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#YourCareer : How Taking Control Of Time Will Make You Successful And Happier.

We always hear people lecture us—usually our bosses and parents—that “time is money”. Time is an incredibly valuable finite resource. While you can get more money, we can’t create more time.  

Going into the new year and decade, it’s important to think about how you can maximize your time to fast-track your career. Just think about how quickly the last ten years flew by. When we reach the year 2030, you’d love to look back and relish all your amazing accomplishments. One of the best and smartest ways to achieve long-term success is to take active, thoughtful control of your time. Instead of squandering it mindlessly, you need to leverage time to your best advantage.

Most people lament that they are overwhelmed with work, responsibilities, family obligations and annoying chores. It doesn’t help matters that society makes it too easy for us to get distracted from our goals. Social media sucks us into scrolling endlessly through our Facebook, Twitter and Instagram feeds, binge watching shows and movies on Netflix and engaging in other time-wasting activities.

You should develop a cost-benefit analysis of how you spend your time. If you can earn more money doing what you do best—your job and profession—compared to spending a lot of time doing tasks yourself, than it’s prudent to outsource the chores. This includes things like fixing leaky plumbing, electrical work, food shopping and house cleaning. The time spent on these tasks takes away precious time that you could be enhancing your career or spending it with your family. The chores should be delegated to others. The time spent on your career will return massive dividends.

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What Skill Sets do You have to be ‘Sharpened’ ?

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You also need to consider the dollar value of your time. Think of how much each minute, hour and day is worth to you. Contemplate what activities would result in furthering your career. For instance, if you are an attorney and bill out hourly rates ranging from $200 to $500, it’s a waste of your time, energy and money to mow your own lawn, shovel snow from your sidewalks and clean your home.  Put a price tag on your time and things will become more clear.

At first blush, this sounds arrogant and elitist. After digesting the concept, it’s simply practical. A landscaper may charge you about $50 bucks a month to take care of your lawn and a high school kid will happily take $30 dollars to shovel your driveway. While they are doing these chores, you can bill an extra few thousand dollars. You also avoid blowing out your back, slipping on the ice and doing a poor job on pruning the shrubs. You’re far better off allocating projects out to others and using the time to grow your career.

It’s also important to say ‘no’ to people. There are so many daily requests made of us at work and socially that takes up too much time without any benefits or upside. It seems harsh to do, but you need to protect your time from the intrusions of others. The more you allow people to consume your time and energy, the less you have to devote toward your career and life. This does not entail being mean or rude. When a friend asks you to help them move, you’re better off chipping in for a professional mover than schlep a couch and bed up five floors of a winding, narrow staircase.

According to Harvard Business School professor, Ashley Whillans, its smart and prudent to spend money to eliminate the stresses of repetitive chores. Your money buys you the precious commodity of time. Whillans emphasizes the happiness that is derived from the time taken back by not having to engage in certain tasks that you don’t like and are not good at.

In a TED Talk, Whillans says that “using money to buy ourselves out of negative experiences,” such as mundane and monotonous housekeeping and laundry is essential to de-stressing. She takes the concept further by asserting that it’s worth paying more money in rent or a home purchase closer to work as the time saved in commuting is invaluable. Her research shows that “buying time” leads to greater happiness and cuts down on the daily stress of life.

The concept may make some people feel guilty and uncomfortable. We’re always told to save money and do things ourselves. There is a little discomfort with paying people to deliver our  food, fold our laundry, drive us places and do all the unpleasant tasks. Instead, Whillans says to focus on all the value you have with the extra time saved, which will lead to greater happiness.

By taking control of time, it will make you more successful in your career and happier in your life.

 

Forbes.com | December 26, 2019  | Jack Kelly 

The Two(2) Things Your Boss Must Do To Set You Up For Success. A Must Read !

Years ago, back when I was teaching high school and college students, one of my mentors told me that the teacher made the difference in the classroom. She told me that instructors had to own the success and failure of their students. I agreed, and now—after years of hiring and supervising staff and leading teams—I help executives and supervisors understand that they make the difference in their organizations. They make all the difference (for success and failure) with their teams and employees.

It is the responsibility of your supervisor—the person you call your boss—to set the stage for organizational and operational success and create an environment for you and your colleagues to do your best work. Supervisors are the difference between success and failure, between high morale and low, between engagement and apathy and between a thriving culture and a toxic one.

Every supervisor—the good and the bad—impacts organizational, operational, team and employee success, but the worst ones have a negative impact because they fail to prioritize their employees’ needs. However, if you work for a supervisor who consistently does these two things, you are being set up for success and will likely have a great work experience.

Your boss must define what success looks like.

Supervisors who don’t distinguish high performers may very well end up rewarding the poor ones, and this is a key factor in toxic organizations.

If your boss doesn’t define what success looks like, he is doing way more than undermining overall organizational success. He is indeed sabotaging your ability to succeed as a contributing member of the team and, quite possibly, setting you up to fail. Defining success is a key responsibility for effective supervisors, and when they can’t or won’t define it, you can bet your bottom dollar they aren’t going to work to help you achieve it either.

Why it’s critically important for effective supervisors to define success:

Today In: Leadership
  • When success is defined, it can also be recognized and rewarded. But when it isn’t defined, you can put in all kinds of work and produce major deliverables and still not be adequately recognized or rewarded for your high performance.
  • When success is defined, employees understand how to become high performers. They become more engaged in goal accomplishment and better able to position themselves for a promotion and secure merit bonuses and raises.
  • When success is defined, it’s a sign that the organization likely has a transparent performance management program that it takes seriously, and it’s also a good sign that due diligence is taken to ensure employees understand the performance process and receive effective coaching throughout the entire year.
  • When success is defined, a culture of accountability—as opposed to a culture of toxicity—can be created because there is less chaos about roles and expectations, and there is less confusion about performance expectations.
  • When success is defined, it forces or prompts a review of the overall organizational or operational strategy to ensure alignment between performance expectations and strategy. Also, more attention gets paid to position descriptions to eliminate discrepancies that could lead to conflicts with goal achievement or create ambiguity among various roles.

If your boss doesn’t define what success looks like, he really can’t set proper standards for performance or accountability. As a result, everyone’s performance—the high and low performers—just ends up getting treated equally. Employee morale decreases, and over time, the culture could become toxic as well.

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What Skill Sets do You have to be ‘Sharpened’ ?

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Your boss must provide resources and remove obstacles.

Supervisors who can’t be bothered to prioritize their employees’ needs should never expect their employees to prioritize the organization’s needs.

If your boss doesn’t provide the resources you need to effectively do your job, he is undermining your ability to succeed. And, if he doesn’t remove obstacles that impede performance, he hinders trust and makes it difficult for employees to thrive. Next to the need to define success, supervisors have an absolute responsibility to listen—and respond—to employee needs. It is the supervisor’s job to leverage his influence and leadership on behalf of employee success. If employees don’t have the resources they need to perform at high levels, the organization will suffer, and everyone will eventually feel it.

Why it’s critically important for effective supervisors to provide resources and remove obstacles.

  • When resources are provided and obstacles are removed, employees have what they need to do their jobs well and deliver meaningful results. Also, workplace obstacles are minimized or eliminated. Obstacles such as conflicting policies that impede the customer experience get modified or removed. Obstacles such as broken communication flow, process redundancies, duplication of effort and procedural gaps get dealt with.
  • When resources are provided and obstacles are removed, employees can focus on making themselves, their team members, their bosses and their organizations look good instead of fighting to be heard or spending unnecessary time complaining about what’s getting in their way.
  • When resources are provided and obstacles are removed, employees feel heard, appreciated, respected and valued. As a result, they become truly engaged on what matters to their bosses. This leads to organizational leaders getting more input and deeper levels of investment from employees.
  • When resources are provided and obstacles are removed, employees are free to use their talents to think, experiment, create and innovate in a way that will elevate operations and help to achieve strategic goals. Change management efforts and disruption issues have less of a negative impact on organizational performance and profits.
  • When resources are provided and obstacles are removed, supervisors with a tendency to micromanage employees feel less of a need to do so. Instead, they can focus more on the big picture. They can become better leaders and better change agents because they realize they can actually get out of the way and allow their employees to confidently shine.

If your boss doesn’t take the time to understand what resources you need and which obstacles are in your way, he is not making you a priority. Surely, as a consequence, you might start to question whether you need to make him a priority either.

Key takeaways

For supervisors

If your goal is be an effective leader and create a high-performance culture of accountability and trust, it is critically important that you define success, provide resources, remove obstacles and then get out of the way and let employees do their best work.

You can give the best office and holiday parties, but fail to do these things, and it won’t really matter. You can provide your employees with the best work schedules, but fail to do these things, and it won’t really matter. You can pay employees great salaries, and still it won’t really matter if you neglect to prioritize these things.

For employees

If your supervisor won’t make defining success a priority, he is showing you that you aren’t a priority. If you work for a boss who doesn’t provide clear performance expectations and a definitive understanding for what success looks like, he is setting you up to fail. If your boss consistently neglects to ask about what resources you need to do your job or what obstacles may be in your way, you might want to run like hell before he sets you up to fail.

One of the worst things you can do is just stay on the job hoping that your work product meets with your supervisor’s goals. That hope will quickly turn to disappointment after you have given all you can only to receive poor performance reviews, get overlooked for raises and promotions or find yourself treated no better than any poor performer who does half the work as you do for twice the pay.

Author:  Terina Allen Careers   I cover careers, professional advancement and leadership development.

 

Forbes.com | December 12, 2019

 

#CareerAdvice : 7 #Skills You Will Need To Survive And Thrive In This Frighteningly Fast-Changing World. Got Kids? #MustRead !

In the last couple of weeks, I have written about some very somber topics. A study conducted by Third Way concluded that many college graduates earn the same as high school graduates, but are left heavily burdened by tuition debt of over $100,000. Wells Fargo projected that robots will displace 200,000 bank employees within the next 10 years. I have also covered General Electric—once the greatest example of American capitalism—freezing pensions and being accused of fraud. HSBC, the large global bank, announced 10,000 layoffs, in addition to the 60,000 jobs that have already been eliminated on Wall Street. The unbridled adoption of artificial intelligence may result in millions of job losses and require massive retraining for those impacted and U.S. income inequality is at its highest level in 50 years.

Read the paper, watch the news, go online to Twitter or Facebook and you’ll be assaulted by vitriol, anger and pessimism. It’s clear that many people are despondent over the current state of affairs in America. Although, on average, we live a lifestyle unimaginable to past generations, we feel that the good days are behind us. There is a palpable sense of doom and gloom.

If you look back at America’s history, this feeling of hopelessness and fear of the future is common. We’ve been through some difficult times and have always found a way to dig ourselves out, improve and move forward. Amazingly, every time a seismic shift, catastrophic-seeming event or frightening change occurs and seems like it would be the end of us, we’re able to figure out solutions and keep advancing.

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What Skill Sets do You have to be ‘Sharpened’ ?

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Currently, we are collectively dealing with the impact of rapid changes including globalization, technological advances and a different type of economy and job market. It feels to many that this is utter turmoil and chaos. It’s easy to get discouraged and feel overwhelmed. While that’s understandable, in this new, evolving economy and job market, you need to become mentally and emotionally strong. You must learn how to possess the ability to adapt, survive and thrive. There is no time for self pity. It’s a time for action.

Here is what you need to do to succeed in this newly changing world.

  1. Learn to code, write and speak well. You don’t have to be a tech engineer, but it will be helpful to know some coding. It’s predicted that many jobs will require this skill in the near term and future. The ability to write well and speak intelligently and communicate clearly and efficiently with people is prized by major corporations. These skills will greatly enhance your marketability.
  2. Develop a thick, impenetrable skin. We are in—and will continue to be in—a time of rapid change. The days of working at one company for the entire duration of our careers is over. Corporate pensions are a thing of the past. You need to rely upon yourself and navigate your own path. The odds are high that you will have a number of different careers over your lifespan. Within those careers, you will switch jobs, get laid off and sometimes get stuck in part-time gigs. If you are timid and afraid, the world will devour you. You will need to teach yourself to be strong, unafraid and not intimidated by what the future brings.
  3. Tune out the politics and noise. So much time is wasted arguing with strangers on Twitter and Facebook. I’m unaware of anyone who has ever said, “Thank you! That’s a great point. You have completely changed my mind on this topic!” Arguing or even just reading or being in the presence of people who live to fight, yell and point fingers is a waste of time. Concentrate your time and efforts on productive pursuits.
  4. Read voraciously and keep learning. Most of us graduate school and stop learning. It’s like your friend who listened to a certain type of music in high school and never tried hearing other genres, as he’s stuck in a time warp. To remain competitive, you have to keep up with all of the developments within your field, as well as new trends that may impact your career. By constantly learning, you’ll be ahead of the crowd that chooses to remain static.
  5. Save your money. There will be times when you are in between jobs or earning less money than you did in the past. The mistake most people make is to live beyond their means. If they earn $1, they spend $3—believing that there will always be a steady flow of cash. For every dollar earned, save as much as possible. Having funds for a rainy day makes all the difference in the world. As your funds grow, you’ll have a second income stream. It’ll also afford you the flexibility to select jobs on their long-term growth potential, as opposed to being forced to take a job because you need the money right now.
  6. Embrace the change. You can’t stop the tide from rolling in. Things change and you will need to be malleable and move with the flow. Instead of being resistant and ignoring your new reality, think of how you can profit and benefit from new circumstances. With change comes opportunities—if your eyes are open to it. How many times in your life has a bad thing happened, but because of it, you ended up in a better place? This occurs all the time! There is always opportunity, but you have to be receptive, bold and ready to seize the chance to succeed.
  7. Rugged individualism is a uniquely American characteristic, in which we are  self-reliant, wary of taking aid from others and skeptical of government assistance. Think of the cowboys in Western films. They lived their lives on their own terms. Nowhere outside of the U.S. is as easy to start a business than in this great nation. It’s also viewed as okay if you fail. We have the ability to reinvent ourselves, start over, take chances, fall on our faces and get back up again. There is a great feeling of taking the reins of your life and building something great for yourself and your family. We have fought and won world wars, been the first to put someone on the moon, freed ourselves from tyranny, helped liberate the world from Nazis, built incredible companies and have all the intelligence and information in our hands on a handheld device. There is absolutely nothing that can stop us from succeeding.

I am a CEO, founder, and executive recruiter at one of the oldest and largest global search firms in my area of expertise, and have personally placed thousands of profes…

 

        Forbes.com | October 9, 2019 

#Leadership : #ProductivePeople – The 3 Ways that Happy People Deal with Problems . Great Two(2) Min Read!

To state the obvious: It’s easier to be happy when things are going well. Positive outcomes are known to lift people’s moods, while negative emotions (like anxiety) generally reflect concerns about negative outcomes.

But, happy people are also good at dealing with problems in ways that help them to maintain their mood, while still dealing with issues effectively. Here are three common things that happy people tend to do to deal with speed bumps in life.

FOCUS ON THE FUTURE

It is important to understand the problem you’re facing, and so happy people certainly analyze the situation. But, they don’t remain focused on the problem for long. That is, they avoid rumination—which is a set of repeated thoughts about something that has gone wrong.

Instead, they look to the future. There are two benefits to this: One is that the future is not determined yet, and so happy people can be optimistic about things to come. The other is that happy people are looking to make the future better than the past, which creates a hopeful outlook—no matter what the present circumstances look like.

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What Skill Sets do You have to be ‘Sharpened’ ?

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FIND AGENCY

At any given moment, the situation you are in exerts some amount of control over your options. When you’re sitting in traffic, for example, there isn’t much you can do but wait for the cars around you to start moving. The amount of control you have to take action in a situation is your degree of agency.

Happy people seek out their sources of agency when problems arise. They are most interested in what they can do to influence the situation, rather than focusing on all of the options that have been closed off by what has happened. The focus on agency is important, because it provides the basis for creating a plan to solve the problem. And the sooner a problem is addressed, the less time it has to cause stress.

KNOW WHEN TO FOLD

There are always going to be big problems that you can’t solve. Perhaps there is a client who is never satisfied with the work you do. Maybe there is a process you’re trying to implement that never seems to have the desired outcome. You might even have been working on the problem for a long time.

Despite all the discussions about the importance of grit, effective (and happy) problem solvers are good at knowing when to walk away from a problem that can’t be fixed. Each of us has a limited amount of time and energy that we can devote to the work we are doing. Spending time on problems that cannot be solved has an opportunity cost. There are other things you could be doing with your time that might yield better outcomes. It is important to learn when it is time to give up on a problem rather than continuing to try to solve it.

This is particularly true when you have been working on that problem for a long time. There is a tendency for people to pay attention to sunk costs—the time, money, and energy they have already devoted to working on something. But, those resources are gone, and you can’t get them back. If it isn’t likely that additional effort is going to help you solve a problem, then you should walk away, no matter how hard you have worked on it already. Happy people are good at ignoring those sunk costs both when making the decision to walk away from a project and after making the decision to walk away. They don’t spend time regretting the “wasted” resources.

 

FastCompany.com | July 22, 2019

#CareerAdvice : #SuccessfulPeople -How to Pursue your Dream when Everyone Says it Won’t Work….A Great Read!

You finally decided to take the plunge and fulfill your dream to start a business or change your career. You’re excited to tell the world of the new direction in your life, but when you tell your closest friends and family your big news, you hear “what if you fail?“are you sure that’s the right move for you right now? Suddenly with your biggest fears being echoed by those who you thought would be your biggest supporters, and instead of being excited, you are now put on the defensive.

Business and leadership coach Melissa Anderson of Box the Outsidesays it’s not uncommon for the strongest naysayers to be the people who care about you the most. They may try to turn you toward the path that they understand, the status quo, because they’re scared for you and don’t want to see you take a risk and fail. But, Anderson says it’s more common that naysayers are attaching their own fears of failure to your success. “Subconsciously, their fear lies in the fact that you might actually succeed,” she says. “If you have success facing your fears, then they might get left behind.”

She says most people are conditioned to view their future though a lens of limited beliefs. They are taught to play it safe. They’re taught that failure is bad, so they seek to protect themselves against things that might make them fail.

When people see someone close to them face the possibility of failure and succeed, that turns everything they believed about their own lives upside down. “If everyone else is out there fulfilling their wildest dreams, why am I sitting here in my drab reality?” says Anderson.

So how can you turn off the naysayers and follow your dreams?

ACCEPT THAT CONCERNS ARE MORE ABOUT THEM THAN YOU

Other people’s concerns about your potential for success or failure often have more to do with their realities than your own. They may not understand why you desire something different from what you have, or from what they have. Their fears are articulated in criticism, as they try to steer you toward the path of stability that they are more familiar with.

They may even be critical because they have a dream that they aren’t pursuing, and seeing someone else chase after their dreams reminds them of what they are too afraid to go after themselves. When they see people chasing their own dreams, going against the grain, it frightens them because it goes against the status quo of stability and may also remind them that they aren’t going after their own goals.

Learning to accept that the fears and concerns being spoken about are not really about you, but are about them, can help you to maintain a relationship with the naysayers.

 

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What Skill Sets do You have to be ‘Sharpened’ ?

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FIND YOUR TRIBE OF SUPPORTERS

If your support doesn’t come from those close to you, seek out others in your community that will support you. Find a mentor or a group of like-minded individuals who support one another’s endeavors. Surround yourself with people who motivate and encourage you, and who can provide constructive feedback. Start by exploring networking groups with similar goals to yours. By being supportive of others, you’ll find that others become supportive of you. Investing your time and effort in a networking group is important to anyone, but is especially critical for people who don’t already have supportive individuals in their lives to encourage them when times get tough.

MAKE A PLAN FOR SUCCESS

Identify the resources you need to make your dream a reality. This also means recognizing the areas where you may need help. Reach out to individuals who can provide assistance and help you in the areas where you are not strong yet. This is where having a network is hugely beneficial. Moving forward with a new career or a new business when your regular supporters aren’t full of encouragement can be difficult, but if you make a plan and find individuals who can support you in the areas you’re lacking, it will help you get there faster.

BEING A VISIONARY MAKES YOU DIFFERENT

“It takes vision and courage to leap headfirst into actualizing your dreams, and that’s what separates the innovators from the other end of the bell curve,” says Anderson. Take pride in your ability to be a visionary and be okay with others not understanding why you are doing it. Most successful entrepreneurs and innovators think in ways that other people don’t understand.

TURN NEGATIVE OPINIONS INTO POSITIVE OUTCOMES

Changing your reaction to naysayers may mean you need to reinterpret their words. Instead of hearing “I don’t think this will work,” hear, “I’m excited, but also scared for you.” “By changing the narrative to something more productive, you can use this fuel as golden tokens of support that fill your piggy bank towards success,” says Anderson. If proving someone wrong is what motivates you, you may want to post those negative comments in a journal and turn to them when you need a push.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Lisa Evans is a freelance writer from Toronto who covers topics related to mental and physical health. She strives to help readers make small changes to their daily habits that have a profound and lasting impact on their productivity and overall job satisfaction

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FastCompany.com | March 26, 2019

#CareerAdvice : #YourCareer – 6 Tricks for Surviving Work and #PersonalAdversity …Sometimes, Life is Difficult. But you Can Still Make it Better.

Maybe your job isn’t great. Or, you hate your apartment. Those coworkers you have are so annoying. Or, you may be dealing with life challenges like illness, job loss, or sudden caretaking responsibilities that are getting in the way of some other things that you want to do.

Into each life, some annoyances, obstacles, and misfortune will fall. And while some self-help gurus will tell you to simply ditch what’s making you unhappy or holding you back, sometimes, it’s not that easy.

“Everybody has those constraints and situations that we don’t want to be in,” says licensed clinical social worker and resilience expert Linda Hoopes, PhD, author of Prosilience: Building Your Resilience for a Turbulent WorldYou don’t want to get stuck there, but sometimes, you’re stuck with them for the time being.”

But there are things that you can do to make many situations better and cultivate greater resilience, even as you look for long-term solutions or resolutions, she says.

1. HONOR YOUR OPPONENT

It’s easy to ruminate about why you’re stuck in a bad situation, but challenges are where we learn, says performance coach Bob Litwin, author of Live the Best Story of Your Life: A World Champion’s Guide to Lasting Change. Litwin works with professionals in high-pressure jobs, such as talent agents and hedge fund managers. And sometimes, having a difficult boss or set of circumstances can be a gift.

“Adversity is the ultimate great teacher,” he says. As an elite tennis player, he says his toughest opponents were the ones who made him better. While the difficult situation may seem “just awful,” sometimes they “bounce you in a better direction and teach you how you’re going to be in that situation,” he says. Simply understanding that you have an opportunity to learn from your challenges can give them some previously unseen value, he says.

 

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What Skill Sets do You have to be ‘Sharpened’ ?

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2. BREAK IT DOWN

Many big challenges are really a series of smaller challenges that can seem overwhelming. When you break down the individual components of a situation, they’re easier to address, Hoopes says. For example, a “crappy” job may break down into unpleasant interactions with coworkers and long hours that affect family time. Break down the individual components of what’s making you unhappy, and they’ll be easier to address, she says. Prioritize those that are draining your energy most, she adds.


Related: Why adversity can be the best thing for your career


3. CHANGE WHAT YOU CAN

Even within a bad situation, you can make small changes to improve it and turn it into motivation to make bigger changes, Hoopes says. You can look for opportunities to learn new skills, even in a job you hate. If you’re managing caretaking responsibilities, you might be able to enlist help from others to get some time for yourself. Think creatively about your situation and how you might be able to make small changes to improve it, she says.

In addition, stop beating your head against the wall trying to change things that you can’t, says Paul G. Schempp, PhD, a research professor at the department of kinesiology at the University of Georgia. “We see this with highly successful athletes. Often, people who are less successful focus on things like injuries or ‘The crowd doesn’t like me,’ or ‘I’m not getting enough playing time,’ so they start on this downward spiral, because all they see is the negative things,” he says.

When you start letting go of things over which you have no control and focusing on the things you can improve through small changes, it’s easier to get out of that trap, he says.


Related: How to stay motivated when your company is going through a crisis


4. CHANGE YOUR STORY

When you’re dealing with obstacles or adversity, change the story you’re telling yourself, Litwin says. The way you think about or explain your situation is your story—and most stories have flexibility about them.

“Even if somebody is saying, ‘My situation is much tougher than what you’re saying to me,’ I would say, ‘Okay, well, that’s good, because that story can be flipped too, which is, the tougher I am, the more focused I am at making changes of who I am in order to accomplish what I want.’ We know that plants, when they’re not given that much water, often become stronger because their roots have to work harder to find the water that’s there. That’s a better story about literally plants in dry soil, that they do amazing with very little,” Litwin says. Reframing the issuein this way can make a world of difference in how you view and respond to your circumstances.

A useful tool here is tracking your progress, Schempp says. When you focus on the small changes you’re making to improve things or move away from your challenges, you immediately shift to a place of taking control and making a difference. He refers to a Harvard University study about the “progress principle,” where acknowledging small wins was found to be a powerful motivator.

5. FIND YOUR CALMING PRACTICE

Even as you make changes, it’s important to understand how to calm yourself down when you’re feeling the stress of your challenges, Hoopes says. Whether it’s going for a run, spending some time in your garden, or finding a couple of hours to catch up on a favorite television show, take that time to push your personal “reset” button.

6. DON’T LET OBSTACLES DEFINE YOU

When you’re stuck in a tough time, it can be easy for your self-talk to be dominated by the situation. Remind yourself that your situation doesn’t define you, says counselor and coach Anahid Lisa Derbabian. “Begin to notice critical or discouraging thoughts or words, which can in subtle ways sabotage yourself and keep you stuck. In the moments when you realize that you are doing this, do not blame or shame yourself. Just allow yourself to shift into messaging, which is compassionate and helpful to you,” she says. If possible, ask for help from family or friends to help you recognize these patterns—and also to assist you in making changes or finding the resources you need to do so.

Most of all, use your situation as a source of motivation to make long-term changes that will help you find lasting solutions or ways to adapt to your situation, Hoopes says. “[fusion_builder_container hundred_percent=”yes” overflow=”visible”][fusion_builder_row][fusion_builder_column type=”1_1″ background_position=”left top” background_color=”” border_size=”” border_color=”” border_style=”solid” spacing=”yes” background_image=”” background_repeat=”no-repeat” padding=”” margin_top=”0px” margin_bottom=”0px” class=”” id=”” animation_type=”” animation_speed=”0.3″ animation_direction=”left” hide_on_mobile=”no” center_content=”no” min_height=”none”][There is] a Buddhist saying, ‘Pain is inevitable. Suffering is optional.’ Life just has this stuff in it, and it’s just, ‘Okay, here I am in one of those zones. Now what am I going to do?’” she says.

Gwen Moran writes about business, money and assorted other topics for leading publications and websites. She was named a Small Business Influencer Awards Top 100 Champion in 2015, 2014, and 2012 and is the co-author of The Complete Idiot’s Guide to Business Plans (Alpha, 2010), and several other books.

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FastCompany.com | August 10, 2018

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#BestofFSCBlog : 4 Things Every Manager/Entrepreneur Needs to Do the First Week of the New Year.

Now that the holidays are over and the new year is in full swing, it’s time to head back to the lab to formulate fresh, smart, and effective ideas that will grow your organization.

Whatever the size of your firm, whether you’re B2B or B2C, and regardless of the industry in which you operate, here are four must do’s that you need to launch if you’re aiming to increase profits and market share over the next 365 days:

1. 100-Day Plan.

Since the 1930’s when Franklin Roosevelt pioneered it as a means of gauging his effectiveness in the Oval Office, the 100-day plan has become a tradition for newly elected American Presidents. The plan consists of achievable short term goals that adhere to a President’s long term vision for the country. Entrepreneurs should write their own 100 day plans as blueprints for advancing their organization’s productivity and profitability. Such a plan establishes 100 tasks, and requires managers/business owners to consider the specific steps and resources that are needed to bring them to fruition.

While there’s a time and place for visionary long term planning, the 100-day plan allows managers/entrepreneurs to craft and pursue attainable objectives and start the year off with a burst of energy. When the 100-day finish line is reached mid-April, entrepreneurs will know if they should be celebrating or if they need to recalibrate their efforts.

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2. Declutter

Whether you want to improve the feng shui of your office or just make it easier to find and store your stuff, a comprehensive tidy up of your company’s work space is a laborious yet necessary task. To make it happen, set aside a Saturday when your team can come in, rent a dumpster and high capacity paper shredder, and destroy unnecessary documents, presentations and files, and toss out old equipment, brochures, books, product samples, and other unproductive items.

Once your space has been tightened and tidied, implement a cloud-based backup system that allows for fast and convenient recovery of your organization’s electronic files. The decluttering will not only allow your team to operate more efficiently, it will also help your office to look more streamlined and professional.

Related: 5 Marketing Essentials for Your Business to Appeal to Millennials

3. Fire the person you know you have to fire.

Maybe you’ve tried to intervene to help turn things around, or  you’ve ignored the problem in hopes that it would eventually take care of itself. But however you’ve handled the challenge of having weak members on your team, you know that they’re there and that they’re dangerous the to the health of your company.

If you didn’t have the heart to do any purging during the holiday season, delay no longer. The costs to your firm in reduced productivity, low employee morale, additional supervision, damaged client relationships, and lost revenue that are caused by substandard employees can be as high as $190,000 per year, so make a decision now to either remedy a situation that’s fixable — or to clean house.

Related: Pay Yourself: Why Founders Should Set Aside Profits Every Month

4. Get high or higher.

While 26 states and the District of Columbia have laws legalizing marijuana, the suggestion here isn’t that entrepreneurs should light up more. Instead, the first week of the new year is a perfect time to review and possibly raise the prices of your products or services. Too many small business owners try to compete by lowering their prices, and that’s often a mistake.

Instead, devise a plan by studying your competitive landscape; looking at your firm’s pricing history; reviewing the calendar to determine the best time to bump up your rate, fees, or prices; and thinking about how you can enhance the value of your offerings in order to justify price revisions. If you detect some white space that would allow for small yet profitable increases, you should absolutely seize it.

After the joy and frenzy of the holidays, it’s understandable if it takes a minute for business owners to snap back to attention and keep their ships moving forward, but the upside to getting started is significant. Entrepreneurs who have the discipline to leverage these four steps as an annual early January organizational “reboot” will help to energize their teams, inspire exciting ideas, and generate new opportunities for innovation and growth.

Entrepreneur.com | December 29, 2016 | Lyneir Richardson

#Life : 25 Best Habits to Have in Life…If you are Committed to Happiness and Success, Work These into your Daily Routine.

We are creatures of habit. Everything we think, say and do is a result of deep-seated habits etched into our minds through years and years of repitious behavior. Those very same habits either help to propel us forward or to hinder our progress in life. In fact, the state and quality of our lives right now is a direct reflection of our daily habits. 

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Habits are an undeniably powerful part of life. They’re an integral part of the underlying behavioral psychology that shapes the direction of our lives. They’re so integral that a study determined that approximately 45 percent of everything we do on a daily basis is driven by our habits.

Parting ways with our bad habits and replacing them with good habits is by no means a simple task. It takes commitment, willpower and an unwavering desire to overcome our seemingly natural tendencies to think, feel, speak and act in a certain way.

Related: 10 Bad Habits You Must Eliminate From Your Daily Routine

Clearly, for those absolutely committed to things like happiness and success, habits offer the pathway to enrichment in life. They’re also the tools we use to help automate our progress towards one end or another, assisting us with the achievement of our goals and the fulfilment of our dreams.

Still, for the most part, we’re often left in the dark. We’re unsure of ourselves or where to start on the road to developing good habits. What are the best habits to have in your life when you want to succeed or be happy? Are there some that usurp others, providing some secret magical recipe for achieving life’s loftiest goals?

What are the best habits to have in life?

While any list of habits concoted might seem subjective, there are, in fact, 25 particular habits that will not only help you to succeed, financially speaking, but will also keep you healthy, happy and fulfilled in life. Focus on these 25 habits, consistently making efforts to instill them into your daily routine, and in time, your progress and momentum towards your goals will skyrocket.

1. Wake up early.

The early morning hours are a time for peaceful reflection and ample productivity, where the world is still and asleep, allowing you to focus wholeheartedly on your long-term goals. Anyone who is serious about success in any measure knows that it’s important to wake up early.

Even if you’re not a morning person, use incremental changes in your daily routine to start waking up earlier and earlier. Begin by setting your alarm clock back by 15 minutes the first week, 15 minutes the next week and so on. Do this until you can wake up at least two hours earlier than you’re waking up now.

2. Gratitude.

We spend a great deal of time immersed in our problems. But problems are also a sign of life. The only time we’ll lack problems is when we’re six feet under. And if you want to shift your focus away from your problems, you have to be grateful for what you have. Yes, even for your problems.

Gratitude is the surest pathway to health, happiness and success. It shifts our attention towards what we have rather than what we don’t have. It’s the natural abundance of simple pleasures and opportunities that we’ve been afforded with and blessed with that we often take for granted.

 

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3. Smile.

Studies have confirmed that people who smile a genuine smile (also referred to as a Duchenne smile) are happier in life. This is one of the best habits for allowing you to find emotional, mental and spiritual peace-of-mind over time — simply by placing a smile on your face.

The physiology of our bodies dictates the psychology of our minds. When we frown or slouch or do any number of other things that convey a sense of depression and unhappiness, our mind takes those cues and runs with them. However, once we shift our outward appearance by consciously adjusting ourselves, our inward feelings follow.

4. Eat a healthy breakfast.

Breakfast is an important part of life. Yet, 31 million Americans skip breakfast every single day. And that saying you’ve heard your entire life about breakfast being the most important meal of the day? It’s 100 percent true. If you’re serious about success, eat a healthy breakfast every single morning.

This single habit doesn’t take much effort. Some planning is certainly required, and if you’re rushing out the door every morning with barely any time to spare, you might want to consider waking up earlier to ensure that you wield this habit in your own life.

5. Exercise.

One of the absolute best habits to have in life is to exercise every single day without fail. This isn’t about heavy weightlifting or running a marathon. This is about doing lightly strenuous activity to oxygenate your blood and boost the endorphins in your body.

Not only will you feel physically better when you start this habit, but you’ll also feel more motivated, have more mental clairty and be more emotionally sound. Exercise releases dopaminine, oxytocin and serotonin into the system, giving an almost euphoric effect without the usage of any drugs whatsoever.

Related: Richard Branson: To Be Successful, Take the Stairs

6. Drink water with lemon.

One habit that has monumental health benefits is to drink a large glass of water with lemon every single day. Lemons are a natural source of Vitamin C, but also possess other health benefits — such as helping with your digestion, boosting your immune system, along with cleansing and rehydrating your body.

The water itself is also an important way to flush any toxins from your system early on in the morning when you first arise. Ultimately, over time, this will also aid with things like weight loss, a reduction in any inflammations and an overall boost in energy.

7. Walk 10,000 steps.

Most people have heard about the benefits of walking at least 10,000 steps in a day. Yet, as a society, we tend to fall far short of that goal. One study, which provided shocking results of just how many steps we do take, compared that number to countries from around the world by studying participants from the U.S., Switzerland, Australia and Japan.

Americans, on average, take 5,117 steps a day. Compared to Australians, who take 9,695 steps per day, and residents of Switzerland, who take 9,650 steps per day, and those of Japan, who take 7,168 steps per day — we fall way short. Event still, this single habit is a great way to resolve our sedentary ways. Park further from the office or take the stairs when you can to help boost your daily steps.

8. Vitamins and minerals.

As a culture, we lack the necessary vitamins and minerals through our food intake. Processed and refined sugars, carbohydrates and other foods that are a staple of the American diet help to exacerbate this problem. We simply don’t get the proper nutrients our bodies need on a daily basis.

Find a good set of vitamins and minerals that you can take every day. It’s easy to ignore this healthy habit, but the feeling after weeks and months of doing this on a regular basis, is tremendous. That impact can help us to improve other areas of our lives by providing mental, emotional and physical clarity.

9. Effective time management.

An essential habit for succeeding at anything in life is effective time management. How well you manage the precious little time you have says a lot about what you can achieve. And considering that we all have the same amount of time in this world, how you leverage this resource will dictate your potential for success.

Find a good system for managing your time and implement it. This isn’t complex to do, but does require conscious and consistent effort. However, once this habit has been solidified into your daily routine, virtually anything is possible, and no goal will be too big to attain.

10. Daily goal setting.

Most people have goals. Whether it’s something to achieve in business or in life, we’re all moving in one intended direction or another. However, while long-term goals do give us direction, it’s the daily goals that we set that allow us to create short-term milestones that are integral to our success.

Long-term goals can seem overwhelming even in the best of times. But by implementing a daily goal-setting strategy, you can overcome some of the enormity associated with achieving big things in life by focusing on the one-day-at-time, short-term scenarios.

11. Inspire yourself.

It’s often difficult to stay motivated for any considerable amount of time. We get discouraged and dissuaded from our goals when things arise in life that send us on tangents and veer us off track. But one of the absolute best ways you can stay motivated in life is to inspire yourself on a daily basis.

Read, watch inspirational videos and get inspired by stories of otherswho have achieved their dreams. Anthony Robbins calls this your “hour of power,” but you can spend as much or as little time on this as you need. Inspiration is the pathway to achievement because what the mind can conceive, it can achieve.

12. Save and invest.

No good habit list is complete without one that calls for saving and investing. We often overlook the necessity to save for the future because we’re so busy living in the present moment. The truth is that most Americans have less than $1,000 saved up at any given moment.

But it’s not just about saving. You have to invest the money that you save, and do so wisely. The more attention you pay to this now, the more your life will be replete with financial success in the future. You should also be sure to have at least six months worth of savings in your account to stave off any potential financial calamity in the future.

Related: Why Entrepreneurs Need to Save and Invest Money

13. Budget and track expenses.

Benjamin Franklin once said, “Beware of little expenses, a small leak will sink a great ship.” It’s easy to lose sight of little expenses, but they add up, especially when we fail to budget. Be sure to manage all of your expenses, and sweat the small stuff, so to speak.

When it comes to sound financial habits, this is an important one to have, and one that will lend itself to your future financial success. The money saved on frivilous or extraneous expenses can be saved and invested for your future. Don’t ignore the future for sake of revelling in the present moment.

14. Learn something new.

Educate yourself, and learn something new every single day. Committ to learning and improving your life, whether it’s by acquiring new skills or enhancing the existing skills you already have. From foreign languages to software programs and apps, you should carve out a small amount of time every single day to dedicate to this habit.

Whether you decide to learn something new through an online course, an audiobook, a blog post, a video tutorial on YouTube, or even through TED Talks or other means, the importance of implementing this habit is paramount. Find something that’s worthwhile learning and do just a little bit of it every single day.

15. Organize.

Physical clutter results in a loss of focus. When our lives are disorganized and in a state of disarray, it’s hard to stay focused on our goals. Take the time to organize your home and office, and do just a little each day to enforce this habit. Take a single drawer and organize it, or organize a solitary corner of your home or even a cabinet in your office.

The importance of this habit is highlighted by a study in the Journal of Neuroscience titled, “Interactions of top-down and bottom-up mechanisms in human visual cortex,” which says “Multiple stimuli present in the visual field at the same time compete for neural representation by mutually suppressing their evoked activity throughout visual cortex.” In plain English — clutter lends itself to a major loss of focus.

16. Contribute to others.

In our quest to achieve and succeed, we often forget about others. We fail to contribute something of value to our fellow man, woman or child. This isn’t about donating money; this is about contributing your time, which is far more valuable than money. It also helps to shift your focus from a state of lack to a state of abundance.

We tend to spend too much of our time steeped in worry and anxiety. But, when you enlist the habit of contributing to others, you can easily alleviate your personal concerns, and even your problems, by realizing the necessity of helping others. In fact, it’s the people in this world that contribute the most value to others that end up achieving the greatest success.

17. Network.

Clearly, it’s not just about what you know in this world. In order to succeed, we need to reach out to others — who you know is extremely important. But networking isn’t just about dropping names; it’s about finding ways that you can help and add value to the lives of others.

The best networkers in the world are also some of the most successful individuals. But they didn’t focus entirely on themselves at the outset. They always looked for ways that they could help others without thinking about receiving something in return. That’s how the world’s best networkers are born.

18. Break through fears.

We spend a lot of time immersed in fear. Those doomsday what-if scenarios play out in our minds throughout the course of any given day. We’re so worried and nervous about the future that we forget to enjoy the present moment. It’s so ingrained in our minds to fear things that it stifles our progress.

Breaking through your fears is quite possibly one of the most important habits that you could develop. Get used to doing one thing that makes you feel uncomfortable each and every single day. Talk to a stranger, give someone a compliment, or tell someone the truth about something that makes you feel uncomfortable.

19. Take action.

Take action. It’s a cliche that we’ve all heard repeatedly, yet it’s something that many of us fail to do. In fact, we do just the opposite — we procrastinate. We fail to take action for whatever number of reasons, hindering our progress and ability to achieve any of the monumental goals we set for ourselves.

The best way to overcome procrastination is to use the 15-minute rule. Take whatever it is that you’ve been putting off for the longest, set a timer on your phone for 15 minutes, and only commit to doing it for that long. Why only 15 minutes? First, it breaks the cycle of inaction. Second, after 15 minutes, you’ve built some momentum, so you might just keep on going.

20. Follow a plan.

Having a plan is integral to every successful entrepreneur — and person — throughout history. Whatever it is that you want out of life, not only do you need long-term goals and daily goals to help conceive, but you need to follow an intricate and detailed plan that you create along the way.

Without a plan, we often fail to realize our goals. Without understanding how we’ll get from point A to point B, it’s hard to see the cliched forest through the trees. But when you stick to a plan and track your progress, making changes along the way, you can eventually reach your goals as long as you don’t give up.

Related: How to Improve Your Focus to Increase Your Effectiveness and Results

21. Enjoy “me” time.

One of the habits that most of us fail to implement in our lives is to enjoy some down time — or “me” time. Do one small thing that you love doing every single day. It’s not always about achievement and success. By doing one small thing that you love, you’re actually instilling peace of mind and re-focusing your center.

Whether you listen to your favorite music pumping through headphones, take a walk through the park, go for a drive along your favorite road, watch a movie, or anything else for that matter, be sure that you always carve out some time for yourself in the day.

22. Implement positive thinking.

Like attracts like. When we think negatively, harboring negative thoughts, we attract negative things into our lives. When we think positive, we attract positive things. It’s hard to stay positive all the time, and it’s often our natural tendency to think negatively about things.

However, positive thinking is one of the surest pathways to the achievement of your goals. Ignore the naysayers and the people who doubt your abilities, and pursue the things that you love, staying positive all the while. It’s purely a matter of momentum. Think positively for long enough, and good things begin happening.

23. Read.

Whether you read the newspaper, financial news, a novel, a non-fiction book, or anything else, find time to read something. Reading is an important habit to develop in life, and you shouldn’t rely on audiobooks or movies all the time. Good old-fashioned reading, the traditional non-screen way, does the trick.

Reading can help you uncover new worlds, ideas or ways of doing things that you might not have known about before. It’s also a great way to educate yourself or entertain yourself at any given moment.

24. Get ample rest.

Although it’s important to wake up early every day, it’s also imperative to get ample rest. Finding that delicate balance might be difficult, especially if you have kids, two jobs and other obligations. However, if you care enough about your physical well-being, along with your future success, you’ll focus on a minimum of six to eight hours of uninterrupted sleep every night.

If you have trouble falling asleep, be wary not to drink coffee or alcohol too close to your bedtime. Also, if you smoke, eat too much sugar, or ingest any other type of toxins throughout the day, you’ll find it difficult getting to bed at a decent hour. Cut those out of your routine so you can get some ample rest at night.

25. Journal your thoughts.

Journaling your thoughts is a great way to reflect on who you are and what you’ve been doing in life. Time can go by so quickly that we often forget the details of what we did even a few short months ago. Those details are often novel to recall as it adds clarity and purpose to our lives, reminding us of life’s lessons and joys.

Get in the habit of writing out your thoughts and journaling your experiences on a daily basis. Intertwine it with your goals, hopes and dreams for the future, writing out what you envision your life will look like down the road, then come back to read it later on to get a window into your mind at any point in your life. This is a powerful method for self-reflection, and also a great way to motivate and inspire yourself going forward into the future.

Getting started.

How many of the habits above have you already worked into your life? Are there bad habits that seem to continue holding you back from achieving any semblance of success and happiness? Bad habits can get in the way of our progress and quitting them is not easy by any means. However, it’s all a matter of momentum. It all boils down to small incremental steps that you can take day in and day out to help you build up the right repertoire of habits to help you achieve whatever your heart desires. The habits above are some of the best habits to have in life. How many of them will you agree and commit to taking on today?

 

Entrepreneur.com | December 2, 2016 | R. L. Adams

#Leadership : From Cold Emails That Work To Finding Your Purpose: This Week’s Top Leadership Stories…This Week’s Top Stories May Get you to ReThink the Much-Reviled Cold Email and Ask the Right Questions to Find your Company’s Purpose.

These were the stories you loved in Leadership for the week of November 14:

1. SIR KENSINGTON’S: THREE QUESTIONS FOR FINDING YOUR PURPOSE

Can this condiment company help your business find its mission? Maybe. Sir Kensington’s, which makes ketchups, mustards, and more, didn’t just pluck its corporate “purpose” out of the sky or have a CSR officer draft a memo. It looked back on what had actually led to the company’s success. These simple questions can lead to the type of self-examination to help you do the same.

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2. MENTORSHIP AND THE ART OF THE COLD EMAIL

“I’m all about cold emailing,” says Jennifer Fitzgerald, CEO and cofounder of PolicyGenius. That may be surprising for some to hear, but it’s helped Fitzgerald secure some of her most prized mentors. She isn’t alone. Here’s what fellow startup founders have discovered about putting a widely reviled networking method to good use.

3. FORMER FELLOW TO PETER THIEL: YOU CAN HAVE YOUR MONEY BACK

The Thiel Fellowship awards $100,000 grants to students under 22 years old to drop out of school and pursue an innovative project. But since the program’s billionaire benefactor Peter Thiel is a high-profile Trump supporter and now part of the president-elect’s transition team, one fellow says he’s had enough. This week, Cosmo Scharf explained why he cut ties.

4. FOUR EMAIL SUBJECT LINES THAT MAKE EVERYONE HATE YOU

Your simple follow-up email may seem harmless enough, but on the other end, somebody is staring at their inbox and grinding their teeth. This week we learned why certain email subject lines are likely to backfire, leaving others feeling more aggravated than interested in helping you.

5. THIS PROJECT MANAGER’S WORKFLOW HACK TRANSFORMED HOW GE BUILDS AIRPLANE ENGINES

One Air Force veteran who now works with GE Aviation says his military experience taught him to spot problems that impact others and take action quickly. That training came in handy when Paul Thienprayoon saw how badly his team’s inventory system was slowing down the assembly and repair of GE-made airplane engines. Here’s how he took a simple Excel sheet and turned it into a software tool that streamlined the Aviation division’s workflow.

 

FastCompany.com | FAST COMPANY STAFF  | 11.18.16 5:00 AM

#Leadership : 4 Steps to Reinventing Yourself After Hitting Rock Bottom…Failure is the Unpleasant Beginning of Being Reborn as an Entrepreneur.

Hitting rock bottom — as energetic, smart and business-savvy entrepreneurial — types, this dreadful phrase is simply not in our vocabularies.

happy young business man portrait in bright modern office indoor

But it happens — even to the best of us who think we are completely prepared for this roller coaster ride in the pursuit of success. And if you don’t want to commit career suicide by going back to that nine-to-five job that made you jump into entrepreneurship in the first place — you must navigate through the tough times. So, how do you do that? Where do you turn when you’re awash in the confusion, anxiety, self-doubt and worry of “rock bottom?”

“Anytime I hit into a wall,” David said, “I reminded myself why I was doing what I was doing. I connected to my vision. And I realized that no matter the hiccups along the way, it was still way better than committing ‘career suicide’ and going back to being an employee. It was not an option.”

David Schloss, now co-founder and CEO of digital-marketing company rampify.com and one of the most respected names when it comes to Facebook advertising, can tell you how to navigate through that unwanted world — because in 2014, he hit rock bottom himself. He had just been “going through the motions,” he recalled. He had no real goal in mind. “I simply had no direction,” he said. “I felt totally lost.”

Related: How Entrepreneurs Benefit From 3 Types of Failure

On Halloween that year, David had $0 in his bank account. He was only 72 hours away from either coming up with his rent payment or getting kicked out. His car was two weeks away from getting impounded. It felt like walls were closing in. His business was crumbling — and he was very close to throwing in the towel and going back to working a day job.

Thankfully, David was able to turn things around. He didn’t go back to being an employee and instead created his own thriving marketing company. Here are four tips from David that will help you through the tough times, get back on track and rise up in the business you were meant for:

1. Let yourself be vulnerable.

Life isn’t always sunshine and roses. We hit walls. Sometimes we lose. We struggle. Too often as entrepreneurs, we hide those struggles. The problem is, if you don’t let yourself be real and vulnerable when you’re struggling, then it will actually hold you back from progressing through the tough time.

In David’s period of uncertainty, he did something that proved to be a powerful key in his turnaround — he let himself be vulnerable. David had hundreds of business friends on Facebook. Realizing he needed help, David reached out to every last one of them for advice and guidance. Two things happened.

“First, I discovered I wasn’t alone,” he said. “Other entrepreneurs had gone through similar things.” Knowing that other people had made it through, too, helped David develop confidence that he could also get through it. “Second, they were able to give me actionable advice to get on the right track.” It was that advice that got him moving in the right direction.

Related: 18 Ways to Bounce Back from Failure

Had David stayed “closed up,” he wouldn’t have had the support he needed from others to help him move forward. When you’re in a tough spot, don’t be afraid to ask for help. Sharing the struggle is the bravest thing you can do. Being vulnerable isn’t a sign of weakness — it’s a sign of strength.

 

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2. Develop a vision.

It’s difficult to know if you’re progressing when you don’t know where you’re going. In “Seven Habits of Highly Effective People,” Stephen Covey talks about beginning with the end in mind. Know where you want to end up at the beginning of the trip — it’s your guiding north star. In David’s comeback, asking himself, “What do I want to create?” proved to be powerful.

“Asking that question,” he said, “is what helped me develop a vision for the future I wanted.”

David used the advice from his colleagues to help him get super clear on the vision and direction he wanted to go. It’s that vision that helped him get out of bed in the morning and get to work.

Vision is critical. If you don’t know where you’re going, how will you know when you get there?

3. Create an action plan.

Vision is knowing where you’re going. Action is how you’ll get there. You’ve heard “if you fail to plan, you plan to fail.” While that’s true, there’s an important distinction to be made — your plan must be based on “action” instead of based on “results.”

In my first book, “Fish Out of Water,” I explain how successful people focus on what’s inside their control, versus outside their control. While the result is not always directly within your control, action is.

Related: 8 Ways Intelligent People Use Failure to Their Advantage

David got clear on where he wanted to go, and then he made a daily, weekly, monthly, and quarterly plan of action of how he was going to get there. To him, his success wasn’t based on the amount of money he made — it was based on the actions he took to make that money. He set time aside to focus on personal development. He committed to contacting at least three people every day to create a conversation without pitching or selling anything. He created two training videos every week to provide value to his audience. David believed that if he took the right actions, results would come as a byproduct of those actions — and they did.

4. Persist.

It’s no surprise that things don’t always go the way you planned. Persistence is a decision to keep moving towards the vision no matter the hiccups along the way. It’s not just doing what it takes — it’s doing whatever it takes. It’s falling down and getting up again anyway, as David did.

“Anytime I hit into a wall,” David said, “I reminded myself why I was doing what I was doing. I connected to my vision. And I realized that no matter the hiccups along the way, it was still way better than committing ‘career suicide’ and going back to being an employee. It was not an option.”

Planning is what gets you moving toward your vision, but persistence is what keeps you going.

Entrepreneurship is a fulfilling journey, not just a satisfying destination. It’s not just about where we are going — but who we become. Throughout the process of crawling up and out of the dreaded rock bottom, David began to realize he wasn’t even the same person anymore. So just remember, when you’re in a tough spot as an entrepreneur, it just means you’re being reborn into the new you. Embrace the new you.

 

Entrepreneur.com | November 2, 2016 | Calvin Wayman