Your business is not your
life. Your life and business are two different things entirely, and should not
be equated as one and the same. Therefore the growth or death of your business
depends on a peculiar set of principles which should on the other hand not
determine the directional swing of your life. To apply this wisdom, you must
understand how to “work on your business and not in it”. Lack of this
understanding breeds a cataclysmic effect that makes circumstances in business
have a ricocheting effect on its proprietor’s life cycle, and the worse of it
when the circumstances are bad.
However, for your business
to have a true success destination, it must form a core part of your life. But
in this equation, your life is the master and business the servant. Therefore,
your business can and should only play a significant role in your life, but not
to alternate as your life’s alter ego. Yet, before you can determine what that
role will be, you must ask yourself the following questions:
ii.
What kind of life do I want?
iii.
What do I want my life to look like; to feel
like?
iv.
Who do I wish to be?
Your primary aim in life
will provide the answers to these questions.
Once you have established a
picture of how you want your life to be, and you come to the realization that
it’s more than just the craving for things to have and things to do, you can
then direct your focus to the development of your strategic objective.
Your Strategic Objective is
a very clear statement of what your business has to ultimately do for you to
achieve your primary aim in life. In this understanding, your business is a
means rather than an end, a vehicle to enrich your life rather than one that
drains the life you have.
Your strategic objective,
as well as your business strategy and plan are products of your life plan. Your
life plan shapes your life, and the business that is to serve it. Your business
strategy and plan provide the structure within which your business is intended
to operate overtime to fulfill your life plan.
As soon as you come to
understand that your strategic objective, business strategy and plan are meant
to drive a business that will actualize your life plan, only then will you see
that this is actually a game dominated by a rule: “Setting Standards”, e.g.
setting financial or money standards. The standards you create for your
business will shape both your business and the experience you have of your
business. Standards create the energy by which the best companies, and the most
effective people, produce results.
At this point you come
face-to-face with the first dilemma encountered by everyone going into
business: “How can I possibly know what standards to set and how much results
they will produce in future?” The answer is, you can’t possibly know it or see
it all; there are certain steps best taken and journeys best traveled even
before the total picture becomes crystal clear. At the beginning of your
business, any standards are better than no standards.
Therefore, creating standards
is not just strategically necessary for your business; it is strategically
necessary for your life, for the realization of your primary aim.
Indeed, the first question
you must always ask when creating standards for the achievement of your
strategic objective is: “What will serve my primary aim or purpose?” And when
it’s about setting financial or money standards, it becomes: “How much money do
I need to live the way I wish?” Not in income, but in assets. In other words,
how much money do you need in order to be independent of work, to be financially
free (Financial Freedom)?
Gleaning from all that has
been said, it becomes evident that why many small business owners and
entrepreneurs rarely succeed is because there are in businesses or pursuing
business opportunities tied to motives outside what inspires their life plan or
primary aim in life. The greatest energy the universe has ever witnessed is
that which resides in life: “The energy
of discovery and creativity”. Therefore, when a business or endeavor is not
tied to life fulfilling goals and objectives, it lacks the basic requirement
for growth.
An opportunity worth
pursuing is a business that can fulfill the standards you’ve created for
achieving your primary aim and strategic objective in life. If it is reasonable
to assume that it can, then the business is worth pursuing. If it is
unreasonable to assume that it can, then no matter how exciting, interesting,
or appealing the business is, forget it. Walk away from it. It will consume too
much of your precious time and prevent you from finding a true opportunity
worth pursuing.
How do you know whether you
have an opportunity worth pursuing? It is when it is tied to what you can drive
passionately and which can produce solutions that can alleviate the
frustrations experienced by a large enough group of consumers to make it worth
your while.
Identifying this standard
fulfills two basic requirements of your strategic objective:
(a) It
gives you feedback on what kind of business you’re creating.
(b) It
defines who your potential customer will be.
In other words, it tells
you what kind of business opportunity you need to create or embrace and for
whom (consumer and customer).
BOTTOM-LINE IS!!!!!!
Get a “Life” today!! Locate your passion (primary aim), develop strategic objectives and set the matching standards, then watch your business or enterprise serve you, to achieve your life plan.
