Federise your Business for Ultimate Success

Living in Melbourne, the home city of the 2010 Asia Pacific Grand Slam of Tennis, otherwise known as the Australian Open, it has been hard to escape the blanket exposure Roger Federer has received over the last two weeks, as he has danced his way to yet another Grand Slam Final.

Whilst I have always been conscious of the growing legend that Roger Federer is creating as his career trajectory continues unabated, the statistics rolled out in the local media throughout the last week or so, and the ever growing list of records he is breaking or simply extending further, are simply breathtaking.

Taking in his clinical approach to winning his semi-final the other night, I began to wonder what lesson for business success could be found by analysing the real essence of Roger Federer.

This article is being written and will be published prior to Roger playing off in the final this evening against the great British hope Andy Murray, but the outcome of this single match will not change the person that Roger has become, or the success of brand Federer, other than creating more records, should he be successful.

Amazing as it may seem, the essential essence of Roger Federer and his keys to achieving unbelievable sporting and financial success, can be found in words starting with the letter P.

So here is a comprehensive list of the secrets to business success, as distilled from the exploits of one supreme sportsman, using only words commencing with the letter P.

Apply the lessons of each of these P elements to your business, and watch it take on a new life.

1)      Preparation

Roger never comes to a tournament unprepared to go the full distance. He leaves nothing to chance and reliance on luck has never been his approach. His fitness has always been a key element of his success, and he has employed the best to ensure that it stays that way.

2)      Practice

Roger is the ultimate example of practice making perfect, the ease at which he executes his strokes, moves around the court, anticipates opponent’s moves and clinically steps up to a higher level whenever necessary, screams out hours and hours of practice and continual refinement of technique.

3)      Participation

Roger is a participant in the wider world of tennis other than just participating as a player. His voice is respected and he gives his time to advancing the interests of all professional tennis players. His approach should see his “tennis career” extend well beyond his playing days.

4)      Performance

Roger is the ultimate performer. He always brings his A game to the court and spectators know that regardless of whether or not the match is competitive, they will observe a master in action, and leave with a finer appreciation of what it takes to succeed at the highest level.

5)      Professionalism

Roger and professionalism go hand in hand, which is a lot more than can be said of all of his contemporaries. Has there ever been a more professional sportsperson. I doubt it. Long after matches are over, Roger is still giving media interviews which he conducts in English, German and French, respecting the needs of various media organisations.

6)      Persistence

Roger is nothing if not persistent. He waited a number of years before achieving his first success at Grand Slam level, and once having tasted success, he has persisted with all of the work required to maintain ongoing success, in a highly competitive environment.

7)      Personality

Roger is regarded as one of the nicest people to ever compete and succeed consistently at the highest level of his chosen sport. His personality is also his brand, and surely brand Federer, is now one of the most valued brands going around. The brand reflects the person and the personality continually adds value to the brand.

8)      Posture

Roger walks on to the court and no-one is in any doubt that he is there to do the business of winning. Off court his posture is one of co-operative endeavour to assist those who support the periphery of the world that he inhabits as he plies his trade. His standing outside the tennis world continues to grow, and his work with his own foundation supports this growing respect.

9)      Pride

Roger takes great pride in his achievements but suppresses the temptation to let his ego become rampant as a consequence of climbing many tall mountains on the way to where he is today. He now plays for his place in history as the best male tennis player to ever play the game.

10)   Projection

Roger projects the expectation of being successful in all of his tennis endeavours and whilst this may be intimidating for opponents he does not overtly set out to intimidate lesser opponents. None the less, he always projects the intent that winning is his sole objective when he steps onto the court.

11)   Power

Roger exercises power in a controlled and deliberate manner. His power comes from both his physical prowess and well developed techniques and from his status as a champion of his chosen field. He has not been known to use his power unwisely or inappropriately in any endeavours on or off the court.

12)   Promotion

Roger quietly and judiciously, continually promotes both his own brand and the sport which has richly rewarded him, over the years. He is now assiduously promoting his own foundation, and during the current Grand Slam, he used his promotion skills to raise considerable funds for the people of Haiti.

13)   Patience

Roger is now clearly a patient man. Success did not come immediately to him, he was somewhat petulant in his earlier days, and seen to be in a hurry but now is approaching statesman status, whilst continuing to compete successfully at the highest level.

14)   Perfection

Roger will dispute this, but in the eyes of tennis players and supporters worldwide, Roger Federer is as close to the perfect tennis player that anyone is ever likely to see in their lifetimes. He is blessed with natural talent, but has carefully honed this talent on a consistent basis for over ten years, to reach that state of perfection.

15)   Predictability

Roger created a new record this week in reaching his 23^rd consecutive Grand Slam semi-final. Tournament organisers, the media, the paying spectators and many other stakeholders have benefitted from this predictability over the last 5 years. No other player gets close in terms of predictability, and few would ever bet against Roger before a semi-final.

16)   Profitability

Roger has redefined tennis as a business and is probably one of very many who treat it as such. His predictability as demonstrated above ensures consistent cash flow and avoids the peaks and troughs of revenue generation. Brand Federer continues to grow in value and it would be impossible to estimate the earnings potential of this brand over the next twenty years or so.

There you have it, sixteen words, each starting with the letter P, which defines why Roger Federer experiences a level of success which, others only dream about. As a business owner you can learn valuable lessons through assessing yourself and your business against such precise benchmarks.

How do you and your business measure up?

Where can you take action using these lessons to grow your business to a new level?

Do you have what it takes to climb your personal mountains?

Posted via web from Unique Insights

Two Magic Pills for Business Success

To be successful as a business owner, regardless of the type of business you operate, you need to insulate yourself from the negative aspects of selling yourself, your business, and your product or service, and at the same time, fully commit yourself to the ongoing development of the vital skills you need to have, in order to be truly successful.

This can be easier said than done, but with the right approach, you can achieving realistic outcomes in financial terms, from your investment of capital and time, in your business. This approach does, however, requires you to pop a pill or two for the overall good of your business.

The pills you need to swallow are the Two Magic Pills for Business Success. These Magic Pills are the tonic required to ensure a healthy future for your business. Taken daily, these Magic Pills will make a significant difference to the outcomes that you are able to achieve in your business. life.

As with all such magic remedies, there is a trick involved. The trick here is to develop the habit of taking these Magic Pills daily, for as long as you are in business. If you do, over time they will reduce or completely obviate, your need to call on others to help you to be successful.

The first Magic Pill is to take whatever steps that are necessary to develop and continually reinforce your faith in yourself. That is, you need to cultivate and feed a very strong self image. This is vitally important, as without one, you will find life as a business owner extremely tough.

A Google search on Self Image reveals in excess of 6,000,000 references, so there is no shortage of information available on this subject, and the sheer volume of references indicates the importance of the subject matter to all aspects of life, not only business.

This first Magic Pill needs to be accompanied by both the determination to never quit regardless of how tough the road to success may become, and having enough faith in yourself to repeat the right disciplines and actions until they become ingrained, and continue them for as long as it takes for you to eventually achieve success.

The second Magic Pill is to develop a strong ability to focus, that is, to become extremely efficient in your use of the time available to you, to conduct your business each day.

Focus is the most powerful tool a business owner can possess, so it is imperative that you develop your skills in this area. Focus allows you to accomplish more in less time by staying in the moment, and being completely attuned to the task at hand. See prevous posting titled Focus is everything in Business to see if you may be guilty of lack of focus.

A quick Google search for "ability to focus" will take you to a wealth of resources that you can tap into to improve your performance in this area. Find what works for you and put it into practice, and persist practicing until lack of focus is no longer an issue for you.

If your business is not doing as well as you had anticipated, ask yourself the following questions; Do you have stong faith in yourself and your abilities? Is your self image as strong as it must be if you want to succeed in the tough world that is today's business environment? Are you as focussed on the success of your business as you need to be? Is your focus in the right area?

Take these Two Magic Pills for Business Success everyday for an extended period, and you can virtually guarantee yourself, that your business will improve out of sight.

The Six Critical Elements to Building a Successful Business

Creating a business is one thing, but building a successful business that attains a level of profit which represents a satisfactory return on the time and capital invested by the owners and also proves to be sustainable over many years, is a challenge that many business owners fail to overcome.

I believe that six critical elements (the Six S's) must all be effectively in play before any business can realistically become a successful business.

If one or more of these elements is not operating at an optimal level within your business you have some work to do if you want success to eventually come your way.

The Six S's are Synergy, Strategy, Structure, Systems, Substance and Sustainability.

Synergy refers to the alignment between yourself, your role as a business owner, your psychological suitability to the roles you chose to perform within the business, and the actual nature of the business you choose to be involved in.

Strategy refers to the key decisions you make now, as to the future directions you wish your business to take, to get to where you want to be, at a certain point in the future. It is the foundation of all that follows. It also needs to be reviewed and adjusted as circumstances change.

Structure refers to the framework around which you will build your business. It provides the bones around which you will add meat as your business grows. A sound structure holds everything together, and is greater than the sum of its parts.

Systems refer to standardised operations designed to guide the way, light the path, simplify complexity, provide leverage, and ensure consist application of procedures and processes throughout the business. Good systems prevent systemic failure and reduce the overall costs of doing business, hence increasing profitability.

Substance refers to the quality of physical assets, the level of intellectual property present, the working capital available, and the capability of the human resources deployed, or available, to service the growth needs of the business.

Sustainability refers to the longer term ability of the business to continually re-invent itself, remain relevant to its markets, remain profitable, and continuously improve its reputation as a good corporate citizen.

How does your business stack up? Could you be more successful? What more do you need to do?

Opportunity for meeting SME Online needs.

This blog is based on personal experience over the last three weeks. It may provide an eye opener for those who are technically savy and can't for the life of themselves understand why any SME business would resist fully embracing the internet age.

Having taken my own business online over the last three weeks, I now understand more clearly why many SME businesses do not fully embrace the internet and take advantage of all that it offers to them as business owners.

I found that the work involved for anyone who wants to do it themselves is quite considerable, and that is only what is necessary to establish a low level base for a future bells and whistles platform, once sufficient experience in the online business environment is obtained and the funds are available to go down that path.

The work included, but was not limited to, purchasing a domain name, building a complete website, setting up e-mail accounts in the new domain, constructing a comprehensive profile on LinkedIn, signing up for Skype and configuring that system to operate in a personal computing environment, incorporating all Skype add-ons, signing up for a blogging service and setting it up to operate in conjunction with the website, taking and incorporating digital photographs into the website, Skype and LinkedIn, sourcing an online design company to design a company logo for the website and for other electronic forums and then incorporating same where required, selecting and configuring an on-line CRM package, selecting and configuring an e-mail marketing package, and creating a newletter template.

The hours allocated to the tasks listed exceeded three full working weeks and there are still a few small corrections and tweeks which need to be made to finalise the first stage of getting our consultancy business online.

The $ cost involved was minimal, less than $500.00 all up, but without 20 years of computing experience, and significant exposure to online business through other activities, it would not have been possible without calling in specialists to do most if not all of the work.

I would hazard a guess that the cost for a SME business owner to outsource all of the necessary work would see a cost of at least 10 times and up to 20 times what I incurred being charged for all of the work involved.

Having to project managing the exercise would also cause a lot of hassle for the business owner and it would be unlikely that the same result could be achieved within three weeks from first deciding to take a business online if most of the work was outsourced.

Understanding just how busy most business owners are on a daily basis, and how tight cash flow can be especially in difficult economic conditions, I now have a clear understanding of why so many SME businesses have not embraced technologies which we all know they should be embracing.

Perhaps their exists a great opportunity for an IT company to put all of the required elements in one box, include clear instructions, and get it out into the market at a price which would encourage a high volume uptake of the offering.