; it’s just a pile of concrete. Those fear-of-failure folks also need to be reminded that fear is a behavior, and behavior . . . is a choice! 

Those who think they have goals, but don’t adhere to all four criteria, have only wishes. And wishes only work for Disney characters!

Reality dictates that what “Sounds like a plan” rarely ever is, and what trys to pose as a goal without being specific, realistic, flexible and due-dated is simply a self-absorbing waste of time and energy, and often of money. Reality calls for disciplined action backed by burning desire. Reality is the stuff entrepreneurs are made of.

Entrepreneurs, some would argue, don’t plan; they just act. This is often true when it comes to describing the ways entrepreneurs appear to function in their business activities, but when it comes to getting started, and their daily pursuits, those who are most successful will inevitably point to having and constantly adjusting genuine goals to make their ideas work! Sounds like a plan, eh?  

 www.TWWsells.com or 302.933.0116 or Hal@BusinessWorks.US  

Thanks for visiting. Go for your goals! God Bless You.

 “The price of freedom is eternal vigilance!” [Thomas Jefferson] 

Make today a GREAT day for someone!

What keeps small business

owners awake at night?

With appreciation for the inspiration for this post to Meredith Bell info@2020insight.net (publisher of a great free weekly self-development newsletter titled GOLDEN EGGS), based on yesterday’s conversation with Meredith about what keeps CEO’s awake at night.

As recently as three years ago this past May, a respectable study identified worrying about the caliber and extent of employee skills to get the jobs done that needed to be done (I’m paraphrasing here) as the number one reason that CEOs were unable to sleep at night.

But the economic impact on business was nowhere near as catastrophic at that time, and consumers were nowhere near as rambunctious.

Today’s business owners and managers are losing sleep over the inability of their business’s marketing efforts to keep up with the break-neck speed of change in the consumer marketplace (and slightly slower-to-respond industrial and professional service marketplaces). Wasn’t it just yesterday that $137 Kindle electronic readers were $400?

Without belaboring what’s prompted all the consumer scrambling for better greener quality with better warranty coverage at lower prices and faster delivery with improved customer service –because everyone is acutely aware of the maddening pace of information access and exchange– suffice it to say that marketing tools, methods, approaches, and people must rise to the occasion.

The place to start is at the point of word creation. If the words you use to market your business don’t work, nothing else can work.

If the words you’re using aren’t doing the job, it doesn’t matter how dramatic your graphic designs are, how friendly your website is, what fantastic salespeople you have, how terrific your operations are, how low your overhead is, how many awards you’ve won, or how spectacularly your products and services perform.

It doesn’t matter.

What does matter are the words you use to get your prospects and customers to be aware of and buy into all of those assets of yours.

Business owners need to be evaluating their market performance daily, not quarterly or monthly, or even weekly.

In this centrifuge of market activity — unless you enjoy being thrown up against a high-speed spinning back wall, anything less than some form of daily analysis will not leave you enough time to adjust today what did or didn’t happen yesterday.

This doesn’t mean you need to get yourself caught up in some kind of delirium and start behaving like The Mad Hatter. It means you need to keep a sharper eye on the changes that are taking place, even as you read this, and be prepared to make adjustments if and when and as they become necessary . . . not a month later. 

Except for branding themes and policies, marketing words can be changed in a day! If your words are not doing what you need them to be doing this morning, change them tonight.

It’s true that one word is worth a thousand pictures. Not convinced? Consider how many images your mind can produce when you see or hear any of the following words:

• AMERICA
• TODDLER
• GORGEOUS
• STRESS
• FREE
• HAPPY
• HOME
• NOW
• HEALTHY
• NEW
• LOVE
• WATERFRONT
• BIRTHDAY
• PUPPY   

 www.TWWsells.com or 302.933.0116 or Hal@BusinessWorks.US  

Thanks for visiting. Go for your goals! God Bless You.

 “The price of freedom is eternal vigilance!” [Thomas Jefferson] 

Make today a GREAT day for someone!

Do your business messages 

reach out and grab? 

Do they win meaningless awards?

Or do they just lurk quietly in the

shadows, sucking their thumbs?

Time and again , the slick-talking, 3-piece-suit, hot-shot marketing and ad agency “experts” came swooping and swaggering down into small town America from big city America, and stuck it to star-struck, bedazzled small business owners who learned the hard way that all that’s written doesn’t sell!”

                                                                    

Do your business sales messages sell? Have you been blaming the economy, the competition, the weather and your spouse for lousy words that simply don’t cut it?

Do the words and images your business uses to sell your products and services reach out and grab your ideal prospects and turn them into loyal customers? Or do they stand timidly in the shadows of your business entrance, with their thumbs stuck in their mouths, muttering quietly to themselves about how great your company is?

If your words aren’t getting the job done, you have a copywriting catastrophe, and you are paying dearly for it!

If the words you are using to market, promote, publicize and advertise your business are not attracting attention, creating interest, stimulating desire, prompting action, and promoting satisfaction, you have a copywriting catastrophe. And you are paying dearly for it with more money, time, and effort than your business can afford.

First, you have to ask yourself if the person or entity who’s creating and producing your business messages has the right kind of skill, experience, and attitude to put you front and center on the competitive stage you most want to dominate — your neighborhood, your community, your state, region, industry, profession, nation, planet, or cyberspace.

Next, you need to outline or bulletpoint your goal issues. Be specific, flexible, realistic, and have a deadline.

Then go shopping. But battle-hardened advice would suggest that you avoid flashy Las Vegas-style or upscale “boutique” organizations that ooze out of high rent districts in favor of down-home, in-the-trenches wordsmiths with lots of business background (but not necessarily in your specific industry or business specialty), lots of diverse success stories, and a clear positive attitude.

You want a person or team that is more interested in making sales for you than in winning awards for her/him/themselves. You want a person or team that sees the long-term promise of a relationship with your business and is willing to put a meaningful chunk of fee compensation on a performance incentive basis. A bonus for demonstrated results puts a fire under most butts.

Great copywriting will do more than win sales. It can ignite innovative thinking and create revenue streams. It can reassure existing customers while bringing new ones to your door. It can motivate employees and suppliers alike. The right words can renew. revitalize and pump up entrepreneurial spirits. But, sorry, they can’t make your coffee for you. Cream and sugar?

www.TWWsells.com or 302.933.0116 or Hal@BusinessWorks.US  

Thanks for visiting. Go for your goals! God Bless You.

 “The price of freedom is eternal vigilance!” [Thomas Jefferson] 

Make today a GREAT day for someone!

~~~~~The TXTMSG

Line in the Sand~~~

Are you really sure you understand your target market?

Are you still selling what you’ve always sold the same ways you’ve always sold? Are you using the same best sets of words in the same tone of voice? Still giving the same premiums and discounts and “special” offers, the same warranties and reassurances? Still emphasizing the same benefits and features?

If your answer to any of these questions is leaning even just a little bit toward yes, odds are you have either gotten lazy, have not been keeping up with the times, have not been sizing up your target market the right way, or you’ve been spending too much time in Disneyland.

Let’s eliminate the first and last choices and assume you are being conscientious, but have maybe lost touch with some of what’s going on in your customer (buyer) and consumer (user) markets (which of course are sometimes one in the same and sometimes different). Consider this:

They seemingly cannot

                                       

function for more than

                                    

a  couple of minutes

                                 

without looking to see

                                  

if they are receiving a

                                      

text message.”

                       — Fred Hertrich, Professor of political science, Middlesex (NJ) County College,   describing one of the prevailing winds in today’s college student population – to underscore: 1) the frustration of many teachers trying to deal with rooms full of distracted people and 2) the necessity of today’s faculties to communicate with students electronically.  

(East Brunswick, NJ, Home News Tribune, 8/21/10)

Has the prospective customer or consumer you seek most to influence crossed the line of electronic literacy? “But,” you say. “I’m not selling electronics!” Perhaps, but you are selling to people who are either electronics-literate or not.

Computer savviness is no longer the guide (unless you’re selling to nursing home residents) because everyone knows something about computers. The place where the line is drawn in the sand is:

THE TXTMSG LINE

Most older-than-45 people can and do use cell phones, check websites, visit blogs, send emails, search Bing and Google, and purchase online. Most know how to use WORD and many use Twitter and Facebook. But very few of these folks text message because they grew up in a different world.

Older Americans learned that “correct” and “proper” communication depends on neat handwriting and that spelling, punctuation, and grammar are paramount ingredients. Lax email messaging is about as far as these folks will comfortably stray. Texting is to them like “Emails Gone Wild!” and too “teeny-bopper” cult-like to be able to relate to.

Well, that may not mean anything to you, unless you’re targeting 20-somethings or 60-somethings, who clearly will not respond positively to the same old kinds of messages delivered in the same old ways. It’s not a bad idea to periodically step back and reassess what you’re saying to whom, and how you’re saying it.

Think of it as a

GR8 NU WAY 2 C HOW UR MAKIN UR PT.

www.TWWsells.com or 302.933.0116 or Hal@BusinessWorks.US  

Thanks for visiting. Go for your goals! God Bless You.

 “The price of freedom is eternal vigilance!” [Thomas Jefferson] 

Make today a GREAT day for someone!

“You must be very

  proud of yourself!”

“No, I own a business

and I have a life!”

Self-pride can, and almost always does, get in the way of progress — and even survival!

Self-pride. Now isn’t that like stubbornness? “Stop being so stubborn,” my stubborn mother used to say, “it’s gonna get you in trouble. People care about you as a person and they respect what you’ve accomplished, but no body cares about your honor except you   . . . not even me!”

So, yes, I am the son of a wise mother.

As a management consultant and entrepreneur coach for many years, I’ve seen my share of business and life failures. Research studies always point parental fingers to “being under-capitalized” as symptomatic of poor management and the key reason for business failure.

But rarely does anyone look beyond “poor management” being the ultimate culprit to see what else is lurking in the shadows . . . what else is there to account for business and life failures?

Someone should be looking. Why?

Because at the end of this fraying personal and business lifeline is a very heavy anchor that is best categorized as self-pride. It’s something that happens when you choose to get sidetracked from your business and life pursuits, to deal with some imagined threat to your ego.

You put day-to-day operations off to the side to entangle yourself in a legal suit that you know you’re right about just to gloat in satisfaction at having humiliated an annoying competitor, or to realize a thousand dollars payoff after legal expenses.

How much business is lost in the process of your ego-indulging diversions?

The minute the sidetracking starts, it has a tendency (like An object in motion tends to stay in motion) to snowball itself into an avalanche. And it doesn’t take long (sometimes just minutes!) to get to the point of completely immobilizing growth and survival modes.

In minor role applications, the sidetracking diverts needed attention from goal pursuits, family well-being, and from business and career opportunities and success.

Turning your spotlight inward takes the focus away from where you’re headed, and when it gets dark — you’re bound to trip over or run into some thing. You may or may not get up, or be able to.

In major role applications of this sidetracking, businesses go bankrupt, couples get divorced, children get abandoned, and some people can end up depressed enough to be taking their own lives as their failures become more pronounced.

What to do?

There’s always choice involved. Turn the other cheek! Why not? Is letting go so hard when you consider the consequences of holding on?

When you choose to feel insulted (you’ll know when you feel your face flush or knees wobble or stomach churn or head ache or fists clench), you need choose to stop where you are and stop whatever you’re doing.

Force yourself to take some (at least 3 or 4) really deep breaths, while saying to yourself with each inhale, “Healing energy into my body!” and with each exhale, “Stress and tension out of my body!” Remind yourself again that your behavior is your choice!

You can choose to escalate a situation or simply back away from it because it gets in the way of your success (and presumably because you prefer success to getting sidetracked). Getting (choosing to be) sidetracked is simply an admission that you have chosen for someone else to get inside your brain and control your behavior.

Don’t choose your self-pride over your self!

www.TWWsells.com or 302.933.0116 or Hal@BusinessWorks.US  

Thanks for visiting. Go for your goals! God Bless You.

 “The price of freedom is eternal vigilance!” [Thomas Jefferson] 

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