Success comes in a variety of ways. A lucky few, bred with
the proverbial silver spoon in their mouths, have success
thrust on them by heritage. The greater majority achieve it
the old-fashioned way, through “sweat, blood, and tears.”
Ever noticed something unique about the latter group?
Observe carefully and you’ll find the following four
distinctly defining traits:
Business Ownership: Most successful people have their own
business. The popular saying that you cannot get rich
working for somebody else is true today more than ever. A
recent survey puts the proportion of authentic business
ownership at only 5%. Granted that entrepreneurial trend is
reported to have reached an unprecedented peak in this
generation, still far too many new businesses are of the
fleeting kind and the survey refers only to abiding
business ownership. With business ownership estimated at
only 5%, it means that the rest of us are content with our
“jobs” mentality and content with faithfully enriching the
already bulging coffers of a select few. Consider this fact
the next time you hear how the economy is booming, and how
many more new jobs it has created. An outstanding 95% of us
provide the impetus for that boom.
They offer a good product/service: Find a need and fill it,
and your success is assured. One of the greatest
difficulties in starting a business is determining a need
to meet. The typical consumer’s needs run the gamut from
desired products to services of different variety. A good
product/service is one that is brimming with customer
benefits. These benefits may take the form of saving people
money and time, or helping them stay healthy, youthful, and
vibrant. It is not hard to think of examples that fit these
categories. Why do you suppose, for instance, that
e-commerce has soared to incredible heights so quickly?
Because it offers stress-free shopping from the comfort of
the prospect’s home, a welcome relief from our much-harried
lifestyles. What about those ubiquitous nutritional
supplements? They too, promise something people crave –
health, youthfulness, and longevity. The thing to remember
though, is that promises alone are not enough to foster
success. To truly succeed, you must deliver them.
They yearn to help others succeed: Ray Kroc revolutionized
this idea and in time others followed. I’m referring to the
idea that success is more quickly attained by helping
others succeed. Look around you today, and you’ll find a
McDonalds on just about every block, because that man hit
upon the notion of setting up franchises as a way of
inviting others to share his good fortune. Notice too, that
the businesses that succeed the most are those that have
embraced aspects, if not the whole of Ray’s model. I
recently read an interview by Tom Monaghan where he
credited precisely such a model with the bulk of his
success. Much contemporary network marketing philosophy is
an offspring of this model. My grade school teacher used to
say: “One good turn deserves another.” The evidence is
compelling...successful people have discovered the
immutable secret that one good turn does not merely deserve
another...it invites another!
They dare to dream: The Bible’s Book of Proverbs,
acknowledged by many as the repository of profound wisdom,
has this to say: “Without vision, the people perish.”
Without a dream and the insight to visualize your dream,
most business endeavors falter and success stays elusive.
As a poor young boy, Tom Monaghan’s dream was to become
wealthy so he could invest significant resources on his
passion for religion. Guess what...his dream came true,
just as he had visualized it! Not very long ago, Tom
decided he he’d had enough of the trappings of wealth and
sold his interests in Dominos Pizza, pledging his time and
vast fortunes to the Catholic Church. Of immense
significance in making dreams come true is faith, easily
the most potent ingredient necessary to nourish dreams.
Faith is of course the confident assurance that the ends we
desire are inevitable. Faith emboldens us to picture those
ends vividly in our minds’ eyes, long before they become
real. In the absence of faith, dreams are a mere fantasy, a
wistful, idyllic longing for the things that can be. Faith
gets a hold of our dreams and unleashes an action-producing
force that transforms them from fantasy to concrete
reality. Throughout human history, sages have emerged to
point us to the incredible power of faith.
“If you can believe, all things are possible to him that
believes.”
With those words, the good master himself attempted to
launch us on a great excursion through faith. How often
have we said to ourselves: “I will believe it when I see
it?” Motivational writer/speaker, Dwayne Dwyer says we’ve
got it all wrong. “You will see it”, he insists, “when you
believe it!”
Want to be successful? Start your own business. Offer a
good product or service with customer satisfaction at the
core. Help others succeed. Build a dream, and dare to
believe in that dream.
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