Are You a Greek or a Roman?

I heard an intriguing comparison between the Greeks and the Romans. The Romans copied many ideas from the Greeks but the Roman Empire survived much longer than the Greek Empire. Perhaps the Romans learned from the Greek successes as well as their mistakes

The Greeks believed that it was honorable to die in battle. It meant that regardless of the conditions they must stand on the battle field and fight until they won or died.

The Romans wanted to win the war. That meant if they weren’t winning this battle they would withdraw, rethink and fight again another day.

Which are you and which would you rather be?

Perhaps you know some Greeks. They believe that they should honor their word at all costs. Being true to your word is a good thing. But what if you gave your promise while lacking important information, under duress or in a state of heightened emotion?

Many of us have made dumb promises. The most common one is “until death do us part”. Those promises were made in good faith at the time but things change. It’s not just marriage that can be a bad promise. There are many other promises that we make throughout life that might need to be revisited.

You can think like a Greek and stand fighting to death until one of you dies. Or you can be a Roman, retreat, rethink and fight a different battle. The Romans weren’t cowards. They were good strategists.

Sometimes we make impossible promises to a boss, customer or employee. We simply need to revisit reality, deal with the disappointment and move on. Some battles you can’t win today.

PS: This post isn’t meant to disparage people of Greek origin. The analogy seemed worth repeating. It’s ancient history and there might be a valid lesson in there.

PPS: Remember the 300 Spartans. They fought bravely and they all died.

George Torok Host of Business in Motion Business Speaker  
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Professional Service Provider: Pump up Your Self-Esteem

Although self esteem is important to all entrepreneurs, it’s more critical to professional service providers because the value you are selling is based on your skills, abilities and flaws

Alan Weiss delivered a full day workshop to a group of professional service providers – consultants, coaches, advisers, trainers and professional speakers. Weiss is a successful independent consultant. He earns a seven figure income from his home with no staff. He is the author of “Million Dollar Consulting” along with at least 40 other books.

He covered a variety of topics in the program. It’s curious how he emphasized the importance of self-esteem to the success of professional service providers. But perhaps he simply recognized the difficulties that many battle with this elusive trait.

To support the need for self-esteem some of the questions from the audience illustrated the doubts of those individuals. While listening to the questions and answers I was reminded of some of my own doubts both past and present.

This article is the result of my notes from that workshop and my own thoughts while connecting the dots.

Alan’s advice was to imagine waking up every morning with the attitude that you have a lot of value and wonder to whom you can provide that to. That’s a better way to start the day, rather than hoping you are going to make a sale today.

Competence alone doesn’t ensure high fees. It needs to be coupled with strong self esteem. Self-esteem rescues you from the “inputs trap” and would instead base your fee on outcomes. Successful people care about the results not the hours you put in.

Strong self-esteem breeds higher confidence levels. Higher confidence enables you to be in the moment. This allows you to listen and think better when talking with clients. Confidence gives you more control of the conversation and hence your success. Confidence enables you to ask better questions to gain more information and negotiating power.

Your self-confidence assures the client of their smart decision to hire you.  It also makes it easier for you to ask clients for testimonials that both boost your self-esteem and attract more clients.

Your high self confidence allows you to reframe a client’s perceived negative into a positive.

Where do you find confidence and self esteem?

First recognize your own worth. Review your achievements – especially the results you achieved for your clients. Perhaps you should review this list every morning.

Recognize and build upon your strengths. Minimize the attention and energy that can be wasted fumbling with weaknesses. Keep your eyes on the road you want to follow not the boulders or soft shoulders.

Develop your skills – your performance skills and your communication skills. You need the first set so you can deliver as promised. You need the second set to sell yourself and your value.

Get better organized. The simplest sign that you are organized is that you know where things are – both physical and intellectually. Knowing where things are will help you feel more in control. Coupled with locating things is the ability to understand, create and follow systems. Knowing what the next steps are boosts confidence.

Associate with people who make you feel better about yourself. Not sycophants but associates who you respect.

Most importantly don’t be afraid to fail. That might be tough because many of us were taught to avoid failure or that it was shameful. Failure is a natural part of the learning and growing process.

Here’s one more thing that Alan Weiss did that seemed to convey his tremendous self confidence. He revealed some past flaws and embarrassing moments. The willingness to openly admit to human frailty seems to exhibit more self confidence and hence competence to your listeners.

© George Torok helps entrepreneurs build their self-esteem and most importantly their business. If you want tips to help with your marketing visit www.PowerMarketingBlog.com  If you want to improve your presentation skills visit www.SpeechCoachforExecutives.com  If you want motivational boosts visit http://motivationalspeaker1.wordpress.com/  If you want to talk directly to George Torok call 905-335-1997

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Innovation is Not The Answer

Innovation is not the holy grail of business success that many gurus claim it is.

“We went from zero to 2 Billion and we never had an original idea.”

Jim Estill, speaking at TEDx Times Square

Jim Estill built his first business on two unoriginal ideas – courtesy and strong work ethic.

He later started another business during his last year in university by accident. He built that business to one with $2 billion in sales. Along the way he didn’t innovate. He simply learned and copied from others. His point is that it’s not the ideas that matter it’s all in the implementation.

Action counts.

Coupled closely with that action is the speed of action. Urgency is more important than perfection. You can probably talk about successful companies and individuals who are far from perfect. They didn’t let the lack of perfection stop them from acting.

Although Jim didn’t mention it in this talk, one of his mantras is “Fail fast, fail often and fail cheap”.

Don’t worry about the possibility of bruises and scrapped knees get on the bike and ride it.

Enjoy the video below. Jim’s presentation starts about six minutes in and it’s only about seven minutes long.

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Frank O’Dea interview on Business in Motion

Interview with Frank O’Dea on Business in Motion

Frank O’Dea is a business builder, philanthropist, author and motivational speaker
http://www.frankodea.com/index.php
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Who is Frank O’Dea?

Former skid row panhandler

Founder of Second Cup – which became the largest chain of gourmet coffees and teas in Canada.
Co-Founder of ProShred Security – a company that pioneered the entire industry of on-site document destruction

Author of “When All You Have is Hope”

In 1985 he co-founded Street Kids International, an organization developed to help homeless children in third world countries, through education and self-reliance programs. A few years later, he became the founding Chair of War Child (Canada), an organization that provides assistance against suffering and abuse of children in war affected countries. In the same year, Frank co-founded the Canadian Landmine Foundation, an organization that raises funds for the dismantling of minefields around the world
Officer of the Order of Canada
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Insights from this radio interview

Second Cup started in 1975 selling dry coffee in bags to take home. That was a disaster.
So it morphed into selling gourmet liquid coffee by the cup.
Secrets about creating a new industry:
Find a place where no one else is. It’s risky. People will call you foolish. You need to be courageous and have a vision.
Currently building houses in Brazil. Lots of opportunity there.
I made lots of mistakes. That’s how I learned.
The longest I stay at something is 10 years. Then I get bored and move on.

The formula for success?
Hope – Vision – Action

Frank O’Dea

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Virtual Assistants, interview on Business in Motion

Interview with Virtual Assistants

Guests: Jenn Kubillis of JK Business Services & Jacquie Manore of Workload Solution Services
Members of the Golden Horseshoe Virtual Assistants Group www.GHVAG.ca

Insights from this Interview

Outsourced adminstrative assistants – evolved out of the corporate secretarial roles. Now much more than secretaries.

Work with small and medium sized business.

Do what you love and hire the rest out to virtual assistants.
Online convention for Virtural assistants the week of May 16 – 21. Follow the convention at www.OIVAC.com

Even virtual assistants need to get out of bed, take a shower and get out to meet the world.
Becoming a VA is a viable career choice.

Radio interview with host George Torok on Business in Motion

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Bruce McDougall, The McDougall Group, interview

Radio interview with Bruce McDougall, on Business in Motion with host, George Torok.

Who is Bruce McDougall?

He is the founder and president of The McDougall Group, a financial planning company in Burlington, Ontario. A past president of the Burlington Chamber of Commerce he is a long time active Rotarian. He is a marathon runner, tri-athlete, a past competitive racquetball player and an avid golfer.

Insights from this interview

“Building wealth requires discipline and a plan. You don’t need a lot of money to start.”
“Biggest mistake that people make is starting too late.”
“Biggest myth is that you need to take big risks with your money.”
“The hardest thing in sales is the ability to get up off the floor and keep going. When hiring sales people – that’s difficult to test for.”
“As a financial planner you are really a sales person. You are running a business and every business needs sales.”
“When I was interviewing wait-staff for my restaurant I would try to intimidate them to test how easily they might be intimidated by customers.”
“How do you choose a financial planner? You have to like the person.”
“Most entrepreneurs have had three or four failures. Don’t dwell on it. Learn from the mistakes and move on.”
“Get inspiration from keeping people around you who are experiencing similar experiences.”

Radio interview with Bruce McDougall on Business in Motion with host, George Torok.

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Alan McLaren, Infinity Communications, interview

Alan McLaren

Interview with Alan McLaren, Co-CEO of Infinity Communications

Who is Infinity Communications?

Infinity is a full service communications agency specializing in public relations, branding and social media strategies.  We help our clients “Get Noticed and Stay Noticed”, through focused communication programs designed to build brand awareness and drive revenue growth.

One of the best ways to reach your target audiences is to use a combination of traditional public relations strategies offline, while leveraging social media and web strategies online.
We are living in a connected world and it is important to bridge the conversation both online and offline.
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Insights and excerpts from this interview with Alan McLaren of Infinity Communications

• Purpose of marketing is building the brand to be top of mind
• Common mistake on the web is not connecting the dots
• Key question is, does more traffic mean more business? That is the bottom line
• Marketing is not scientific. One plus one does not equal two
• Half the time, we turn prospective clients away because the fit is not right
• Red Flag Deals was one of our proud success stories
• I hate doing the numbers – but you need to do that
• As Co-CEOs we each have our strengths and defined roles

Interview on Business in Motion with radio show host George Torok

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