3 Ways to Protect Your Business

If you're facing a veritable rodent in your midst; be it a hacker trying to disrupt your business, a knock-off competitor who wants to steal your clients/prospects, a rip-off copycat who can't come up with their own ideas... you have to think like them. Using a metaphor of raccoons that set-up residence in our attic, here are a few ideas to fend off the business rodents who can infest your space.

1. Don't Blindly Trust the Professionals. 

   Without going into details about how the roofing pros didn't ensure raccoons got into our attic, suffice to say they fell short of keeping the sound of raccoons ballroom dancing on our upstairs ceiling. Thousands of dollars later, the "pros" were never invited back while the raccoons never needed an invitation.

2. Overestimate the Tenacity of Your Competitors.

   It turns out that raccoons are pretty tenacious creatures. I custom built a layer of hardwood and stapled chicken wire all along the point where the raccoons were getting in. I even hired a small man to squirm into the space between the roof and soffits to ensure the barrier was screwed in. Months later, the sound of raccoons doing a remake of Saving Private Ryan echoed through our entire attic space. Again, I humanly relocated our furry guests. 
   
3. Overcompensate Your Barrier(s) to Entry. With the roofing company and skinny helpers permanently in my rear-view mirror I decided to take matters into my own hands. With the barrier of wood and chicken wire torn back and tossed aside by raccoons determined to exercise their squatter's rights, I squeezed into the tiny space. I sprayed Coyote Urine in and around the opening. I tripled the number of screws in the wood/wire barrier. I caulked the entire perimeter. I cut out sheet metal to cover the space with extra-flaps to surround the top, sides and bottoms. Screwed another dozen screws into any available opening. Then caulked the entire length and breadth of the metal edges. 

By thinking like a raccoon (not lazy roofers or uninvested skinny guys) did I conquer this first world problem. May your business be fortified by your attention to not blindly trusting professionals, overestimating the tenacity of your competitors, and overcompensating any barriers to entry into your business space. 

A self-serving bias can cut two ways. Avoid any form of self-destruction.

As you'll see in this video, if you take credit and say, "Those good things are due to me," then you have a self-serving bias. If you say, "Those bad things are not my fault, they happen to me because of someone or something else," then you have the other side-of-the-sword where you are playing the victim.

Basically, having these kinds of biases hobble your growth.

The solution is to let go. Let go of the credit. Let go of the victim language. Just let go of the bias altogether.

It all correlates to the versions of the truth. There's your truth. The other person's truth. Then theirs likely 'the truth.'

Having a bias may make you feel good. You may feel vindicated. You may feel 'right.' Your bias may launch you into, "The good fight." But if bias has anything to do with ego or fear, it is a bias that is on the road to dysfunction.

If you absolutely HAVE to HAVE bias, then have a bias for LOVE while you have a bias against hate.

As Martin Luther King said, "Hate is too great a burden to bear."

Look for ways you can observe without judgment. Look for opportunities to clarify someone's point of view. Challenge yourself to actively listen over silently formulating what you're going to say next. Self-serving biases diminish your relationships with others, and, get this, your self.

Breakthroughs in life happen when you are constantly in the solution loop of listening, not talking. Test out what you think and challenge your own beliefs. Be part of a conversation not a one-way stream of your biases. Being right is far less important than being happy.

Let go of the self-serving bias.

Lead By Example

Few of us "sign-up" to be a role model but all of us are a role-model in some way or another. Whether it's your inner circle, random acquaintances, or an unknown observer, you are being observed at some level.

I remember when Michael Irving was being scrutinized for his behavior and he said, "I never signed up to be no role model." Too bad there Sparky, you and the rest of us ARE role models. We all influence each other in some fashion or another. What you do about it is up to you.

There are all sorts of paths to "lead by example." What you do leads the list. What you say, is a close second. Who you hang out with, snuggles up to third-place. Then there's a pack of: who you work with, play with, endorse, reject, and inspire. There are the places you visit, the events you attend, the sites you click onto, the mail you receive.

There are a gazillion different ways to be perceived and an overwhelming number of messages you send out to your world.

What is a mere mortal to do?

Do the best you can while knowing you can always go from your best to better. Being a perfect role model is not the point. Being an ideal role model is not the destination.

Being the person who serves with love and seeks fulfillment is a pretty good place to start.

All this is not in the video but I did want you to have a touchstone for being the role model you are meant to be.

Fear can be the bane of our existence. Getting rid of fear(s) will be a lifelong pursuit. 

The paradoxes surrounding FEAR is multilayered: 

• Run away from fear it gets larger.
• Run towards fear and it gets smaller.
• If you let fear go up, confidence goes down.
• If you minimize fear, confidence goes up.
• Fake that you're not scared and you're only kidding yourself.
• Embrace your fears and you are courageous.
• If you ignore what you fear, you're ignoring what is important to you.
• If you dive into the middle of what scares you you're on your way to fulfillment. 

This video is a small exploration into the power of fear. Whether that power is in your hands or out of your control is absolutely up to you.

Enjoy.

Here's your breakthrough for today. You'll gravitate to that which you believe to be true, so be the architect of that truth. Let me say that again, backwards. Be the architect of your truth so that you can gravitate towards that truth.

We could spend an hour on this topic and give you all sorts of good examples of celebrities that had a truth in their mind and they gravitated towards that, positive and negative. Gosh, the first person that comes to mind is Muhammad Ali.

He thought he was the greatest in the world, he told everybody he was the greatest in the world, and you know what? He probably was, in terms of boxing, the greatest in the world.

There are people that have a truth they are the architect of. There are some people, it just occurs to them. So be the person that chooses the truth that you want to gravitate towards. Be the architect of that truth, design it.

Now, how?

Well, repetition, repeating things over and over help. You keep telling somebody something, in some form or fashion it's gonna come true. Negatives can occur too.

If you're not conscious of your truth, negative things can occur because you may have a subconscious truth that's going to take you backwards.

So be the architect for maybe a positive truth, and really design that in a way that has not just repetition, but has emotion attached to it. When you think about it, you feel it inside, there's this buzz inside, you just go, oh, I would love to do that.

So when you establish that truth, you'll gravitate towards that.

You do that, well, we got this.

Here's your breakthrough for today. It has to do with allowing people to know where you're headed so that they can follow you.

This is human nature! When our son was very young, actually by the age of one, it would drive him nuts if he didn't know exactly where we were headed and what was going on in that day. And that really hasn't changed.

Do that in an email, in the subject line, in a speech. If you're making a point, start with the point, let people know where you're headed and they will follow you, they will be able to follow where you're headed.

And so you do that, well, you're gonna have more effective communication, more effective teamwork, and you'll have people at your side rather than resisting where you're headed. You do that, we got this.

Today’s message has to do with not being so fixated on making the other side wrong.

Whether it has to do with business growth, overcoming obstacles, maintaining resilience or a simple conversation that finds itself on the topic of politics. 

I'm a DIY (Do It Yourself) kind of guy.

There are really two categories of people.

There are the "DIYs" or there's the “I don’t care how it works just fix it” kind of person.

Remember the book, Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance. It is a book from long ago that triggered a lot of us to say I want to figure out how this works and get after it. It did not trigger people that went I don't care how it works and quite frankly I'm going to pay somebody to figure out how to make it work because I got better things to do.

Those two categories of people are very different. But here we are. Two sides who don’t see eye to eye yet they coexist wonderfully.

They don't try and make the other one wrong and say, “Well you got it wrong. My way is the right way!”

They coexist. They get along.

So whatever category you find yourself in, we can get along with the other side.

In fact when it comes to getting along … we got this!

Coaching for Business Growth

Growing your business can be a challenge. Growing your business when employees are working from home can seem like an insurmountable challenge. We have found that coaching has a massive impact on employee engagement and keeping leaders happy.

The problems that exist with remote work environments is managers struggle to know if people are delivering on the work-time they've committed to. But the real focus should be on the results that the employees are producing.

This video is designed to have your people understand how to stay engaged and deliver those results that you're looking for. It's also designed for your employees to enjoy the message in a short, brief, and fun video.

If you're curious about how coaching (from an outside perspective) can improve team productivity or individual productivity, then give us a call. We hope you have a great day and enjoy this breakthrough video.

Why So Happy?

Is it the coffee?

Did the boss give everyone a raise?

NOPE! The boss did one better.

She hired a pro to spice up their Virtual event.

Meanwhile, we feel bad for everyone in the Zoom Desert.

Stop dry and boring Virtual meetings.

Professional presenters are a glass of water In the online desert.

Hire a pro for your next virtual event.

Hire a pro to spice up your meeting and bring fresh ideas to your group. We're proud of Vince's Virtual Presenter Certification and his ability to help your group engage online at a whole new level. His content on overcoming obstacles and energetic inspiration couple with his tools for resiliency, no matter the challenges you face.

Conversations with Dune explore a variety of inspirational topics, practical tools for entrepreneurs, insights for parents, and anyone searching for a better way... Enjoy this one hour and fifty minute interview.