Category: Business

An industry awareness helps you plan products and the direction of your business and how you fit into the big picture.

A market awareness helps you determine what’s needed, what people will buy, and what you should work on.

An awareness of your team help you determine how to make requests, how to motivate others to action, and what can (and can’t) be done within a certain timeframe.

Knowledge of yourself ties this all together.

Your quirks and idiosyncrasies and motivations and habits (good and bad) color the tone of your interactions and deals and the culture fostered within your organization.

If you’re not aware of how you’re perceived and how your decisions impact others, how can you lead? And if you haven’t taken the time to learn these things, why even bother?

It’s tempting to slave away around the clock when working towards a significant goal, or to feel like working around the clock is the right thing to do. 10,000 hours, right?

The trouble is, not everyone’s wired to slave away around the clock without burning out and becoming massively unproductive.

When I first started freelancing in Atlanta and was taking on web design/development projects, I holed myself up for what felt like weeks at a time in order to take my business seriously.

It resulted it much Facebooking.

When I started making time to be away from the computer, engage in actual recreation, and put some structure around my work (no work on weekends or after 6pm, for example), I saw a dramatic and immediate spike in my productivity.

As a matter of fact, I started to find inspiration and motivation and creativity coming to me when I was nowhere near my office. I started looking forward to my projects (instead of falling into the lazy and ungrateful habit of lamenting the workload…) and attacked them with enthusiasm.

Sometimes a day at the beach is much better for your business than a day at the office.

Freelancing is a bit like being a magician sometimes.

There’s technical skill, mastery of a craft, a touch of showmanship, and the careful orchestration of dozens of factors that result in you audience (customers) being delighted and begging for more.

By the same token, a big mistake during showtime (a project) can severely damage your show (business), and repeated failures can result in irreparable damage to your reputation (livelihood).

Yesterday, I paid to have my dry-cleaning delivered (don’t look at me like that; I live in NYC) and noticed that my receipt proudly states “All Work Done On Premises.”

When said laundry wasn’t delivered within the window specified, I went there to investigate. When I explained what happened, the gentlemen immediately said that it “must be the wash and fold — it’s always late.”

(This illustrates that all work is actually not done on the premises, of course.)

Sigh.

If the promise is that your company conducts business in a particular way, it’s critical that you deliver on the promise. This should be obvious.

What’s baffling is when companies not only fall short on the promise, but on an even acceptable level of service.

I attended an event last night where the line to enter the venue was wrapped around the building. It was cold, windy, and few expected to be standing outside waiting to get in.

Tickets for the event ranged from less than $100 to almost $400, and the proceeds went towards a good cause.

As we were waiting in line, organizers of the event announced that press and VIP attendees should go to the front of the line, no waiting. I wasn’t press, but I wanted to be VIP (the ticket level) at that moment.

I wondered why there weren’t staff members walking around with iPhones and Square readers, accepting payments on the spot for attendees who wanted to jump the line.

I probably would have paid.

I did some work for a guy last year who turned out to be a fraud.

The day he was supposed to mail me a check for $17,000.27, he disappeared. An open records request by a very helpful paralegal resulted in a shocker: Mr. Moneybags was incarcerated for his inability to fulfill some personal financial obligations.

We had one more discussion when he emerged from jail, wherein he reported having been in the hospital (not knowing that I knew the truth), hoping things would return to normal.

They did not.

Inexperienced freelancers often get burned like I did because they don’t have the proper contract(s) in place, because they don’t get things in writing, and because they don’t realize that many clients seek to extract the maximum amount of work for as little money as possible (and sometimes less than that).

This particular situation stung because 1) I was going to quit my job with the money I had earned and 2) I had several friends doing work for this guy, and immediately realized that none of us would be getting paid. Oof.

Instead of doing cartwheels in traffic following the bad news, however, I reframed the issue and emerged smarter and more determined than ever.

It was an invaluable lesson for me (although one I could have done without), and embarrassing disasters like that are just as important to my story as the public victories.

I spent much of the day (yesterday) with a client who loves her business.

She calls herself “insanely courageous” and I can understand why. From the heartbreaking stories of her upbringing, to the overachieving nature she took on in her academics, to the fact that she now invest 50% of profits back into the business — my client is anything but ordinary.

The impossible balance she’s struck involves doing what she loves every day, creating lasting change in the lives of those served by her business, and being compensated fairly for it.

I know plenty of people who hate what they do for a living but are compensated quite handsomely.

I know plenty of people who create lasting change, but would be in trouble pretty quickly if they missed a paycheck.

I know plenty of people who make plenty of money, but add very little value to anyone’s lives.

Melissa didn’t get where she is by chance or by interviewing her way to the position, or by just praying very earnestly for it to be that way. She has worked extremely hard to get where she is, and she never settled along the way when easier paths were available.

I’d love to see more “heart-centered” businesses receiving recognition and providing a framework for other businesses to follow. It’s a beautiful thing to see up close.

Some people are deterred by the impossible. Others specialize in it.

A few questions to consider:

1. Who’s making the money?
2. Who is the gatekeeper?
3. Who is the real gatekeeper?
4. Who attracts unwanted attention?
5. Who makes friends with everyone and transcends the pettiness
6. Do the answers to the questions above impact your success?

These are the questions I would ask before getting into any industry without substantial financial backing or political clout.

With all the meetings and meetings about meetings and posturings and watering hole discussions and politics and bureaucracy and time wasting and distractions and CCs and BCCs and all-hands and mixers and off-campuses and eggshell walking…

…it’s amazing that any actual work gets done inside of many companies.

I remember staying until late in the evening just to to get work done.

I remember getting warmed up around 6pm when the emails stopped coming in so I could focus.

I remember pulling an all-nighter at work just to have a productive and distraction-free swath of time.

Work culture is broken.

Success (be it freelance work, entrepreneurship, or what have you) is not about skill.

It’s not about talent, and it’s not about luck.

I’ve noticed over the years that the most critical tool in the arsenal of effective humans is a winning mindset. It might manifest itself in the form of quiet confidence, and on the other extreme, it might be overconfident delusion.

Regardless of what it looks like, it’s critical. I meet few people who are (truly) surprised that they saw success in a venture that they undertook.