MEMO TO MYSELF: “Are you doing things which make money?”
By definition, successful business owners get this. (I’m defining ’successful’ to mean those who have a business from which they make an honest living.)
Anything less is ‘failure’.
Don’t take this personally – you can be ‘failing forward’ in the sense of taking action on your goals and figuring things out from experience.
I like to call this course-corrective feedback. (And yes, the truth can hurt, sometimes.)
After reading Tim’s article I was struck by how brainwashed I was when in the ‘employee mindset’. (As a teacher, I could write a book on this… haha!)
Rarely did I question whether my daily activities were “making money.” – that was something for my managers and the front office sales folks and rainmakers to figure out.
Silly me – now I’m all of those people in one.
So, I’ll ask the question again:
Are you doing things which make money?
END OF MEMO.
- Mark McClure
PS – If you’re not in business to make money, ignore this post.
3 Comments
Yes, about 80% of what I do makes me money, The other 20% is a combination of things that I do for fun, feelings and yep in some cases just for the hell of it. I find that I can get too far over on the productive side and then I’m not loose enough to see new opportunities. Best to you in 09 Mark.
[Hi Tom,
I can sense your happy doing what you do each time I visit your site.
And the very best to you this year, my friend.
Mark]
Great post Mark. It’s so easy to fall into the trap of doing stuff out of habit, even when it doesn’t progress our goals, such as making money.
We all have to perform activities that ‘enable’ our goals, or ‘defend’ achievements – even down to admin jobs such as accounting. When these jobs become easy and form part of our comfort zone, it’s always tempting to do them more often.
Your course-corrective feedback is a good model to use. I went through such an event just before the end of 2008 and now I feel so much more confident and keen to achieve my goals in 2009 – which (coincidentally) is to Make Money (or I should add, Make Money More Efficiently so I can spend more time with my family and friends)
[Simon,
There's absolutely no hiding from it when you look at a P&L statement haha!
I've always been attracted to 'course-corrective' ideas - even before I read Dr. Maxwell Maltz's book, Psycho-Cybernetics, some years ago.
That book was published in my birth year - 1960 - so it must be good
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maxwell_Maltz
Mark]
Don’t you teach at Winston Churchill Collegiate Mark?
[Chris,
I'd choose that over the Wilkins Micawber Academy any day
Mark]
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