No B.S. Business Success In The New Economy. Dan S. Kennedy

a member of one of my coaching groups came to grips with his need to get rid of a soured employee. He procrastinated for over a year, tolerating her bad attitude, sabotage of his authority with other employees, and almost constant criticism of his ideas. He argued with me that she was indispensable. She’d been with him for 13 years, knew his business inside and out. She managed the office, interacted with clients, and he relied on her daily. He had erred in letting this one person become so apparently indispensable, but it ultimately turned out she wasn’t quite as indispensable as she or he thought. In the two months immediately following her departure, the number of new clients dramatically increased, revenues increased, other employees stepped up to the plate. She had been blocking the flow of money into the business just as surely as if a giant boulder had been placed in the doorway. This is a situation all too common; the business owner reluctant to rid his business of a person who has long ago morphed from asset to liability. Turning blind eye and deaf ear to this is mental weakness.

      I once had to end a 5-year relationship with a business partner who had been my closest, best friend. At another time, an 11-year working relationship with a lawyer who had become a friend and who had gone through many battles with me also had to be ended. I’ve had to fire long-time employees who I liked personally. And I’ve had to put my foot down, have a confrontation, and endure temporary anger and tension in the work environment. But, ultimately, business cannot be run by committee or consensus. You’re it. Being it is not always fun. But always necessary.

      I have also fired clients, and encourage my clients to let exceptionally troublesome or unprofitable customers go. I have killed pet projects, and encourage my clients to welcome the swift sword; to get out of bad situations sooner rather than later, with only egg on their faces and disappointment in their minds rather than blood all over the floor and a gaping hole in the bank account. Any mental weakness, squeamishness, hesitation, or procrastination over tough decisions will be costly and can be fatal. One of the worst things you can possibly do in business is be late.

Hey, That’s Not Fair!

      A lot of people respond to their various handicaps, problems, and disappointments with the complaint “It’s just not fair.” And it sure isn’t. For starters, we don’t get to pick our parents. There’s a flaw in the system right there! Next, most of us aren’t moviestar gorgeous. The U.S. tax system is grossly unfair to small business owners and job-creators. And we’re being threatened with that being made worse. Often, business owners are confronted by unfair competition on a slanted playing field here at home and in the global marketplace. Injustice abounds. But all this pales in comparison to the biggest injustice and mystery of all, the frequency with which bad things happen to good people.

      Donald R., an honor student, a considerate, courteous young man, and talented athlete, had an accident on the high school trampoline, landed on his back across the frame, and wound up paralyzed in both legs and in both arms for life. He had to make a choice. He could have retreated into isolation, devoted his life to self-pity and bitterness, and lived as a helpless invalid. Most people would have been sympathetic. What happened to him was so unfair. Instead, Donald R. learned to focus the entire force of his personality through his voice so he could use the telephone, the only tool that lets him travel anywhere in the world while wheelchair bound, to become an enormously successful businessman.

      At first dialing with a pencil clenched in his teeth, he became one of the most proficient telemarketers in his chosen industry. He supported himself with dignity. He made the money to have a beautiful home custom built with every imaginable convenience and gadget to help him function as if he wasn’t handicapped. He became an inspiration to others in his field and to other handicapped people. He was influential in his community, generous to good causes, completely productive, and proud. He enjoyed an active social life and a happy marriage.

      There is no argument that Donald got dealt a lousy hand. Bad things do happen to good people, and sometimes we have little or no control over such things. However, we can control our reactions to the cards we are dealt. After Donald had his accident, he dumped a few cards, drew a few new cards, and changed his hand by choice. I knew Donald personally many years ago, when I was in direct sales, and marveled at the decisions he made, the autonomy he insisted on, the success he achieved. When you think about what stops most people in their tracks and ends most people’s ambitions, Donald’s obstacles were Mt. Everest vs. others’ pebbles.

      For several years, I appeared on a number of seminar-events where Christopher Reeve was another of the speakers. Imagine suddenly being dealt his hand. Going from a physically imposing, athletic, dynamic actor known to many as “Superman” to someone completely immobilized, wheelchair captive, totally dependent. He still chose to pursue a multi-faceted career as a professional speaker, author, actor, and producer, even though the very act of getting out of bed was a Herculean project. He is no longer with us, but in the years he was, he organized an important nonprofit organization that continues his advocacy, compelling the medical establishment to reluctantly reconsider its position on certain spinal cord injuries as irreversible, and promoting research needed to find new treatments, cures, and technologies for persons with such injuries.

      That’s why there are always people who pull themselves out of the worst ghettos in America to become successful, prominent businesspeople, top athletes, and good family men and women. Oprah Winfrey is just one example of someone who proves this point. She emerged from the horror of child abuse; she began her career inauspiciously, but made herself into the top female talk show host in America, a talented actress, and a savvy entrepreneur. This is why we can never accept the idea that success is predetermined by genetics, upbringing, environment, or education. It’s why it is so hard to gift success. Because decisions made have more impact than any other factor.

      We choose our reactions. We decide what happens next. Complaining, whining, and proclaiming the unfairness of the situation does nothing to improve it.

      I’m sort of an unjustified success. I’m woefully unqualified for just about everything I do.

      As I recall, I got C in high school speech class and probably deserved worse. I had a rather severe stuttering problem three different speech therapists failed to cure. If you had seen me stuttering and stammering as a kid, you wouldn’t have wagered a nickel on my future as a professional speaker. Incredibly, I rose to success and prominence, including ten consecutive years on the biggest, seminar tour in America, a tour envied by other speakers that included dozens of cities each year, audiences as large as 35,000, and appearances with former U.S. Presidents, world leaders, Hollywood celebrities, famous athletes, and other top speakers. By any reasonable appraisal, I didn’t belong there. I chose to be there.

      The fact that I earn a large income as a writer would be a heart attack-sized surprise to my English and journalism teachers. In total, I’ve had 13 books published. My first business book, The Ultimate Sales Letter, has become something of a bible for advertising copywriters, and has been continuously available in bookstores since 1991. That kind of longevity is rare. My books have been translated in 8 different languages, published in 21 different countries.

      Over the years I’ve talked to a lot of people thinking about writing a book. Many hold back because they feel they aren’t qualified. That’s a double whammy; a self-image deficiency, and an inaccurate appraisal of the way the marketplace works. Others have written books but not done what is necessary to market them. Mostly, everybody’s waiting for somebody else to discover them, certify them, anoint them, invest in them instead of deciding to make what they want to happen, happen.

      I’m also responsible for the sale of tens of millions of dollars of merchandise each year through the advertising that I create, but I have no formal training in that field. As a direct-response advertising copywriter, I’ve earned over a million dollars a year in fees and royalties year after year. How did that happen? Choice.

      I could go on with other resume items, all the result of decision, not of qualification.

      Personally, I prefer being an unjustified success rather than a justified failure.

      For years, one corner