The Entrepreneurial Savant

When someone asks you for a price quote, resumé, copy of an article, name or phone number, estimate or for any other information, get it to them as soon as possible. My brother Richard, who owns a custom cabinetry business, has found that one of the most effective ways to beat the competition without price cutting is to get his quote back to the client ASAP, the next day if possible. This sends a clear message that he is businesslike and will not drag his feet through the job, a primary concern people have when hiring outside contractors.
We’re all time conscious and with the advent of overnight delivery and email, the expectation time frame for delivery of information went from weeks to days, hours or minutes. Most e-commerce businesses are now including one or two day shipment as a matter of course compared to those ‘delivery in 4-6 weeks’ notices that used to be common in mail order. All of these things mean we are time conscious to a degree never known before. The early bird truly does get the worm nowadays.

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A rainmaker is someone who makes things happen. In a business she may bring in new sales when things are slow. In a creative situation, he may break up logjams and get things going again. Being a rainmaker means taking situations where things are not happening and looking for a way, sometimes any way, to get the momentum back. Rainmakers look for new angles, they throw ideas on the table, no matter how absurd or unusual, they ask people to do things outside of their job description or expertise and they look at a process that is stopped up and try to find a way around the stop.
Rainmaking is a skill requiring creative thinking and the nerve to go out on a limb. Sometimes it might mean being the first to say or do something that everyone has been hesitant to do. Often, it means diverting attention way from the thorny difficulty that has everybody stymied and back onto the bigger picture. Rainmakers say things like ‘Is this worth the effort?’ or ‘let’s just pick one small problem, solve it and then go on to the next’. They ask secretaries and dock workers what they think. Whatever gets the job done.
Rainmakers always find their way to the center and take the risks that take them to the next step. The best ones develop the people and listening skills that help them enlist others into their rainmaking.

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When I first started writing and for a long time after that I always considered myself a creative person. I played music and was good at problem solving at work. My definition of a creative person was one who created original ideas, stories and concepts, coming from some mysterious internal source. That’s still a part of my definition of creativity but now I’ve discovered that this kind of creativity is only half of the creative equation and to my surprise, not necessarily my most effective half.
This kind of creativity is content creativity. It is the source of art and music at the composition level, entrepreneurship and idea generation. It’s the resource we tap into when we brainstorm for new ideas. The other half of the creativity equation is process. Process is how we put those ideas to work, how we get the paint on the canvas, how that new company sprints ahead of it’s competition. One example might be found in your neighborhood fast food joint. The burgers and fries are the content, the semi-automated methods used to get them to you quickly is the process. In the case of fast food (and many other franchise type businesses), the process is what makes them successful and what makes you go there. The process results in fast, consistent tasting, hot food every time you drive through. These companies have realized that their process is what makes successful, rather than their cheeseburgers. On the other side of the coin, the one of a kind restaurant specializing in a local delicacy may be more content-oriented. However, even the mom and pop restaurant must be focused on process to remain profitable.
Finding new methods to process ideas is in itself a creative act, though one of a totally different nature. Process and content cannot exist without one another. When you’re faced with a difficult problem to solve, try separating it into two components. One is the basic creative material involved, the other is the process used to make that raw material into a solution or product. By separating content from process, it becomes much easier to identify the nature of a problem and apply the right kind of solution.

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This is a simple yet powerful way to achieve your goals. Many of us depend on appointment books and calendars to organize our life. Taking this one step further, as part of your goals achievement process get a five year calendar that is on one page. These are available as poster size planners at office supply stores. Use them to make specific appointments for each step of your goal achievement process. For instance, if you are a musician and you dream of making a record, break your dream down into realizable steps. These might include getting 12 songs together, rehearsing with other musicians, saving a certain amount of money each week for expenses, playing a certain number of gigs to prepare for recording, looking at studios and talking to others who have put out records, booking your first recording session, finishing recording and mixing, having cover art done by a designer, having CDs duplicated on your own label and selling them to stores, opening social networking pages etc. Each step can be entered into your calendar as a specific appointment or deadline by which you hope to have things ready. This project may stretch over one or two or more years but you can always see the next step and have a good idea where you stand. Not only that but your five year calendar will keep having new projects and goals added to it, serving as a record of your dreams and achievements.

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 *Virginia Satir

When problems crop up look for the specific problems and attach specific solutions to them. It is easy to generalize when something seems difficult to cope with or is beyond your immediate ability to solve or resolve. Virginia Satir was a founder and very effective practitioner of family therapy. She believed in getting immediate results from therapy rather than discussing problems endlessly. Going for the specific source of a conflict was one of her most effective tactics for helping families change the way they interact. This problem solving approach of avoiding generalities can serve as the first step in the process of handling difficult situations or challenges. Look for specifics.

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Every salesperson knows what a ‘cold call’ is. Its a telephone call to someone you don’t know that you make for purpose of furthering your cause. If you’re selling something, you may be seeking an appointment to make a presentation. If you’re raising money for a cause you may have a similar goal. If you’re trying to learn about a new career or resource you may simply be trying to find the right expert for advice. Whatever the reason you make the calls, they are often the only way you can accomplish your goal(s). Unfortunately a very human and common fear of rejection keeps most of us from making cold calls and we get stuck, unable to make forward movement.
There are many methods of beating the fear. Use a script so that when fear freezes you up, you can keep going with what you wanted to say. Rehearse your script ahead of time with a co-worker or spouse. Find common ground ahead of time through research so that you can turn a feared encounter into an opportunity to share interest. Most importantly, make a certain number of ‘cold’ calls everyday. These shots into the dark can lead to many new resources and profitable relationships.
Give yourself an incentive to make your calls everyday. Think of them the way a salesperson might. A good cold caller knows exactly how many calls they need to complete to make an appointment and how many appointments it takes to make a sale. Knowing their average profit on each sale, they can assign a dollar value to each and every call, no matter how successful. For instance a real estate agent may call on homeowners to get houses to list and sell. She knows that for every twenty calls she completes (reaches a person), she gets one appointment. One half of her appointments result in listings for which she averages a commission of $1500 each. The math shows each call she makes to be worth $37.50. ( 40 calls = 2 appointments = one listing @ $1500. 1500/40=37.50) It kinda warms up those cold calls doesn’t it? Take your goals and reduce them to the value of a phone call done three times a day, day after day. The value of each of those dials may be a pleasant surprise.

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Synergy is defined as the whole being greater than the sum of the parts. Synergy is what makes planning so important. By planning how to reach your goals through a well defined set of steps you get the added bonus of synergy. It works like this: Every effective action you take multiplies the effect of any other actions you take. If you are seeking publicity for an event you’re working on you make a plan to reach every potential source of publicity. You call the radio and TV stations with a good story about your event. You send press releases with pre-written anecdotes about the organization, perhaps its history or influential founders. You build a website, place ads on Google and send out an email blast, all according to your basic plan. What happens? People hear your event announced on the radio on the way to work. You’re in their E-mail later that morning. The paper features a story about the eccentric millionaire who started your group and mentions the fund-raiser. That night, they flip on the news and there you are again, building the decorations. Wow, they think, this event must really be the thing to do. And the power of synergy reinforces and reminds them about something that now seems much more than just an event in the paper.
Professional promoters and public relations people do this all the time, but there is no reason why you can’t get in on the action. The event you are promoting might be yourself. Maybe you want a new job or a new client. Make a plan and use the power of synergy to make it many times more effective.

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Are you surprised when things don’t turn out the way you planned?
When unexpected events turn things around in unexpected ways?
When it seems that Murphy’s Law should be named after your experiences?

It is said that entrepreneurs are risk-takers. Perhaps that’s why so many fail. Most successful people are risk-avoiders because they know that it is very difficult to make up a loss, whether a monetary one or a loss of momentum. They build in risk protection using a variety of techniques. One of the most effective is rehearsing scenarios. All this means is that they look into the future and imagine as many possible scenarios (What-if? situations) and how they would react to them. They look at how different variables could affect their plans and they make contingency plans to handle those crises and profit from them. In cases where they cannot profit, they plan ways to exit with the least amount of damage.
Perhaps you have a business dependent on one customer. What if the impossible occurs and they pull out? Rehearse your actions now and you’ll be ready ahead of time. Suppose a partner pulls out of a project or a relationship? Or your distributor goes out of business? Or you don’t get into the college you wanted? Simply rehearsing these scenarios and developing back-up plans can do a great deal to ensure your success.

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When things aren’t going your way or you ‘blocked’ and can’t seem to resolve a problem or begin to take the steps required to solve that problem, there are exercises that can help to break out of your ineffective state of mind. One, from Dr. Van K. Tharp, a psychologist who specializes in the psychology of successful investment traders, goes like this:
“Get up out of your chair. Walk away about four feet and then look at how you looked in that chair. Notice your posture, your breathing, your facial expressions. Then imagine how you would look if you had the sort of mental state you would like. When you can see that clearly, sit down in the chair again and assume the position that you just imagined.
The exercise works for almost any situation as it involves several important principles–changing your body posture, seeing yourself from a more objective viewpoint and imagining a more resourceful state.”*

*As quoted in Market Wizards by Jack D. Schwager, Harper & Row

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Have you ever wondered what it is that makes it possible for some human beings to regularly perform at levels far above average? Why some athletes, musicians, counselors, communicators and leaders get far better results consistently than their peers? It used to be an accepted fact that these people were exceptionally gifted in ways that the rest of us could not hope to emulate. Recently there have been breakthroughs in the study of exceptional performance that make it possible to learn from these prodigies. By using a technique known as modeling, people are studying the personal strategies that highly skilled individuals use and putting them into form that can be taught to others.
Classically trained musicians are required to memorize extremely complex pieces of music, taking into consideration a very large number of factors including tempo, pitch, tone, feel, the interaction with other musicians, physical and mental technique, the response of the audience and many other elusive factors. By modeling the interior techniques used by musicians talented in these skills, it has become possible to teach others the process they use to achieve. They may use visualization techniques, mnemonic devices, and other techniques to help them get through a piece. By breaking these strategies down into processes, they can be taught to others.
Is there someone you admire who has abilities you would like to develop? Talk to them about the thought process they go through to prepare themselves. Observe the physical rituals they use. Read biographies and interviews for clues about the mental techniques used to get to that highly capable state. Modeling is a very complex process but even a rudimentary awareness of how it works can help you to learn faster and more effectively.

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