Blog

The Principle of Managing the Ride Wisdom for Today  Successful entrepreneurs recognize that business is just like life-it runs through cycles. Businesses grow and they shrink. They are profitable one year and lose money the next. Your staff performs in an exemplary fashion on one contract and bombs on the next. How you manage these swings is directly proportionate to the company's long-term success. Average entrepreneurs adjust their emotions to the swings in the cycle, but successful entrepreneurs calibrate their emotions at midpoint between the highs and the lows. They manage to maintain this equilibrium throughout the entire business...

Principles of Entrepreneurship Maintenance Wisdom for Today There have been many intelligent minority and female entrepreneurs throughout the history of America who have helped make our country the beacon of light to the world that it is. Certainly, the names of Madame C. J. Walker, James Forten, William Whippet, Stephen Smith, Reginald Lewis, C. Michael Gooden, Nathan Chapman, and Christopher Williams, to name a few, will go down in history as outstanding entrepreneurs. But alongside the many accolades they will receive will be the fact that their business accomplishments were not realized merely from their raw intelligence. Like every...

The Principle of Decision-Node Intelligence Wisdom for Today The principle of decision-node intelligence is related to a science called decision analysis. Decision analysis teaches how to analyze business options logically and then to assess which option to choose. Every decision we make provides a single entry into the next decision node, in that one idea relates to another until we reach a point of understanding. Typically, the output side of a decision node contains multiple choices from which to choose. Although entrepreneurs are free to pick any option as the next branch in the decision tree, they must exercise great diligence and...

The Boomerang Principle Wisdom for Today The boomerang principle is synonymous with the biblical principle of “as a man sows, so shall he reap.” As an entrepreneur, you will find that everything you do comes back at you in similar fashion. For example, if you give to customers, they will give back to you. If you pay people compliments, they will ultimately repay you with a compliment. A corollary to this principle is that when you “throw the boomerang"--when you initiate an action (either positive or negative) that may impact one or many people-when it comes back at you, the return impact will be manyfold that of the initial action. For...

The Principles of Playing Dumb Wisdom for Today The principle of playing dumb is all about balance and instinct. The balancing happens when you want your customer to acknowledge and appreciate your high level of accomplishment and competence in your area of expertise without appearing threatening, condescending, or arrogant. The sad fact is that a few white males are still threatened by an articulate, highly educated, and ambitious women or minority professional. Some feel so threatened that they may not even engage a minority-owned business in contract opportunities. Playing dumb does not mean belittling yourself or not using all your...

The Principle of Bidirectional Intelligence Flow Wisdom for Today Most companies, governments, and organizations in general have a hierarchical structure that is used to manage the entity. Each position in the company, though varied in size and function, plays a critical role in allowing the organization to meet its stated mission and objectives. Every person in every position in the organization has value. The organization or company is as stronger as the weakest of its links. Successful entrepreneurs know that because everyone in an organization is valuable and contributes in a unique way, they must seek out and make allies of as many of...

Maintaining Congruence of Business and Values

Wisdom for Today

• The almighty dollar isn’t. Many entrepreneurs send too much faith, time, and energy trying to appease the money god. Wealth can be either a blessing or a curse depending upon whether or not you must compromise your values to earn it.
• Entrepreneurs must factor their value system into business decisions. For example, don’t open a video store that rents adult videos if that conflicts with your moral values.
• Although the object of being a marketer in the marketplace is to gain, remember what can be lost in the process and protect that which is important to you. Each individual is only an event or two away from disaster.

#entrepreneurship     #business     #consulting     #keynote     #success     #speaker     #author

The Grand Canyon Principle

Wisdom for Today

• Over time, water is stronger than rock. A steady and relentless stream of water will eventually wear away the strongest stone. Likewise, entrepreneur who are confident of their mission and who persist and persevere, even though the most trying of times, will ultimately wear down all obstacles
• When you’re in the Grand Canyon, you may climb many smaller mountains and hills, but the fact remains that you’ll still be in a hole. Successful entrepreneurs must recognize that it is not enough to win the “little battles” in their journey to canvass the canyon or achieve their major goals in business. They must become proficient at scaling the smaller mountains as they keep in sight the larger and grander objective

• You cannot jump over a canyon with a series of small bounds. When you leap you must make it count. An entrepreneur must take great care in planning and determining how to commit time and resources to achieve the objectives that really count.

#entrepreneurship     #business     #consulting     #keynote     #success     #speaker     #author

The Hannibal Principle
Wisdom for Today

• Don’t look at the bars but instead look beyond them. All of us have paradigms that dictate how we view our world and ourselves. Unfortunately, some of our paradigms have been built on inaccurate data and often become psychological bars that tend to incarcerate our minds and disrupt the creativity of thinking. Some of the obvious bars we construct include racism, sexism, classism, physical attributes, perceived wrong, past injustices, or lack of education, to name a few.  Our tendency to focus on the bars serves only to empower them, thus diverting valuable human energy from more productive entrepreneurial tasks such as defending our market niche, developing a winning business plan, and identifying sources of capital for our ventures.
• Learn to expect great things from yourself and others. The starting point for any human achievement of value is your belief in and desire to achieve the object of your dream. You become what you think about. If you think that all is lost and that you cannot win, you will achieve what you focus on.
• Assume full responsibility for your economic well-being and prosperity. Whenever you disown a problem, you relinquish all power to solve it. No one in America has the desire or conviction to fix the economic problems of the minority community but its members. Although the economic quagmire they find themselves in today is not totally of their own doing, the solution and dedication to resolving their perplexing issues must and will come only from within that community.
• Aggressively seek to build win-win relationship with other minority firms and with mainstream firms. Very few companies today can stand by themselves for long. Some experts predict that the successful companies for the new millennium will be those that develop strategic and mutually beneficial teaming relationships with other companies.  Minority and women entrepreneurs must not limit themselves to teaming only with businesses of similar ethnicity and gender. They should instead follow a parallel track and develop partnerships with any groups that seek to achieve common goals. Above all, make sure that the relationship is a win-win one so that becomes a lasting and rewarding experience for both parties.

#entrepreneurship     #business     #consulting     #keynote     #success     #speaker     #author

The Roach Principle
Wisdom for Today

• The bad news for minority and female entrepreneurs is that like the roaches, they are constantly under attack and must fight for their business lives every single day. Many will become casualties of these efforts to reduce their ranks, by the good news is that a critical mass will survive and become even stronger by going through this weeding-out process. The secret here is to survive the screening and become a member of the critical mass.
• As businesses and industries go through the natural process of survival of the fittest, the key to being a survivor is to know your business and the industry and to do what you do extremely well. Maintain a passion for success and master your trade.  

#entrepreneurship #business #consulting #keynote #success #speaker #author