The quickest fix for

“Nuttin’s Happenin'”

. . . is to ACT NOW!

NOW, while we’re on the cusp of

The Great American Work Slowdown. 

Christmas is just a week from Saturday. Everyone (except for rambunctious entrepreneurs–there’s some other kind?) is moving more slowly at work. The rank and file are increasingly preoccupied with office and neighborhood parties.

Could this be true? Is it just my imagination? Are you grinning nervously at that thought or at what I might be tossing your way in the next couple of paragraphs? 

                                                                                                 

Well, if you’re in that “rambunctious” crowd I mentioned, you probably wait ’til the last minute to shop, hate to waste time making the festive rounds but find that a couple of stiff drinks help make those swashbuckling business status-climbers and oozy neighbors a little more tolerable . . . and it’s all good practice leading up to that big week of dysfunctional family gift-giving gatherings! 

Put your mouse down for a nap.

Get up from your desk or work station or laptop, and stop reading this blog (I trust you that you’ll come back). Now, DO SOME thing. ANY thing! It doesn’t matter what you do. What matters is that you do SOMEthing.

Take a walk around the block. Eat a cookie. Take a bathroom break. Turn the music on or up. Draw a picture. Get away from the monitor and keyboard and take some deep breaths. Shake your head like a wet dog. Clap or briskly rub your hands together. Take a slug of cold water.

Appreciate that by breaking your concentration, you are also breaking some element or accumulation of stress.

Don’t quit yet. Don’t rush back to the screen. Gently close your eyes and take ten seconds to massage your temples or the back of your neck (counter-clockwise stimulates more blood flow).

Pick up a pen or pencil (you DO still have one?) and a piece of scrap paper. Write or draw or diagram the first thing that comes into your mind . . . like a creative branding theme exercise! 

It absolutely doesn’t matter what you record (and no one but you will ever see it anyway).

Go ahead. I’ll wait. ………. Good!

Next, draw or write or diagram the first thought you have about something you can do at 9 o’clock tomorrow morning to pump up or booster-shot some part of your business into action right away.

Maybe it’s a new direction. Maybe it’s solving a nagging problem. Or it’s reviewing reports or articles you’ve been shoveling around, or checking websites you’ve been intending to visit, or having coffee with the new (or oldest) employee (or supplier/vendor/sales rep) and listening?

Perhaps you haven’t made enough time lately to initiate collection of customer feedback? 

No matter how small a step, just make it an ACTION step. SOME action always beats NO action! I hear from blog visitors all the time that success comes from having a bias to action. Do you? 

# # #

www.TheWriterWorks.com

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!

Three kinds of business

   owners. Which one are you? 

STATUS QUOS.

Invested in keeping things unchanged. Filled with hope but no action. Many absentee owners fall under this umbrella. Those who do show up regularly, hide regularly from customers and employees.

A (in more ways than one) dying breed. Motto: “Don’t Make Waves.” You may not even still be in business with this economy, or you may be on the way out the door as we speak!

ENTREPRENEURS.

If you are a serious serial entrepreneur, a serious one-time entrepreneur, or a serious family inheritor of an entrepreneurial business, you are probably too busy to be reading this right now — yes, even on a Sunday (Happy Halloween!) night.

 Entrepreneurs act, take reasonable risks, resist authority, pump passion, ask questions, think they can’t sell but sell better than anyone, have a burning desire to make their ideas work, and are “on it” 24/7. Motto: “Do It Now!”

http://bit.ly/ds34iq

FLOUNDERERS. 

Those in this category account for the vast majority of business owners. Those who “flounder” (like the fish of the same name–and check your ocean fishing friends on this, but that, by the way, is no “fluke”!) flop around on the business beachfront. They create commotion, draw attention, get oohs and aahs.

Business owners in this group make a lot of flip-flop sounds, accumulate a great deal of sand, and occasionally snap their teeth. But –in reality– they get nowhere, and eventually become someone’s dinner.

Here’s a synopsis of what sparked tonight’s blog post. It’s a summary of a feature article from today’s Business Section of The Home News Tribune, which you might not know of unless you lived or worked in the Greater Brunswick/Central New Jersey area.

The story, by Staff Writer Jeff Weber jweber@MyCentralJersey.com, is entitled “AS THE EARTHWORM TURNS…Marlboro man takes all-natural drain cleaner to the top”. (Note: For those geographically-challenged, “Marlboro man”is not the tobacco icon, but a clever double entendre reference to an entrepreneur, Ricky Greer, from the nearby town of Marlboro, NJ!)

Ricky Greer founded and launched the EARTHWORM “All-Natural Cleaner” brand in March 2007.

The article suggests he was laughed at, scoffed at, and told to forget it when he tried to get started.

Did he walk away?

Greer nowhas an entire line of bathroom, mold, mildew, carpet, and floor cleaners sold nationwide in pedigree retail outlets like Bed Bath and Beyond, Harmon Drugstores, Whole Foods, Wegman’s, Stop ‘N’ Shop, and Wal-Mart.

“Conventional drain cleanersare not exactly environmentally friendly,” Greer told Reporter Weber. “I knew green was going to come to fruition, and I thought this would be appropriate to everybody because everyone has drains.” 

Greer, according to Weber, “chose Earthworm for the name of his brand because ‘what earthworms do is bore their way through the dirt to allow roots to grow. What this product does is bore its way through the drain to let water flow.'” http://bit.ly/baxYDK

Boosted by feature coveragein a special National Geographic “Green Guide,” and on NBCs TODAY Show, CBSs Early Show and “But I’ve Proven I Can Do It,” Greer expects to sell 20,000 cases this year, after 13,000 in 2009. His product ranks 12th on the U.S. top 20 list, ahead of “Mr. Plumber.”

What business owner category above would you put Mr. Greer in? Relative to that inspiring story, where do you put yourself? Uh, where do you put your SELF?

Remember that whatever you’ve done, or are doing, or plan to do . . . is a choice.

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HELP SAVE THE ECONOMY November 2nd. Vote to move small business forward . . . Support those who endorse free market competition healthcare and REAL job creation tax incentives for America’s entrepreneurs! 

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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!