Around this time of year it is very common for people to set objectives, goals and targets that they would like to achieve. Businesses are doing the same as well. By the time we reach next December most of those goals will remain unachieved or achieved in varying degrees of limited success. So what separates the few that will attain their goals? Luck, preparation, perspiration or inspiration? While all these factors help they won’t alone let you achieve your goal.
What is needed is 100% focus and concentration on what you want and that starts now. Most people go 80% of the way in identifying what they want. That puts you on the road but does not get you to your destination. Imagine if you will that you are coming to visit me in my office in Blackrock in Dublin, Ireland. Perhaps you leave from Cork and travel to Blackrock, which will see you complete 80% of your goal to meet me. What happens though if you don’t know where I am located in Blackrock? You will fail to meet me and our meeting will not happen. You will have fallen at the last hurdle, the last 20%. This is where most people fail because they do not identify in minute detail what it is they want to achieve. Being on the road and not knowing your final destination is called wandering!
When an athlete visualizes winning a race they do so in minute detail bringing sounds, colours and feelings to life in a vivid description of themselves winning the race. Do you do this when loosing weight, setting a sales target or identifying a goal? If not, you should and in doing so you go from being an 80%er to a 100%er and then you have a massive chance of achieving your goal and creating meaningful success. Happy goal setting!
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An industry colleague asked me this question the other day when researching for an MBA he is doing; “How do you generate business as a trainer/coach/consultant?”.
Having a degree in Marketing and Post Grad in Advertising and 7 years working in those industries I was about to respond and rattle off the usual marketing and communications mix of how to get business. But instead I actually asked ‘what do I actually do to get business?’. The following are my top 10 of how to generate business and at least a few of these will apply to what you do…
Make every project you do exceptional – exceed your clients expectations. This makes them think ‘how can I use their services more?’
Ask for referrals from existing clients after completing step 1.
Use social media not to sell but to be ‘top of mind’ and visible so that when a requirement arises you are contactable.
Have an email newsletter, mine is quarterly and focuses not on what we do but on helpful tips, techniques and tools.
Invest in the best design – books are judged by their covers. You wouldn’t buy a Tiffany diamond and get it in a plastic bag…
Be the best example of your own work – share your stories, your insights and knowledge for FREE, this creates traction and interest.
ONLY go after business you will love doing (helps point 1.) I don’t do tenders or easy money workshops. I am only interested if the clients commitment matches my own.
Know your clients businesses intimately and make yourself indispensable to them.
Don’t use business plans, only action plans. Plan less and prototype and test new material more.
Above all else use passion as your compass, do what you love, don’t do what you don’t love. The acid test is always to ask ‘would I do this for free?’ Passion is infectious and everyone want’s a bit of a great thing. Great things come with great price tags!
Do you have some great ideas on generating business? Why not post them as comments so others can learn. Have a great day! Brendan.
Meditation has been around for thousands of years because it works. Harvard Medical School and many other notable research institutions have also endorsed the medical, emotional, physical, spiritual and mental benefits of meditation. It a great way to create ‘inner bliss’. A feeling inside that is peaceful and uplifting and that acts a reservoir of positive energy. There is no right or wrong way to meditate and each and every meditation you do will be unique. Try this short 5 minute Inner Bliss meditation and if you like it you can build it into a daily routine to create happiness and positivity in you life.
It’s the simplest tool and techniques that I know for positivity – be in the now. Learn how and why from this, the third part in our 10 part series about creating positivity in your life. As always if it works for you it will work for somebody else please share – have a great day! Brendan.
In response to the negativity we see all around us we must have defenses and mechanisms in order to create positivity inside ourselves. I encounter the problem of people being overwhelmed by negativity in my business and life coaching, in training and with friends and family in my personal life. In the past I have been lucky enough to have encountered some great tools to help bring out the positivity within you, which I will share with you.
Here is the first of 10 X 3 minute video clips that will help you to feel positive and most importantly this positivity will then help you to create meaningful success in your life and business.
If you like it share it as this could make a real difference to somebody who needs it today. Also go to www.facebook.com/brendanfoley.net to get updates about new content. Thanks and have a great day!
The American motivational speaker Tony Robbins talks about WAGs and BAGs in terms of goals setting, namely being Wildly Audacious Goals or Big Audacious Goals. In my experience people have no problem in setting WAGs or BAGs rather most people struggle on how to chunk, phase or break down their goal into a path that can lead to the BAG or WAG being successfully achieved.
Recently I coached a well-known TV celebrity that on the surface looked very successful and certainly had no shortage of work. He was happy, good at what he does but for all that he was not earning or bringing home enough to stop himself regularly ending up in his over-draft and yet was not a big spender.
My client is a great goal setter, in fact he is too good as he has too many goals and therefore is distracted from the most important goals! The first challenge for him is to priortise his goals. I use a simple 3 step formula to do this;
1. Do I/will I enjoy reaching this goal?
2. Do I/will I get a reward (money, love, health…) from this goal?
3. What cost if any will pursuing this goals have on my life?
The next challenge for him is that he does not chunk his goals into manageable pieces. To use the well worn cliche “how do you eat an elephant?”, “with a spoon”! Which is a nice way of saying you have to start by turning your goal into small pieces. I like to ‘chunk’ goals by what I can achieve in 1 day and then make a list of these chunks. In this manner it becomes easy as your daily goal becomes very achievable and effortlessly moves you closer and closer to your BAG or WAG.
So ask yourself today;
1. What would I like to achieve?
2. Ask the enjoy, reward, cost question of it?
3. Then break it out into daily chunks
Have a great day. PLEASE share this because every time you share one of these stories YOU could be helping someone to create “meaningful’ success in their life! So please FaceBook share and Twitter.
You might remember Jan Carlzon that I wrote about in the Bombay Smile – moment of truth article, the ex CEO of Scandinavian Airlines SAS and the man who coined the term “moments of truth” to describe how people interact with you and your brand. I experienced a great moment of truth with two brands recently that not only spoke of how good businesses are managed but also how attitude is so important to success.
The first store I visited was an art gallery. I was buying two prints by the same artist and as is my nature I asked “would there be a small discount on buying two prints?”. The gallery owner laughed sarcastically and said “maybe if you buy 12!”. I retorted “surely I could get these online with some discount but I would like to give my support to local businesses…” and the reply came “what ever would make you think that – they are the same price online and that is that”. I should probably have left the shop at that stage but I wanted the prints and went ahead with the purchase. While paying I asked “how is business?” the gallery owner replied “up and down” I added “but sure you’re doing something you love…”. She looked at me and said “I am too old to do anything else” in a dejected manner. This was my moment of truth. This lady even though she owned a successful gallery and was surrounded by beautiful art and was regularly meeting artists and art appreciators was not creating meaningful success. This was the root cause of her terrible customer manner and left me feeling flat after my purchase rather than lifted. Next time I’ll buy from someone who loves what they do. But reflect for a moment, do you sometimes act like the gallery owner? and if so are you doing what you love?
The second experience was in a very large supermarket. Feeling a bit flat after the gallery interaction I went to buy nappies for my newborn. The isles had been rearranged and I could not find the nappies I needed. A store shelf packer was busy talking on a 2 way radio and was laying out stock on the shelves. I approached him and asked where the nappies were. He was obviously very busy but stopped what he was doing and led me to the product I needed. I took the nappies and walked to the checkout. As I approached the checkout I heard someone calling out behind me. It was the man again with another packet of nappies, the same as the ones I had in my hand, but these were half price from another part of the store. He passed them to me and said “these will save you a bit”. I was amazed. This guy did not own the store but he was behaving as if he did. I was delighted with my second moment of truth and left the store lifted and delighted! While this man may not have loved his job you could see he loved helping people and therefore was creating meaningful success in his life and mine. I will be back to that store.
So again ask yourself what ‘moments of truth’ do people experience with you? The other interesting strand that weaves through this story is that while I did not get a discount on the pictures I did on the nappies so in that way what I set out to achieve happened!!!
Have a great day and please share on FB or tweet or email – Have a great day Brendan!
If love be the sustenance of the heart, creativity the sustenance of the mind and food the sustenance of the body then meditation is the sustenance of the spirit. – Brendan Foley
When conducting a coaching session I often ask people to score their lives on 4 scales. A quick ready reckoner if you like to assess where an individual is creating meaningful success. I ask people to score from 0-10 how good they feel about; their mind (education, stimulation, creativity), their emotions (relationships, communication, friendships), their body (health, sleep, diet) and their spirit (essence, higher-self, connection). Most answer the first 3 categories; mind, body and emotion easily enough and almost all people stumble when asked to evaluate their spiritual health.
This failure to be able to assess or dialogue with their spirit is quite disconcerting for the individual involved. We all struggle a little to put words on what we mean by our spirit. Many of us confuse spirit with religion (another days post!) when actually pretty much everyone can tell you a balanced and happy person has success in mind body and spirit. Yet why is it so difficult to be articulate about our own spirit?
I believe that most of us have never been thought how to have that conversation with ourselves and fewer of us still make the time to have the silence to allow this real inner dialogue to happen. The good news is that this dialogue is easy and in my view meditation is one of the best ways to facilitate this conversation with the self. You do not need to know what your spirit is to start the conversation, but start it you do need to do. When you start this communication your true wisdom flows and happiness becomes easily accessible! Being in a state of Spirit is one of the 5 States of meaningful success.
Why not check out the meditation in the RESOURCES section. I would also highly recommend the free 21 day mediation programme from the Chopra centre which can be accessed online at http://www.chopracentermeditation.com/
Please share FB and retweet and together we can make today a great day!
Complaining is a cultural norm. We find it in every society and business but does it help us? In my book it is a categoric NO! Here are four reasons not to complain; mental well being, emotional well being, physical well being and spiritual well being.
Mental Well Being
When we criticise others we bring our attention what is wrong with the world. In doing this we often miss what is right in the world and as the law of attraction states what we bring our awareness to is what we attract into our lives. So are you bringing your awareness to success or failure in the world?
Emotional Well Being
When we complain about others our emotional state mirrors the state or the energy of the situation we are criticising. So if we are complaining about a negative we become negative and this leads to dejection and eventually apathy. So nothing is actually achieved by being in this state. Our view of the world when we feel negative creates closed and conservative thinking, not the type of thinking that fixes situations.
Physical Well Being
When you feel negative your physiological state becomes tense and tight. Your breathing becomes shallow, your eyes narrow, you hunch and you become still. The net effect of this is that you take in less oxygen so the blood stream is not carrying enough oxygen to your brain to think clearly. Less light comes into your senses and you feel down, lack of movement creates stagnancy of thought. If the effect of complaining is to raise your heart rate then you could suffer hypertension (high blood pressure) Again none of these things help fix the situation.
Spiritual Well Being
When we complain we judge others. This puts us in place where we feel superior to others and judge people when we do not have a true understanding of why they did what they did. To say bankers are greedy is perhaps to overlook how emotionally damaged many of them were as they had to keep creating wealth and power due to their lack of self esteem and insecurity in the world. Judging separates us from others and causes separation and lack of empathy, which again in turn stops us creating solutions.
So if creating meaningful success is important to you then quit complaining and get about creating solutions! Have a great day – Brendan.
Please retweet and FB share or email if you think that this information could help others…. Thanks.
The title of this post taken from the famous Gil Scott-Heron song of the same name, nicely captures the essence of a really fascinating conversation I had recently with a group of like minded coaches and business people. We were all reflecting on how a large number of people that we interact with were feeling very negative due to the state of the economy. It quickly transpired that most of these people were basing their emotional state on factors outside of themselves. This is perhaps the most risky and reckless strategy you can employ if you want happiness and meaningful success in your life.
Happiness is not created by external forces; be that money, sex, food, perceived success, share prices and so on. Real happiness comes from inside and is a CHOICE. When someone chooses to be truly happy they let go of their attachment to outside forces and embrace change and flux. That is to say that chaos becomes seen as synchronicity and rather than fighting the tide you learn to swim with it to get where you want to go. I know plenty of businesses and people who are embracing this fact and thriving in the so called recession.
Interestingly this same concept or approach to life creates a silent revolution. If I choose not to react to the negativity around me and concentrate on feeling happy and positive then I affect others in a very positive way. I am conscious that as I write this Ireland has broken all records to date with the size of the national debt. Criticising the banks, the Government or others won’t change a thing and all I will do is feel negative. This will affect my ability to do good business today and to be positive company for my family and others. If we all got on with our real job; being happy, then the mess will sort itself out. So start the revolution today CHOOSE happiness and fly in the face of those who will try to drag you down. Inspire them. Lift them and in doing so we will start a revolution that will not be televised but will lead us all to meaningful success.
Please retweet, Facebook or email link to others and help start the revolution! Thanks and have a brilliant day, Brendan.
You could be forgiven for thinking that we live in a world of negativity and disasters, if you regularly consume media then you do live in that world. Our perception is our reality or another way to put it is ‘as within so without’. What we think and feel about the world tends to be what our attention is brought to. If we are looking for negativity then we will find it and conversely look for positivity and we find it too.
My reality is that there are amazing people doing amazing things in my life and the world. While there may be a global financial crisis I meet people and businesses everyday who are thriving, growing and most importantly loving what they do. I know many people who will have 2010 as their most successful year yet. Did you know that there were more millionaires made per head of population in America during the dust-bowl depression of the 1920′s than at any other time!
My question to you is to ask yourself what is wonderful in your life? Who is wonderful in your life? (right now, draw up a quick list of what is brilliant in your life)
What you will find is the more you bring your awareness to what is great the more you will see these things in the world and other people. When you do this you will feel more positive and by feeling positive you will be infectious and others will reflect your positivity.
If you want to prove this theory it’s simple – just do one thing for one day;
Smile at everyone you meet today!
You will be amazed at how good you feel and the impact it makes on those around you. This will also bring you into a state of connection; one of the 5 states of success.
If you liked this please share it on twitter, facebook or email the link – let’s make good news spread. Thanks, have a great day! Brendan PS check out this brilliant video about smiling on youtube (thanks Dave@DAK photography)
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