Category: Uncategorized

The Perfect Pair of Shoes For Big Meetings

Shoe are the first thing someone see when they look down. It’s one of the most vital pieces and the final touch to any outfit I put on. Shoes are especially important to me because I am always looking to make a statement at big meetings.

Disclaimer: This blog post is a collaboration with Beckett Simonon and it is a sponsored post/ad for their products. 

Shoe are the first thing someone see when they look down. It’s one of the most vital pieces and the final touch to any outfit I put on. Shoes are especially important to me because I am always looking to make a statement at big meetings.

After years of trial and error, I have finally come across the perfect brand for dress shoes for my big meetings. I have become a fan of their shoes for a number of reasons:

 

– Hand-made one at a time.

– Resoleable Blake construction.

– Full grain calls leather upper.

– 1 year warranty.

– Extra durable rubber heels.

– Amazing comfortability.

– Sturdy leather sole with full grain leather line for extra breathability.

 

Many of you may not have know who Beckett Simonon is so I want to be sure that I give them a proper introduction. Beckett Simonon is a direct to consumer brand changing the way premium shoes and accessories are offered. They provide men with handcrafted shoes, bags and belts at a reasonable price, while ensuring exceptional service, quality and integrity. 

They have a mission to create a smarter way to shop and manufacture so they can all come out on top. From the environment we live in to the craftspeople they employ to our customers who they serve.

If you’re in the market for a pair of shoes that are durable, classy and a head turner, Beckett Simonon is the perfect brand to try. They have a wide selection of shoes that will be perfect for any occasion in the business world!

How To Grow Your Social Media Audience Without Any B.S

Growing your social media audience will not happen overnight. The tips that were just shared with you will help you grow an audience that is actually interested in your brand and what you have to offer. In this post, I share with you how to grow your social media audience without any B.S.

In direct marketing, it’s long been said that a bad offer to a good list will perform better than a good offer on a bad list. The point is that without a decent audience, you may as well forget about it. You may have a great product or service, but unless you have a long list of people who are at least prospective customers, even the best marketing efforts in the world probably won’t be able to sell it.

The same goes for social media as well. You can spend a ton of time and money in creating content that absolutely rocks, but if you aren’t reaching enough people, your efforts will be unsuccessful. Over the years, I’ve learned a lot of tips and techniques that have helped me master social media for my personal brand and for my businesses.

Here’s how to grow your social media audience without any B.S:

1. Pick Your Platforms Wisely

Not every business needs a presence on every social platform. Certain businesses will flourish on visually rich sites such as Pinterest, Instagram, and YouTube, while others may have more success with Twitter’s 140-character forma. It’s vital that you identify and figure out which marketing channel will work best for your business and the best way to do so is through extensive testing. Focus your attention on the platforms that bring the best results.

2. Differentiating Your Content

Once you’ve decided upon the social media channels that you’ll be using, you need to consider how you’ll differentiate yourself from your competition. There’s a lot of noise in social media, so you want to ensure that your posts stand out from the rest. Create authentic and unique content that channels your voice.

3. Get To Know Your Audience

The most crucial step to quickly growing an engaged social media audience organically is getting to know your audience better. Does your audience like photos or links? Do they respond better to more frequent posts or when there’s a day or two in between? Are they as active on LinkedIn as they are on Twitter? Each business or account is different. Getting to know your audience (what networks they’re on, what websites they visit, what they do on their free time, etc.) is key to knowing where to find them, what kind of content they respond to and what kind of messaging and language makes them take action.

4. Master The Art Of Hashtags

Hashtags are one of the most effective ways to increase visibility for your posts on Instagram. However, not all hashtags are created equal. You need to know which hashtags to use as well as how to use them strategically. Test different hashtags and see which ones give you the best engagement on your posts.

5. Have A Strategy

Posting with no rhyme or reason will not help you quickly grow an engaged audience. Use the insights from getting to know your audience to build a strategy that accelerates your exposure and growth. This means determining post frequency, what kind of content works and aligning your social media objectives and goals to your efforts.

6. Showcase Your Social Streams

Get much more mileage out of your activity on social media by embedding this content elsewhere. There are numerous widgets available from either third parties or directly from channels such as Twitter, Facebook, and even Pinterest that make it possible for you to export your timelines and display them somewhere on your website. Not only does this put your content in front of a broader audience, it increases the likelihood of establishing more lasting social connections among your constituency as well.

7. Add Value

No one wants to see another photo or video that screams “look at this new product I have”. People tune this kind of promotional content out. Instead, try adding value to your followers lives and relate it back to your brand. For example, instead of posting a photo that simply showcases that new dress in your collection, take it a step further and show your followers a few ways to style it. If you have a guide, highlight the benefits and how this guide can help solve a problem. Create value instead of hard selling all the time.

Conclusion

Growing your social media audience will not happen overnight. The tips that were just shared with you will help you grow an audience that is actually interested in your brand and what you have to offer. In this post, I shared with you how to grow your social media audience without any B.S.

6 Mental Habits of Those Who Manage Their Emotions Really Well

In this post, I share with you 6 mental habits of those who manage their emotions really well. Emotions are difficult to manage and not everyone can do a good job managing their own emotions. Managed emotions can not only help you in work, but also in your personal and love life.

Your mental health influences how you think, feel and behave in daily life. It also affects your ability to cope with stress, overcome challenges, build relationships, and recover from life’s setbacks and hardships. Whether you’re looking to cope with a specific mental health problem, handle your emotions better, or simply to feel more positive and energetic, there are plenty of things you can do to manage your emotions better.

Although the universality of basic human emotions has been recognized, the role, function, and importance of emotional intelligence are often undermined. Emotional intelligence is a social skill that can help you become more aware and tactful in handling your own emotions as well as the emotions of others. Thanks to my mentors and my own experiences, I’ve learned how to manage my emotions better over the years.

Here are 6 mental habits of those who manage their emotions really well:

1. They Deal With Primary Emotions

Emotionally intelligent people realize the importance of understanding the reasons behind the negative emotions they are experiencing. They look for the root causes underneath the surface of anger, anxiety, fear, worry, etc. These emotions are reactions and they try to analyze the reasons behind them. What are the triggers, the real reasons behind your emotions? Follow the trail and once you’ve tackled and understood these primary emotions you’ll be in a better position to get a handle on your reactions.

2. They Stay Active

The mind and the body are intrinsically linked. When you improve your physical health, you’ll automatically experience greater mental and emotional well-being. Physical activity also releases endorphins, powerful chemicals that lifts your mood and provides added energy. Regular exercise or activity can have a major impact on mental and emotional health problems, relieve stress, improve memory, and help you to sleep better.

3. They Embrace Change

Mentally tough people are flexible and are constantly adapting. They know that fear of change is paralyzing and a major threat to their success and happiness. They look for change that is lurking just around the corner and they form a plan of action should these changes occur. Only when you embrace change can you find the good in it. You need to have an open mind if you’re going to capitalize on the opportunities that change creates.

You’re bound to fail when you keep doing the same things you always have in the hope that ignoring change will make it go away. After all, the definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting a different result.

4. They Adopt A Positive Mindset

In order to cope with the negative, you need to make a conscious and intentional effort to shift to the positive. Negative emotions can heavily affect your day-to-day functioning. Instead, focus on brighter emotions and look for the silver lining so you can turn this into a habit. Train yourself to be optimistic so that you are surrounding yourself with positive energy. Positivity can be very contagious, which means you’re also creating a positive environment for your team.

5. They Eat A Brain-Healthy Diet To Support Strong Mental Health

Unless you’ve tried to change your diet in the past, you may not be aware of just how much what you eat and don’t eat affects the way you think and feel. An unhealthy diet can take a toll on your brain and mood, disrupt your sleep, sap your energy, and weaken your immune system. Conversely, switching to a wholesome diet, low in sugar and rich in healthy fats  can give you more energy, improve your sleep and mood and help you to look and feel your best.

6. They Don’t Wait For An Apology To Forgive

Mentally tough people know that life goes a lot smoother once you let go of grudges and forgive even those who never said they were sorry. Grudges let negative events from your past ruin today’s happiness. Hate and anger are emotional parasites that destroy your joy in life.

The negative emotions that come with holding on to a grudge can create a stress response in your body. When you forgive someone, it doesn’t condone their actions. Instead, it simply frees you from being their eternal victim.

Conclusion

Emotions are difficult to manage and not everyone can do a good job managing their own emotions. Managed emotions can not only help you in work, but also in your personal and love life. In this post, I shared with you 6 mental habits of those who manage their emotions really well.

How to Do More Each Day By Changing Your Habits

Less is more when it comes to being productive during the workday. Stick to the basics for reaching productivity. In this post, I share with you how to do more each day by changing your habits.

It doesn’t matter what you do or where you work, everyone is always looking for ways to be more productive on the job. But excessive amounts of caffeine and tasks lists won’t get you any closer to reaching peak productivity levels today.

So, why are we all so obsessed with productivity? It’s probably because in this digital age, staying on task and avoiding distractions are harder to accomplish than your actual work. The world is moving faster and faster every single day making it even more crucial to be productive each day to keep up.

This search for a more productive workday has led to a certain misconception about what productivity really is because it’s a lot more than checking tasks off your to-do list. Truly productive people aren’t focused on doing more things. Instead they are doing fewer things, but they make sure that they do those fewer things far better.

Here’s how to do more each day by changing your habits:

1. Create A Morning Ritual

Maybe you like to go for a run or maybe you like to meditate or enjoy a healthy breakfast. every morning. Whatever it is that makes you feel supercharged, kickstart your day with that habit. Establishing a meaningful morning ritual helps you start your day on a positive, and productive note. Having a structured start to your day instead of rushing to make up for the lost time also helps eliminate stress, mental fatigue and enhances your productivity.

2. Redefine “Must”

Think about your typical day. Very little of what you think you “have” to do actually must be done that way. “Must” is a feeling that results from a habit. The only way to change a habit is to first decide that “must” can actually be negotiated or even eliminated more often than not.

3. Measure Your Results, Not Your Time

The whole idea of working smarter rather than harder stems from the fact that many of us put in more and more hours only to find we don’t get more done. That’s why we want to find methods to be more productive in less time.

One way to do this is to adjust the way you measure productivity. If you evaluate yourself by what you actually get done rather than the time it takes to get something done, you’ll start to notice a difference in how you work.

4. Cut Your To-Do List In Half

Getting things done during your workday shouldn’t mean fitting in doing as much as possible in the sanctioned eight hours. Do you really need those 30 tasks on your to-do list? Take a less-is-more approach to your to-do list by only focusing on accomplishing things that matter.

5. Tackle Your Challenging Tasks Before Lunch

Knock out your most challenging work when your brain is fresh. If you have any busy work or meetings, save them for the afternoon. By scheduling your day this way, you’ll be able to create a new and more productive way to manage your time.

6. Build Habits To Help You Start Working

One way to overcome the procrastination problem is building a routine that tells your brain and body it’s time to work. Your routine could be something as simple as your daily commute or grabbing a coffee on the way to work. Other ways to get into a working mindset can include sitting down at your desk or workspace, turning off your phone or putting it away, exercising, stretching, or eating breakfast. You could even have an album or playlist that gets you in the mood to work and listen to that as part of your routine. Routines are a sign of people who have goals and have found the best way–for them–to actually accomplish their goals.

7. Learn To Single-Task

Only 2% of people in the world can multitask successfully. While there’s no harm in occasional multitasking, constant juggling between tasks limits your focus and contributes to mental clutter by making it difficult for your brain to filter out irrelevant information. Moreover, heavy multitasking lowers efficiency and may impair your cognitive control. This is why you should try to single-task as much as possible. Make a list of things you need to accomplish in a day. Start with what’s most important and make your way down the list, completing one task at a time.

Conclusion

Less is more when it comes to being productive during the workday. Stick to the basics for reaching productivity. In this post, I shared with you how to do more each day by changing your habits.

8 Things Entrepreneurs Should Never Forget

There are a lot of things an entrepreneur must remember to be able to succeed and continue their success. In this post, I shared with you the 8 things entrepreneurs should never forget.

Being a business owner and an entrepreneur isn’t easy. It requires a lot of learning and figuring things out over time. Many people never make it as an entrepreneur because they give up far too soon before they figure out all the intricacies that go along with it. Luckily for me, I’ve been able to go through the process of being an entrepreneur and learning a lot that has helped me throughout my journey.

Here are 8 things entrepreneurs should never forget:

1. Culture Is The Foundation Of Success And Your Team Is Your Culture

Any company is only as strong as the underlying culture it creates and reinforces. A company must seek to base their culture on core values. If you create a strong sense of community and culture within the company, it’ll only benefit you long-term. Culture is the foundation for building a strong vision.

2. Stop The Urge To Splurge

Too many people blow money on useless or pointless things. As an entrepreneur, the best investment you can make is in your business or in yourself. Mainstream media and social media fools people into thinking that the only way to be successful is to buy expensive things that depreciate. Stop your urge to splurge, you’ll be much happier long-term.

3. Understand Finance

People all the time will talk about how a well-known business brand started at one time in someone’s basement or garage, so much that it’s become a romantic notion of sorts that going from rags-to-riches is what really identifies a true entrepreneur. The reality of most successful businesses ventures couldn’t be farther from the truth. If you want to make it, you’re going to need money. As long as you understand how and where your money is going, you are better equipped to be successful.

4. Stay Loyal To The People Who Helped Get You Where You Are

Think about all the people you’re loyal to in your personal life. Then, think about how strong that relationship has to be for you to want to be loyal to them. Being loyal in business is another vital part of business growth. It’s important to stay loyal to the people who have helped you get where you are, especially your employees and customers. When you’re loyal to your employees, you can expect high retention rates, quality work, and increased employee engagement. When you are loyal to your customers, you don’t sacrifice the quality of your offerings and you gain their trust.

5. Be Able To Explain Your Business At A Whim

You never know when you’ll have to explain your business. You could run into an investor in an elevator or end up making a sales pitch to a customer while out to eat. Always be ready to clearly and quickly state your mission, service and product or goals. It always applies to those who are starting a business and those who have been in the market for a while. Being able to explain a business to anyone is necessary for success.

6. Keep In Mind That There Are Still Rules

A major perk that comes with being an entrepreneur is that you’re the boss. You can make your own hours and develop your vision of a company. In short, you’re doing whatever you want and it’s awesome. But there are some rules that all entrepreneurs have to follow such as registering your business and paying taxes. These are just some of the not-so-much-fun things you have to handle. If not, you’re going to be in just a little bit of trouble.

7. Seek Help, Don’t Shy Away

We might not have answers to all the problems, its ok to seek help and advice from others. You don’t need to implement them, but keeping your options open are always good. A fresh perspective from outside is needed to give your business the push it needs.

8. Having the Right Attitude

Your beliefs truly matter. What you think is what will eventually become. It’s simple, but too many people screw it up. Entrepreneurs have to believe in themselves, their ideas and stay consistently positive. If they are not positive, they are almost destined to fail. Keep an optimistic mind and you’ll be successful.

Conclusion

There are a lot of things an entrepreneur must remember to be able to succeed and continue their success. In this post, I shared with you the 8 things entrepreneurs should never forget.

6 Mindsets That Guarantee Success

In this post, I share with you 6 mindsets that guarantee success. When you are willing to learn, you can achieve absolutely anything. As you set your mind to grow, you increase your brain’s capacity to learn and to solve problems in more innovative and effective ways. Success is all in your mindset.

When it comes to being successful, you must hold a strong belief system to make it happen. No matter what your craft is, your principles and mindsets are usually the same all across the board. To achieve success, you have to develop the mindsets necessary to be successful. This was something I was able to figure out over the years thanks to great mentorship and guidance.

Here are 6 mindsets that guarantee success:

1. Think of Your Mindset As A Voice

How does a mindset manifest itself? It controls the ways you talk to yourself in the privacy of your own head. Recognizing this fact is the first step to achieving a growth mindset is extremely vital. As you approach a challenge, that voice might say to you, ‘Are you sure you can do it? Maybe you don’t have the talent’ or ‘What if you fail, you’ll be a failure’. Pay attention to your thoughts and see if you frequently tell yourself anything similar. If so, you’ve spotted the fixed mindset at work, undermining your potential for success.

2. Everything Is Inspiring

It may seem strange to walk around with a pen and pad all day, but it’s a method to tame the madness. You can easily get lost in the shuffle of information, forget your next meeting, or what tasks are increasingly important. If you have a pen and planner handy, you can jot down hot topics and walk into your meetings effortlessly and on time. While you’re commuting, a genius idea might strike for your new business. You can pick up information from the people around you and jot it all down. Writing it down means you’re more likely to remember it. You are now a walking resource.

3. Mistakes Correct Me

Success is a process, not an event. Set your mind to the readiness to make mistakes and to experience great challenges along the way in your journey. These times will prove to be your greatest gifts. If you are wrong, you will likely be corrected. Take this in because it is an opportunity to learn and to do better the next time around. Each time you are corrected, adjust your approach you will directly increase your odds for success.

4. Choose Growth

Recognize that you are not stuck forever with the thoughts that you currently have. The way you interpret challenges, setbacks and criticism is completely your choice. You can interpret them with a fixed mindset thinking that your talents or abilities are lacking. On the other hand, you can translate them into a growth mindset which means that you need to ramp up your strategies, stretch yourself and expand your abilities.

5. I Will Never Give Up

Set your mind to thrive. Let there be no language of giving up in your vocabulary. There is no replacement on any journey towards success more sustaining than perseverance. Talent is not persistence. There are a number of unsuccessful talented, skilled people in this world. Success is truly achieved by never giving up, having patience, persistence, a strong mind, and an unrelenting will get through all levels of frustration. It is only perseverance and raw determination which are sustaining.

6. You Can’t Do It All

You have to manage yourself in order to manage others. Accept that you can’t do everyone’s job around you. Accept that finding the perfect work/life balance won’t be easy and accept that some things just weren’t meant for you. If you’re a brilliant chef, embrace it, but don’t try to fit yourself into a box you’ll never fit into. That’s not what makes you who you are.

Conclusion

When you are willing to learn, you can achieve absolutely anything. As you set your mind to grow, you increase your brain’s capacity to learn and to solve problems in more innovative and effective ways. Success is all in your mindset. In this post, I shared with you 6 mindsets that guarantee success.

Five Questions To Ask Before Turning A Hobby Into A Business

In this post, I sharee with you five questions to ask before turning a hobby into a business. Starting your own business seems appealing to many people for several reasons. However, it’s not always what you bargained for so it’s always important to ask some questions before jumping into it.

Does your job feel like a 9 to 5 grind? That may be a sign that you need to make a change in your life. A career change can be a great way to alleviate boredom and re-engage yourself. The problem often times is that making a career change often means you have to start at the very bottom and work your way up. If you’ve already climbed the ladder in your current career, the prospect of heading back to the entry level can be quite disheartening.

There is some good news, though: If you want to make a career change but don’t want to drop to the bottom of the pecking order, you can take a hobby of yours and turn it into a business. That being said, turning your hobby into a business isn’t necessarily easy. 25% of new businesses fail in their first year, and 44 %fail by their third year. Even if you have all the passion in the world, your business might not succeed. That’s not to say you shouldn’t try, it just means you should stop and think about it before making any rash decisions.

Here are five questions before to ask before turning a hobby into a business:

1. Have I Done Enough Research?

You have a great idea for a business and you’re totally the right person for the job:. You’re passionate, skilled and a budding expert in your field. However, you must figure out whether or not your business fits in to a market. Are you competing with other businesses? Who are your competitors and how does your business compare to theirs? Is your target market local or global? By asking yourself these questions. you can begin to determine the next step in your process. You can also determining a business model, which is a nice way of saying that you’re figuring out how you will make money.

2. Do I Know My Target Market Well?

One of the best parts of starting out on your business is that you’ll quickly get an idea of who is purchasing your products and why. You’ll also learn which items are in demand and which ones may not be! It can be hard to retain this exact audience as you transition over to your own website since you’re not allowed to promote any outside websites or social media pages on the listing sites. However, you should be able to paint a complete picture of who your typical buyers are and where you can find them.

3. Am I Ready To Become A CEO – Amongst Many Other Things?

What most “technicians” turned entrepreneurs don’t know is the unknown of starting a business! You are a gifted artisan and you probably have no doubt about your skill and ability to create a product that others will love. As an entrepreneur, there will be far more hats to wear, beyond that of an artisan. In fact, in an ideal world, you won’t even be the person making the product in the future as employees will do that work. Do you know how to balance your books, market your company, master social media, set appointments with retailers, and the many other jobs that an entrepreneur is tasked with? If not, are you prepared to devote the time and effort to learn all this stuff.

4. Am I Ready For The Time Commitment Required For This Endeavor?

Will this be a part-time or full-time commitment for you? Will you work at home from a laptop or in a studio? Even if you only intend to commit to part-time hours, starting a business can be very time consuming. If you’re hoping to travel and live an active lifestyle, consider how much time you need to yourself and how much time your business really needs to grow. If it seems like too much, re-consider the size and scale of what you’re doing. If this is a retirement project, remember that you need a break from work, no matter how fun that work may seem.

5. Will You Enjoy Turning Your Hobby Into a Business?

Many use their hobbies not only to practice a skill, but also to wind down, stave off boredom, or escape from the daily grind. Turning a hobby into a job may intensify everything far too much for you. Your hobby won’t be about escaping the grind anymore, it will be the grind. You’ll need to hit deadlines, put in an average of 40+ hours per week, meet customer service requirements and quality standards, correct errors, and deal with some disappointed and critical consumers. Just make sure you’re oaky with this and that it won’t ruin what was once a great hobby for you.

Conclusion

Starting your own business seems appealing to many people for several reasons. However, it’s not always what you bargained for so it’s always important to ask some questions before jumping into it. In this post, I shared with you five questions to ask before turning a hobby into a business.

8 Ways To Learn The Skills of An Entrepreneur On The Fly

Entrepreneurs are not born, they are made. Being a successful entrepreneur is a continuous learning process no matter what your previous background may be. In this post, I shared with you the 8 ways to learn important skills on the fly as an entrepreneur.

Entrepreneurs are made, not born. Entrepreneurship requires all-encompassing skills and abilities that other occupations often don’t even touch the surface of. Engineers draft plans for a new project, then pass the designs to others who will make it a reality. But for an entrepreneur, it’s different.

Every aspect of a new venture lies in the hands of the entrepreneur. They need to know everything about the business and take the role as a visionary, project manager, salesperson and more. This doesn’t mean that all entrepreneurs need to get an MBA to learn these skills.  In fact, a majority don’t have degrees or extensive education.

Becoming your own boss and an entrepreneur is the new coveted career choice of the 21st century. People are fed up with working jobs that leave them underpaid and unfulfilled. Although some entrepreneurs say they were born to build a company, it’s never been easier for anyone to learn entrepreneurial skills that can propel them into building a successful business.

Here are 8 ways to learn important skills on the fly as an entrepreneur:

1. Market Attractions

Where do you actually enjoy being? Find the markets and industries you’re actually passionate about. If you are attracted to something, you are more likely to pursue it and do whatever it takes to succeed at it. Plugging away in an industry you enjoy is far easier than doing something you dread. Getting plugged into different markets that attract you helps develop your entrepreneurial eye.

2. Delay Gratification

Entrepreneurs have to get used to countless failures and almost zero rewards until they finally hit the jackpot. To train yourself to be able to delay gratification, start small. Say “no” to the extra donut. Keep your old car instead of going into debt to buy a new one. Wake up at 5 a.m. on the weekends to work on your business idea instead of staying in bed. Doing these small things, will allow you to grow and develop yourself for the future.

3. Embrace Failure

Entrepreneurs will fail more times than they will care to count. Truthfully, if you don’t fail as an entrepreneur, you’re probably not trying hard enough. Most business owners, accept failure as a learning opportunity and forge ahead. Entrepreneurs know how to pause along the way and take steps to make a strategy. It’s okay to fail as long as you are resilient enough to get back up and improve upon your previous endeavor.

4. Find And Manage People

Only by learning to leverage employees, vendors and other resources will an entrepreneur build a scalable company. They need to learn to network to meet the right people. Entrepreneurship is all about leveraging the various resources that are in the world. Those who leverage these resources to their advantage end up succeeding.

5. Invest For The Long-Term

Most entrepreneurs are not patient and focus only on what comes next, rather than where the company needs to go. Overnight successes often actually take 7 to 10 years. Entrepreneurs need to stop, pause and plan on a quarterly basis. It’s okay to live in the short-term, but don’t forget to plan for the long haul.

6. Choose Whom You Work With

As an entrepreneur, it is critical that you find the right people. Your entrepreneurial spirit provides huge strengths in certain areas and you need to identify what other kinds of strengths you need around you. By building relationships with people in the workplace and choosing who you work with, you’ll learn a ton and grow as an entrepreneur.

7. Delegate

Ideas don’t build a business, people do. Entrepreneurs cannot run a successful company alone. It is essential to know how to empower others to join their vision. The entrepreneur has to give up some control and put their efforts into building other people’s skills if they want to build a scalable company. Delegating is a skill in itself and when entrepreneurs can master the art of this concept, they’ll move on to great heights.

8. Commercial Business “Knowhow”

Entrepreneurs are not naturally the type of people who are going to want a long list of credentials that prove someone’s ability to do something, such as degrees and diplomas. They’re much more practical, hands-on learning types and want to roll their sleeves up, get dirty and prove stuff. Entrepreneurs do fail and they are failures that they learn from. As an entrepreneur, get down and dirty while learning along the way!

Conclusion

Entrepreneurs are not born, they are made. Being a successful entrepreneur is a continuous learning process no matter what your previous background may be. In this post, I shared with you the 8 ways to learn important skills on the fly as an entrepreneur.

How To Make Networking Much Less Painful

It is so important to get out and meet people because it only takes one connection to change your life. A vibrant network means a vibrant business and life. In this post, I shared with you the ways on how to make networking much less painful.

If it ever seems like networking events are awkward, it’s not just you. All entrepreneurs struggle with networking at some point. The question becomes on how can you make it easier since it’s such a valuable person about growing yourself and your career.

What happens at a networking event? People grow their businesses, make life-changing connections and meet vital influencers. Almost 70% of jobs are found through networking. But sometimes, this just isn’t motivation enough. For those who don’t love spending our free time meeting and attempting to impress crowds of new people, the whole thing can feel a bit frustrating.

The problem is that networking really is essential to the success of your career. With a great network, you’ll hear about job leads or opportunities you’d otherwise miss. You’ll be more successful in your job because you can tap into the collective knowledge and put yourself in front of many more opportunities.

If you hate networking but you know you need to, here are ways on how to make networking much less painful:

1. Come Ready With Topics To Discuss

Be prepared to talk about all sorts of different subject matters. You never know who you’re going to run into or strike up a conversation with. Don’t be afraid to share about your interests and what you do for fun along with asking others the same questions.

2. Focus Less On “Networking” And More On Building Relationships

If you hate networking, it may be because you don’t want to feel as if you are only in it for what you can get from someone. The truth is that good networking isn’t about racking up a number of business cards you dish out, but rather it’s about building relationships. If some of these relationships turn into great friendships, that’s wonderful. When you think about networking, remember that not every meeting needs to have a goal. The important thing is to establish or refresh a connection.

3. Get The Conversation Started With Some Easy Openers

If you’re going into an event blind or without any shared interests to bring up, start a convo with a “content compliment” to keep things professional and show them you’re knowledgeable about the industry. If you can’t come up with something about their accomplishments, go for the basics by staying up to date on industry news or pop culture. If someone’s wearing a great color, necklace or shoes, compliment them. It immediately makes the other person feel good about themselves and opens you up for a conversation.

4. Think Outside The Networking Event

Remember, not all networking has to happen at cocktail hour types of events. In fact, some of the most interesting relationship-building can happen elsewhere. See if there’s a conference you can attend, a hackathon you can participate in, or even a project you can help with. These sorts of events will put you in a much more collaborative environment that will allow you to get to know people in a different way than by simply drilling them with questions.

5. Put The “Social” In Social Media

Social media can be the quiet person’s best friend, especially when it comes to networking. You have the ability to get access to hiring managers, HR folks, and even CEOs at the touch of a button. Reach out to people you find interesting and ask to hear about them. The social world allows you to craft intelligent, thoughtful, and engaging messages to these people without all the stress that may come with face-to-face interactions. What may start as a request to connect can lead to much more meaningful dialogue if you ask the right questions. By the time you’re ready to connect in person, that person could feel like an old friend.

6. Offer Help To Others

One way to get over the feeling of being a networking parasite is to try to give more than you get. When you email or message your network, try to send them something you think they might enjoy—a link to an article, the name of a great book, or some news you heard. It doesn’t have to be big or profound. It will still make a big impact.

7. Reconnect with Former Colleagues

Reconnecting with former teammates, classmates, trainers, and professors is an easy way to build your network. After all, these are people who know your abilities and may be willing to recommend you to members of their network.

If you’ve lost touch, take a minute to run through their social-networking profile, or search for them online. Reach out via email first to congratulate them on a new job, winning a hackathon or another achievement. Once you’ve re-engaged, extend an invitation to connect, endorse their skills and stay in touch.

8. Bring A Wing-Person

There’s nothing wrong with not wanting to go to these events alone. It’s nerve-wracking and understandable you’d want someone you know there. While it’s nice to have someone by your side, make sure you break apart and do some of your own networking too. Knowing there’s a person who you trust in the room will be reassurance enough that you’re going to be okay. This will also come in handy if the event is lame or boring, so you have someone to talk to and enjoy your time with.

Conclusion

It is so important to get out and meet people because it only takes one connection to change your life. A vibrant network means a vibrant business and life. In this post, I shared with you the ways on how to make networking much less painful.