Do Not Be Afraid of No

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Being a salesperson is the best job in the world. Just ask Ted Stearns and he will readily agree. Most people fear sales because they are afraid of a small two letter word: No.

Ted Stearns, who is currently President and CEO of eDisabilityQuotes along with being a Principle with Aegean Capital Partners, can attest to the fact that many people stop their own success because they are afraid of hearing no when they ask for something. His opinion is that if you are getting yeses all the time, you are not asking for enough!

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Furthermore, Ted Stearns see the value of hearing no and still moving forward. Life is a game of numbers and it is merely a matter of finding the right product or service for the right person. This means that if you offer it often enough, you will be certain to find the person who wants it and will say yes. He believes that every time he hears someone say no, he is that much closer to finding the person who will say yes.

It is also important to understand that when someone says no to you, they are not necessarily rejecting of you. If your life and happiness depends on having everyone say yes to you every time you ask for something, you are now at the mercy of other people. By switching your attitude and asking with true curiosity if someone is interested in what you have to offer, you can find out that hearing no or yes is merely satisfying your own curiosity rather than feeling attacked and unwanted.

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Just for a day, decide to find out what happens to you if, whenever someone says no to you, you tells yourself that you just learned something about someone else concerning what they do not like. You can take the heat and fire out of the no you hear and begin looking forward with anticipation for those eventual yeses that will come your way if you just do not give up!

Imagination

Imagination

If I told you that you have access to a lab or workshop where every single one fo the greatest inventions were conceived, would you use it? There is something about this lab where genius takes place, things like the internal combustible engine were designed, genetic engineering were conceived, nanotechnology, Hadron Collider, pesticides, transistors, harnessed nuclear power and electricity and, antibiotics, all were imagined and brought to life here. If that were the case, would you use this lab? Would you want to gain access to it? How much would it be worth to you to work in it whenever you desired?

The imagination in your mind is literally this lab which I have described. It has been said that man can create anything which he can imagine. Thru the use of the imagination, man has harnessed the use of the sky to create planes and rockets to fly at supersonic speeds, or submarines to plunge the depths of the sea or unraveling of your DNA to layout the blueprint which is you. Man has conquered much thru the use of his imagination.

Man’s only limitation, within reason, is his development and ability to use his imagination. In general, most only realize that they have an imagination and very few know how to use it. We have two forms of imagination, “synthetic imagination” and “creative imagination”.

Synthetic imagination is where you take existing concepts and amalgamate and rearrange them into a new combination. This creates nothing; it simply works with ideas and material which is already present. It is the faculty which is used by most entrepreneurs like me.

Creative Imagination is where the finite mind of man has a direct communication with the infinite intelligence. It is when man has the ability to “tune in” or communicate with the subconscious mind of other men and the infinite source. This creative faculty becomes more polished as you develop it and use it. The greatest leaders of business, science, physics, finance, music, art and writers become geniuses because they have learned how to develop and harness this faculty of creative imagination.

Like any muscle or organ, the use of the creative and synthetic imagination becomes stronger with use. For an entrepreneur to achieve the lifestyle and wealth they desire means they must create something to fill the void in the marketplace or create something better than the competition.

In order to achieve that wealth, entrepreneurs require a plan to turn the intangible impulse of a thought into actual money. The imagination will assist in that. If you have the white hot burning desire for wealth but lack a plan or a truly genius idea to get you there, tap into the imagination to develop that plan for you. Ask for a “Million Dollar Idea” and expect it will come to you. When it does, reduce that plan to writing, the minute you do so, you have taken the first of a series of steps which will empower you to take your thoughts and imagination and turn them into money.

Ted Stearns 

Writing a business plan is like running; you always feel better when you’ve finished!

Writing a business plan can be tortuous for entrepreneurs, getting us to sit for hours on end is an activity at the antithesis of our core. Naturally we like to wing-it. For us, we feel that since we are running the ship, and all the plans and know-how’s are in our heads, why must we spend the time to put it down on paper? Yet, developing a business plan is one of the most important exercises a business owner can do; it forces us to think thru the minefields before stepping on a landmine.

Here are some tips, this is not meant to be a step-by-step “how-to”, but it should serve a catalyst to encourage you to take a pen to paper and draft up a plan.

1.     Don’t put it off

Most business owners will only start to draft up a plan only when the bank or investors have asked for one. If you wait until then, chances are you’ve shown the investors that you are not fully prepared to accept their money and that you are not serious about your venture.

2.     The Master Cash Flow

Cash flows are one of the most important components to the plan and they can be the most time consuming. Your Excel skills may be dismal and it may have been eons since you’ve taken an accounting class, but lacking the expertise to develop a cash flow isn’t a reason not to do it, that actually means you need a cash flow even that much more.  

Here’s a tip; place a project on Guru.com; there are plenty of talented freelancers on Guru who can help you develop your cash flow for a few hundred dollars. Years ago I met a phenomenal freelancer on Guru, she has her BA from Harvard and went to business school at Stanford. Over the years she has developed many of cash flows for me and during that time she’s saved me plenty of heartaches.

3.     Growth projections

Your projections have to be conservative in order for you to defend them. As my father would say, “take your projections, cut them in half, and then cut them in half again, then again”. There is much truth in that. The projections must be conservative in order for you to defend them.

4.     Your Team

Chances are your idea and vision will not sell investors. Investors invest in people, not ideas. You and your team will. Who do you have on your team? Think about developing a high caliber Board of Directors who can stand behind your idea, who love start-ups and who can open their network of contacts to you.

5.     It’s not as bad as you think

Really, creating a business plan is not as hard as you think; it doesn’t have to be a doctoral thesis or a novel. Many books have been written to help guide you and software programs will take you step-by-step thru the process (check out Business Plan Pro).

6.     Fluffy vague goals

Leave out hyperbole and hype about being the best. The business plan isn’t meant to be subjective. Keep in mind, the objective of your plan is to point out specific dates, management roles and responsibilities, budgets and milestones.

AFTERTHOUGHT: Creating a business plan is similar to running, I can’t say that I thoroughly enjoy running, although I run or workout almost every day, I do it because I love how it makes me feel when I am finished. I have always felt better after a run, and you will feel better after drafting your business plan.

Good luck

Thwarting the Idea Crushers by Ted Stearns

Thwarting the Idea Crushers by Ted Stearns

Have you ever thought about what Fred Smith and Mark Zuckerberg have in common? Both have created billion dollar juggernauts while their college professors called them crazy. Not to pick on teachers, however, I cannot think of the last professor who has taken their own idea and turned it into a billion dollar company lately.

Idea Crushers, they are all around us, they sit with open ears waiting for a good idea to come around so they can flex their intellectual genius and obliterate it. Yesterday I was discussing a business idea with a friend. In about 3-nano seconds this friend started to explain to me how and why this idea would not work and how it would take insurmountable challenges to implement it. I’m not entirely sure what the underlying reasons were but they seemed to find joy in taking a Scud Missile to my idea.

Now, I have enough confidence in my abilities and experience with taking ideas and exploiting them. Sometimes I will even use their pessimism as fuel to prove them wrong; that always brings a smile to my face.  

The term Idea Crushers is what I use to describe individuals who whether knowingly or not take joy in crushing aspiring ideas. They are black holes; the gravitational collapse so intense that no good idea can ever escape.

They may be colleagues, friends and most of the time family who want to thwart you from making a blunder and being financial mistake. On the flip side they could be jealous, either consciously or unconsciously, of your initiative and success. Or they could be the type that fails to see worth in any idea until it is main-stream.

The Yongle Dadian couldn’t contain a list of all the companies that have launched into the stratosphere that have, from the very beginning been bombarded, attacked and attempted to be derailed with perhaps well intended criticism, still, negative viewpoints, yet they survive and thrive.

If you have Idea Crushers in your life, and we all do from time to time, here are some ways that you can prevent them from detonating a nuclear bomb on your dream:

1)      Don’t discuss your idea with Idea Crushers until you have a proven concept. Ideas are like new born babies, immediately you have to care and shelter them. Wait until your idea has time to grow roots.

2)      If you do find yourself engaged in a conversation the an Idea Crusher, while explaining your idea, disassociate yourself from emotion; ground your reasoning on logic, make sure the principles governing your rational are based on logical arguments rather than subjective emotionally reasoning.

If the negative comments from the Idea Crusher causes you to question your dream and doubt starts to enter into your mind and you find your once white-hot idea has digressed into uncertainty and hesitation, guess what, they have succeeded.

AFTERTHOUGHT: Keep your dreams close to your heart and only share them with trusted friends who will inspire you to go out execute upon them.