10 Things in Life That Aren’t Fair — and What to Do About Them (Part 2 of 2)
Sep/090
“If life were fair, Elvis would be alive and all the impersonators would be dead.”– Johnny Carson
In Part 1 of this series, I discussed some of the ways that life deals us a bum hand, and some of the ways we can deal with that. In this post, I continue the list, starting with some oddnesses about factors that seem to play as big a role, if not even bigger, as individual merit in determining or life success.
1. Most CEOs are tall.
90% of Fortune 500 CEOs are of above average height. Some 30% – compared with only about 4% in the general population – are 6’2” or taller. Since it’s highly unlikely that a random sample of 500 people would show this great a deviation from the national average, the only explanation is that tallness conveys qualities that are seen as “executive material” even when the tall person might lack those qualities or be merely humdrum. By extension, shorter-than-average people with incredible leadership skills might be passed over in exchange for less-stunning but taller candidates.
What to do about it: This is even tougher than appearance issues, since there’s no good way to increase your height (you can wear lifts, I suppose, but will always risk exposure). Again, confidence is key, and the handful of shorter-than-average CEOs out there (less that 3%) are distinguished by their confidence. Study the behavior of shorter CEOs like Jack Welch or Barry Diller. Think “tall” – be seen, make yourself heard. Shorter CEOs also tend to be those that work their way up in a company, so commit for the long haul; taller CEOs come from executive job searches, where they have less personal history and more “flash” in play. And, of course, you can become an entrepreneur – hopefully you wouldn’t replace yourself with someone taller!
2. People buy brands.
Brand loyalty is one of the major factors influencing people’s buying decisions. Part of this is “following the leader” – if I know the brand, it must be because people are talking about it, thus it must be good.” Part of it is packaging design. And part of it is comfort in previous knowledge – the brand you know and kind of like is a better bet than the one off-brand you don’t know and might love or hate.
What to do about it: Commit yourself to trying something new every so often – maybe every month, replace a favorite brand with a brand you don’t know and see how you like it. You pay a huge premium for branding, often at the expense of quality, so it’s worth it to shed a brand here and there. For durable purchases (as opposed to consumables like food), develop a systematic way of comparing your brand against the competitors – Apple (or Microsoft), Ford (or Chevy), Nike (or Adidas) might not always be the best way for you to go, even if you’ve had good experiences with them in the past.
3. People do, in fact, judge books by their covers.
It’s a publishing industry fact – book covers are what grab and hold attention long enough for a purchase to be made. If it were something about the content, you’d expect authors to have some say, but often they have no contractual right to even see the cover before it’s published, let alone approve or disapprove. (More often, authors can disapprove, but publishers reserve – and usually exercise – the right to ignore the author’s disapproval).
What to do about it: If you’re in the authoring game, let book cover designers do what they do best – they know their domain far better than you do. For buyers, check reviews – lots of handheld software allows you to access Amazon and other sites with reviews while you’re standing in the store. Also, get used to using your library – most libraries have online reservation systems that are nearly as effective as Amazon at getting your chosen books to you in a couple of days. That way, you minimize the risk of blowing money on books that turn out to be less than the cover promises.
4. Most people would rather not choose at all than choose between two equally good options.
This is decision paralysis of a sort – when presented with two equally good options, we freeze. Two options where one is clearly better we handle fine, but not where they are equally good, or for that matter, difficult to compare on the same criteria (the apples v. oranges dilemma).
What to do about it: The standard response to difficult decisions is to list pros and cons, but where things are more or less equal, or where pros and cons aren’t comparable, this isn’t helpful. A better option is to re-frame the decision – the think out a way of looking at the choices in a way that is comparable. One way to do that is to look at goals and objectives – what is the goal you hope to meet by choosing one or the other, and which one is better suited to that goal? This moves you past the immediate characteristics of the objects under consideration – that is, one tastes delicious, the other offers two hours of solid motion picture excitement, so if your goal is to have fun for as long as possible, you might spend your $10 on the movie and not the super-sundae.
5. The best ideas often get lost for lack of funding, competence, or experience.
The people who think up brilliant ideas aren’t always in a position to make them happen. They lack sales skills, people skills, marketing skills, or, quite often, just enough money to bring an innovation to market or the mainstream. Or a start-up gets bought out by a monopolistic corporation simply in order to quash their project.
What to do about it: If you’re in a position to do so, seek out start-ups without the skills to succeed and support them however you can. If you’re an idea person yourself, seek out people with the skills you lack – do not could on your idea to succeed for its greatness.
Well, that about covers it – as before, I’d love to hear what you think is unfair about life, and how you’ve dealt with unfairness in your own life. Let us know about it in the comments.
Dustin M. Wax is the project manager at Stepcase Lifehack. He is also the creator of The Writer’s Technology Companion, a site devoted to the tools of the writing trade. When he’s not writing, he teaches anthropology and gender studies in Las Vegas, NV. He is the author of Don’t Be Stupid: A Guide to Learning, Studying, and Succeeding at College.
Follow him on Twitter: @dwax.
4 Ways to Change Your Life and Your Business
Jun/090
You have heard the old saying, “The more you do of what you are doing, the more you will get of what you’ve got.”
Your goal should be to make the current year the most productive and highest paid year so far, until the next year comes along. To achieve this goal, you are going to have to do something different from what you are doing today.
There are only four ways that you can change your life and your business. Here they are:
1. You can do more of certain things. What are the things that you should do more of? Obviously you should do more of the things that are working the very best for you already.
You should use more of the marketing and sales methods that are getting you face to face with the best customers, the ones that buy the most readily and who most appreciate the special features and benefits of your products and services.
It is amazing how many sales people lose track of their most effective selling methods, including networking on a regular basis with other sales professionals in your area, and start off doing something new, different and unproven. Then they are surprised when their sales drop and their income declines. Sometimes, the very best thing you can do is to get back to doing what is already working the very best for you.
2. You can do less of other things. Many people fall into a comfort zone of doing things that are not working particularly well, but because they are comfortable doing them, they continue doing them nonetheless.
You only have so many minutes and hours each day. If you spend your time doing things of low value, that time is no longer available to you to do things of higher value. You must be continually thinking about the value of your time, every minute of every day. You should do less and less of those things that are giving you few results, so that you have more time to do more of those things that are giving you better results.
3. You can start something brand new. In a time of turbulence and rapid change, with customers, markets, prices, demand and competition changing every day, you must be continually open to the need to start doing something that you have never done before.
Jack Welch once said, “Our greatest competitive advantage is our ability to learn and apply new ideas before our competition.”
Perhaps the most important thing you can do is to commit yourself to being an aggressive, continuous, life-long student of the profession of selling. It is amazing how many people come up to me at my seminars and tell me that one method or technique that they learned at a previous seminar, or from a training program of mine, had changed their selling careers. They had doubled and tripled their incomes; they had gone from rags to riches. They had started their own businesses and become millionaires. And it was all because of a single, simple idea that was ideal for them that they had learned through continuous study. You should do the same.
4. You can stop certain things altogether. Use the zero based thinking question everyday and apply it to every sales and business activity. “Is there anything in my life that, knowing what I now know, I would not start up again today, if I had to do it over?”
Look over all of your business activities and be willing to discontinue or eliminate any activity that you would not start up again today if you had to do it over again with your current state of knowledge and experience.
Many people are lemmings. They will continue running in the same direction, doing the same things, getting fewer and fewer results, until they go over the financial cliff.
Top people are always open to the possibility and the need of doing something completely different. They are willing to stop doing anything that no longer works. They don’t get stuck into a “comfort zone” and stay there just because it feels good. They are willing to take the risks and the potential failure that goes with embarking on any new course of action.
This is going to be a wonderful year for people who make it a wonderful year. Throughout your day you should continually ask the questions, “Is there anything in my life that I should do more of, less of, start or stop?”
These questions will keep you on track and will help to guarantee that you become one of the highest paid people in your industry.
Brian Tracy
*What did you learn? Leave me a comment!
The Two R’s of Top Leaders
Jun/090
There are two essential qualities of leadership. Jack Welch, CEO of General Electric says that the “Reality Principle” is the most important of all. What this means is the practice of realism in all things.
Realism is a form of intellectual honesty. The realist insists upon seeing the world as it really is, not as he wishes it were. This objectivity, this refusal to engage in self-delusion, is a mark of the true leader.
Those who exhibit the quality of realism do not trust to luck, hope for miracles, pray for exceptions to basic business principles, expect rewards without working or hope that problems will go away by themselves. These all are examples of self-delusion, of living in a fantasyland.
The motivational leader insists on seeing things exactly as they are and encourages others to look at life the same way. As a motivational leader, you get the facts, whatever they are. You deal with people honestly and tell them exactly what you perceive to be the truth. This doesn’t mean that you will always be right, but you will always be expressing the truth in the best way you know how.
The second key quality of motivational leadership is responsibility. This is perhaps the hardest of all to develop. The acceptance of responsibility means that, as Harry Truman said, “The buck stops here.”
The game of life is very competitive. Sometimes, great success and great failure are separated by a very small distance. In watching the play-offs in basketball, baseball and football, we see that the winner can be decided by a single point, and that single point can rest on a single action, or inaction, on the part of a single team member at a critical part of the game.
Life is very much like competitive sports. Very small things that you do, or don’t do, can either give you the edge that leads to victory or take away your edge at the critical moment. This principle is especially true with regard to accepting responsibility for yourself and for everything that happens to you.
The opposite of accepting responsibility is making excuses, blaming others and becoming upset, angry and resentful toward people for what they have done to you or not done for you.
Any one of these three behaviors can trip you up and be enough to cost you the game:
If you run into an obstacle or setback and you make excuses rather than accept responsibility, it’s a five-yard penalty. It can cost you a first down. It can cost you a touchdown. It can make the difference between success and failure.
If, when you face a problem or setback, and you both make excuses and blame someone else, you get a 10-yard penalty. In a tightly contested game, where the teams are just about even, a 10-yard penalty can cost you the game.
If, instead of accepting responsibility when things go wrong, you make excuses, blame someone else and simultaneously become angry and resentful and blow up, you get a 15-yard penalty. This may cost you the championship and your career as well if it continues.
Personal leadership and motivational leadership are very much the same. To lead others, you must first lead yourself. To be an example or a role model for others, you must first become an excellent person yourself.
Now, here are two things you can do immediately to put these ideas into action.
First, be completely honest and realistic with yourself and every difficult situation in your life. Resolve to face the truth, whatever it is. Don’t wish, hope, pray, ignore or play games with yourself.
Second, accept complete responsibility, especially when things go wrong. Refuse to blame others or make excuses. You can tell the strength of your character when you are under pressure. Be calm, controlled and constructive at all times.
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*What did you learn? Leave me a comment below!
