“Brevity is the sister of talent.” – Anton Chekhov.
People don’t have time to read long rants.
I know… you was taught in school that… the longer your opus – the better mark. It’s like if you wrote something short you didn’t give a proper time for a writing. Short article is the sign of laziness, right?
It’s becoming more and more common to give more freedom, more autonomy and authority to employees.
“At Berkshire, managers can focus on running their businesses: They are not subjected to meetings at headquarters nor financing worries nor Wall Street harassment. They simply get a letter from me every two years … and call me when they wish. And their wishes do differ: There are managers to whom I have not talked in the last year, while there is one with whom I talk almost daily. Our trust is in people rather than process. A ‘hire well, manage little’ code suits both them and me.” – Warren Buffett
Are you searching for a mentor? Have you read an article How To Ask Your Mentors For Help by Derek Sivers?
The best takeaways from the article:
“When I’m stuck on a problem and need their help, I take the time to write a good description of my dilemma, before reaching out to them.”
“Before sending it, I try to predict what they’ll say. Then I go back and update what I wrote to address these obvious points in advance.”
“Then, after this whole process, I realize I don’t need to bother them because the answer is now clear.”
During covid times a lot of people are running out of cash. It sucks. But what you gonna do?
Barter.
It’s the same story again:
During hard economic times people will run out of cash… eventually…
So not only for now but also for preparing yourself for the next crisis why don’t you learn to barter a bit?
Maybe you think that barter is useless when economy is fine…
Wrong.
If you are having a business you can easily expand your market – sometimes even double it using barter. Especially if you are starting a business and have no clients at all – barter is the thing that could work – people would be happy to save some cash – because one can run out of cash at any economic season. It just during bad economy – it’s more common.
“You can learn all you ever need to know about the competition’s operation by looking in his garbage cans. I am not above that, let me assure you, and more than once at two o’clock in the morning I have sorted through a competitor’s garbage to see how many boxes of meat he’d used the day before, how many packages of buns, and so forth.” – Grinding It Out: the making of McDonald’s by Ray Kroc
The thing is what looks like a garbage for someone could be an incredible source of information for others.
I found an interesting recommendation of a book : “a collection of short life lessons that I’ve read at least a dozen times. I still have an early draft with highlights and notes.” – Tim Ferris on the book Anything You Want by Derek Sivers.
It’s quite rare to find such kind of a recommendation…
– and I was thinking: what is wrong with me…
Selling is a step by step process.
And to make one step more you need to receive a smile. It’s a permission. It’s a key to the next door.
If you asked someone a small favor and he gave it to you… It is a smile.
If he gave you more than you asked – it’s a big smile.
Can you make your clients happy?
Let’s check it out.
The most important client of yours is you.
And the question is – are you happy? If you cannot make yourself happy – how can you make happy someone else? I mean truly happy – kinda happy doesn’t count.
“Learning how to live is much more important than learning how to make a living.” – Warren Buffett
Marketing starts with making happy oneself.
There are two types of critics:
from a teacher and from a wiseass.
For example:
A Teacher would say:
“Make reading a habit, I just sit in my office and read all day.” – Warren Buffett
A Wiseass would say:
“In my whole life, I have known no wise people (over a broad subject matter area) who didn’t read all the time—none. Zero. You’d be amazed at how much Warren reads—and how much I read.” – Charley Munger
Both are saying about the same – it’s just different worlds but meaning pretty much the same.
But…
“With few exceptions, they’ve never shipped a good product in its first version. But they never give up and eventually get it right.” – Vern Raburn, former president of Microsoft’s Consumer Products Division.
A good plan, violently executed now, is better than a perfect plan next week. – General George S. Patton
Lesson 1.
If you have a product – no need to make it perfect.
There is more – no need to make it even good.
Remember: “With few exceptions, they’ve never shipped a good product in its first version.”
It’s totally fine to ship a bad product.
Lesson 2
If you have a good product don’t hesitate even a second. Lunch it right away.
Remember: “A good plan, violently executed now, is better than a perfect plan next week.”
Lesson 3
After the first lunch – keep improving it. Don’t give up. Never give up.
Remember: “But they never give up and eventually get it right.”
Anyway it’s a Bill Gates and general Patton way. If it did work for them why it would not work for you?
Well, “never to quit” is quite a controversial idea… As well as “ship something not good”.
Let’s say there is no consensus about that. I guess Steve Jobs and Seth Godin would not agree with some of the tips. So I would say maybe it would work for you, maybe not…
But if you are up to it – keep it simple and small at the beginning – keep it micro. And if it would work on micro level – expand next step a bit;)
hiker 