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“128 great ways to harness your personal power!”
By Olivia Stefanino
BE YOUR OWN GURU!
Discover the 128 ways to harness your personal power at both home and work...
A unique, inspirational and dynamic approach is being brought to the business world by executive coach Olivia Stefanino, whose blend of western techniques and eastern philosophies has led to the creation of the powerful “Be Your Own Guru” personal leadership programme.
Proven over the last ten years in blue chip companies, SME’s and not-for-profit organisations, Olivia’s work is based on the premise that “successful companies employ successful individuals”.
The best way to predict the future is to create it…
Leadership starts with YOU!
1. Understand that your life's success or failure reflects the person who is leading it...
2. Know that others will treat you according to the way you treat yourself. If you know that you deserve to be treated well, then that is how others will sub-consciously decide to treat you, too. However, if you expect to be "walked over", taken for granted and not appreciated, then that will become your reality.
3. Accept that guilt is a useless emotion - beating ourselves up for the past means that we are not getting on with the present - let alone planning for a successful future!
4. Remember that very often the courts pass lighter sentences on criminals that we do on ourselves!
5. Realise that by taking responsibility for yourself and your life, you stop giving your power away. Blaming others and external circumstances leaves you powerless.
6. Understand that your beliefs create the kind of life you experience. Ask yourself, are your beliefs about yourself positive or negative? Just finding the answer to this simple question can start you on the road to change.
7. Know that your sub-conscious is the driver of your mind. Your sub-conscious stores memories and emotions and these will be used - often without your awareness - in your everyday decision making processes.
8. See that while you can't alter past experiences, you can release the emotional ties to the event. The keys to this "letting go" process are forgiveness and acceptance. This release then frees you to make decisions based on reality - and not on your illusions.
9. Recognise that forgiveness is a decision that frees you from the negative effects of anger, frustration and hurt. Forgiveness does not mean that you condone the action - but it is the key to moving on and being the very best of who you are.
10. Create wealth and abundance in your life by focusing on...wealth and abundance. (Most people experiencing financially hard times do nothing but think about how hard life is for them.) Start by remembering all your achievements and recognising all the good things that you do already have in your life. Also be grateful for your new understanding and the consequent opportunity for change.
11. Accept that in order to create success for your company, you must first learn to create success for yourself. The best way to predict the future is to create it…
12. Recognise that personal effectiveness means doing what needs to be done, first - as a priority. Ineffective people use most of their time to undertake tasks that actually have little effect on the bottom line.
13. Remember the 80/20 rule - which dictates that 80% of your effort results in just 20% of the results. Turn this equation on its head and deduce which is the 20% of your time that generates the 80% results.
14. Break out of your comfort zone - personal success will not come without risk taking. Leaders lead because they are ahead of the pack, and this can often feel risky - but exhilarating.
15. Choose to live your own life, not the life that is expected of you by others.
16. Make goals of what you want in life. Most people spend their time thinking about what they don't want - and then they wonder why things aren't working out.
17. Create SMART goals - Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Ritten down and Timed - for yourself, in line with all successful people. Goals which aren't SMART are just wishful thinking.
18. Take action! In order to make your goals reality, make an action plan. Start from the point of your goal's fruition and "chunk" down all the things that you will need to do, making sure that your plan starts with an action you can take today.
19. Engage your sub-conscious in making your goals become reality by focusing on your desired outcomes. Your sub-conscious mind is your servant and nothing delights it more than turning your thoughts into reality. Be careful what you wish for because you just get it!
20. Use your imagination to "power" your sub-conscious. Daydream about how it will be when your goals come into reality. Picture the scene, hear the positive comments people are making about your success. Notice how good it feels to have reached your goal.
21. Recognise that the company you keep reflects your state of mind! If you are surrounded with positive, successful people then the chances are that you are from the same mould. If everyone around you is negative and always complaining, understand that you are behaving that way too.
22. Realise that your mind plays a major role in the health of your body. Negative, complaining people never enjoy fantastic health – just look around!
23. Play to your strengths - your weaknesses will take care of themselves.
The best way to predict the future is to create it…
24. Learn to become more organised - so that you feel you are "ahead" rather than "falling behind". This is the fastest way to reduce stress. To achieve this, you may need to start employing the word "no" more often and/or get more efficient at delegating.
25. Keep one step ahead by ensuring that you allow more than enough time to complete tasks.
26. Do what you do best - and hire in help for your least favourite activities.
27. Bear in mind that interruptions - pleasant or otherwise - account for the greatest amount of wasted time. Plan for interruptions - by telling people that you will be available to them at certain times of the day only.
28. Allow yourself an hour a day to accommodate any unexpected emergencies. If you don't need the full hour, then use the spare time at the end of the day to work on tasks that are not yet urgent, but are still important.
29. Set your deadlines ahead of "real time". This way, your chances of fulfilling all your promises are greatly enhanced. Also, you will have built in emergency time, should it be required.
30. Set aside a percentage of your income and time for personal development activities.
31. Listen to inspiring, motivating and informative CDs/cassette tapes when driving.
32. Choose to spend your time with dynamic people who make you feel positive, enthusiastic and energised.
33. Recognise that negative people who are unsuccessful in their own lives will not wish you to do well because it will "show them up". They're the people who will always lots of reasons why you - and your ideas - won't succeed. Therefore, learn to take the criticism from negative people as an inverse compliment!
34. Don't walk away from negative people. Run as fast as you can!
35. See that successful people are often initially misunderstood - and even laughed at - and that it is only when they ultimately succeed that they are praised. Success doesn't come immediately and determination always wins the day.
36. Persistence and practice always pay off. Remember the response from golfer Gary Player who was "accused" of being lucky - "It's funny," he said, "but the more I practise, the luckier I get."
The best way to predict the future is to create it…
37. Eliminate the word "failure" from your vocabulary. When something doesn't work out, you have simply learned that there's a better way that's still waiting to be discovered.
38. Know that the biggest failure is not to try at all - and remember to congratulate yourself on your efforts, even when they don't succeed first time.
39. Remember Henry Ford’s statement, “If you think you can, or you think you can't, you're right!"
40. Ensure that your career follows your heart. Be aware that it is all too easy to climb to the top of the career ladder - only to discover that you have set it against the wrong wall.
41. Never stay in a job for the money - you will be on the fastest route to unhappiness.
42. Know that all creativity begins with the power of thought. A cake cannot be baked until the cook first thinks to bake a cake. Your future cannot be created positively until you first think positively about your future.
43. Keep your promises and build yourself a reputation for getting things done. And includes the promises that you make to yourself.
44. By the same token, learn to say "no" when you are unable to take on a task and see it through to completion. Explain that you would rather say "no" now, than cause disappointment later.
45. Smile when you know that you have to go through a difficult situation and imagine sharing the story - in a humorous way - with family and friends afterwards.
46. Commit yourself to looking after your long-term health - even if it means foregoing short-term pleasures.
47. Recognise that you can't change other people - including all of your staff - you can only change yourself.
48. Employ the same principles of forgiveness and acceptance to others as you do for yourself. Remember that we forgive for our own sanity - not for the other person's.
49. Recognise that others do not deliberately set out to thwart you, it's just that they haven't worked out a better way of "being" just yet.
50. Put yourself in the other person's shoes. Seeing matters from a different perspective helps to you to understand another's actions. It also enables us to take things a little less personally – try it!
51. Realise that other's behaviour says more about them than it does about you. Also, understand that other's unkind words are often a reflection of the way they are feeling at that particular moment - rather than their true feelings towards you.
52. Understand that people are not their behaviour. While you may not like what they do in any given moment, as a human being they still deserve your respect – and unconditional love, if you can manage it!
53. Remember the maxim that when you are accusing someone else and pointing a finger at them, you have three fingers pointing back at yourself. This fact also applies when someone else is pointing a finger at you!
54. Show respect to everyone around you - especially staff members who are junior to you. Respect is earned not demanded - and the quickest way to earn it is to display it first.
55. Seek first to understand, before being understood. Once a person feels understood, he or she is more receptive to new ideas.
56. Know that it is the "bigger" person who is able to say sorry first.
57. Understand that the staff you employ all reflect aspects of yourself - if you are not happy with their attitude, take a look at your own.
58. Micro-managing your staff will cause resentment and curtail their creativity. Recruit staff whom you trust to do the job - and then let them get on with it!
59. Know that not everyone has to like you. But understand that the more content you are with yourself, the more you will attract other like-minded people to you.
60. Remember that you can never change anyone else, we can only change ourselves. But it is by changing ourselves that we change the dynamics of a relationship. When we change, we behave differently - and consequently other people's behaviour changes towards us.
61. Discover the aspirations of others and see how you can help them reach their goals. Helping others to reach their goals first often encourages them to help us fulfil our dreams.
62. Accept that the only good deal is the "win-win". Trampling over others in order to reach our own goals will only result in disaster, sooner or later. Similarly, going against our own beliefs will ultimately prove unsustainable and disastrous. Both scenarios always lead to disappointment and frustration.
63. Winning hearts and minds is key if you are going to make your ideas work. And this applies to everyone around you - family, colleagues and clients.
64. Speak with passion and enthusiasm - people will respond to your emotions. If you appear bored, unenthusiastic and uninterested, you can guarantee that your prospective clients will feel exactly the same.
65. Understand the power of metaphor. People are often more receptive to learning from other people's "stories" - which they can then apply to their own situation - than they are to direct instructions.
66. Create rapport with others by asking questions rather than making statements, especially if you need to correct someone. "How could we have done this more effectively?" is less threatening than, "You should have..."
67. Be aware that communicating with others is about more than your words. In fact only 8% of your words are taken into account - the rest of your communication is understood through the tone of your voice and your body language.
68. Understand that people generally use one of four ways to process their thoughts. These ways are: visual, auditory, kinaesthetic (feeling) and auditory digital (process). Endeavour to use language that corresponds to these categories. For example, help people to "see" the problem, ask if a thought "sounds" right and pay attention to what "feels" right.
69. Recognise that your mind - and that of your clients - cannot process a negative command. If you're told not to think of a blue elephant, what is the first thing that springs to mind? The reason you immediately thought of a blue elephant is because you first have to think of something in order not to think about it. Telling someone not to do something is a surefire way of ensuring that they do it!
70. Smile when making a recording - especially when making or leaving Ansafone messages. Smiling when recording will make your voice sound warmer and more friendly.
71. Realise when making a presentation or short speech that no-one else knows what you had originally intended to say! So even if you stray from your original plan, no-one else will be any the wiser.
72. Compliment others on an achievement. It is easier for others to accept praise when it is about something they have done - rather than for just being themselves. Compliment a person on an aspect of their personality, however, and it is likely that they will perceive it as insincere flattery!
73. Act as if you are feeling confident, even when you aren't. The brain responds to your actions. For example, try smiling and feeling angry at the same time - it's not possible! It makes sense therefore, to act as if you are feeling confident, happy and in control - your real emotions will soon follow suit.
74. Know that first impressions count. And that you never get a second chance to make a first impression.
75. Invest in discovering which clothing styles and colours suit you best. If you want to create instant rapport with others, dress in a similar style to them, although still keeping your own sense of identity.
76. Dress for the job - or way of life - to which you aspire, not the one you are currently in.
77. Understand that people tend to feel most comfortable with people who like them, and who are like them. Fitting in with the "status quo" will enable you to create instant rapport and win new business more easily.
78. Don't always be polite. If you don't understand ask. Chances are that everyone else won't have understood either. As Confucius said, "It is better to look a fool once, than to always be a fool."
79. Recognise labels for what they are - terms of reference. Labels are not reality. Don't waste your energy with people arguing about whose "label" is right. Look at the essence of a point of view, or of an argument - and deal with this.
80. Never leave a message on your voicemail promising to return calls. Failing to return a person's call just causes offence. Instead, ask people to leave a detailed message that you promise to action by the end of the day.
81. Look at where your company's focus is - is it on creating success or is all your time spent avoiding disaster?
82. Recognise that a business plan is only a blueprint for your ideas - it takes an action plan combined with commitment to make it happen.
83. Be your own business coach - what would you advise yourself to do if you were brought in as a management consultant to your company? Take that advice yourself, recognising that sometimes it means learning to say no!
84. Imagine reading a magazine feature about you and your company's success...What changes do you need to make now in order to make the imaginary contents of that article a reality?
The best way to predict the future is to create it…
85. Understand that profit is sanity and turnover is vanity.
86. Remember that it is easier to improve one hundred areas of your business by 1% than it is to improve just one area by 100%. And the effect on the bottom line will still add up to 100%
87. Look for role models and learn from them. Find the heroes in your field and investigate their success - and model your behaviour and company methodology on them. Read the autobiographies of the people you admire.
88. Take note of your competition - and learn from their successes and failures. However, it is more important to focus on what you and your company are doing - and where you are going - than wasting your time keeping one eye on the opposition.
89. Be flexible and adapt to your marketplace - what's in fashion today will become yesterday's news soon enough. Make sure that you are not applying yesterday's fads to what you are doing today.
90. Remember Sir James Goldsmith's adage, "If you can see the bandwagon coming, then it is probably too late."
91. Innovation is the key to success - bringing a new slant to an already successful product or service almost guarantees increased profits.
92. Understand that nothing is as permanent as change.
93. See the significance of the old Korean proverb, "The second man in makes the money!"
94. Remember that phenomenal success requires phenomenal celebration. In other words, remember to pat yourself and your staff on the back!
95. Realise that for staff to be creative, they need to have room to make mistakes. See mistakes as part of their education - and without pointing fingers, make sure that others learn from those mistakes as well.
96. Understand also that it is vital to learn from other people's mistakes as there simply isn't time to make them all yourself.
97. Do what you do best - and leave others to do the rest. Don't waste your time on tasks that someone else can do better than you.
98. Know where you sit within our business team and recognise that the most successful teams comprise people with completely different perspectives.
99. Value other members of the team - even when they don't see things the same way you
do...Their viewpoint is equally valuable and you may even learn a thing or to. We all learn more from people who are different from us than those who are the similar.
100. Recognise that bullying tactics NEVER work. When staff feel intimidated, they will not produce their best work for you. They will do just enough work to avoid your criticism.
101. Wherever you go - know the reason why you are there.
102. Work out your hourly rate and on every occasion that you are tempted to waste time, ask yourself whether you would pay yourself your hourly rate for this activity. If the answer is no, then either delegate the activity or don't do it at all.
103. Don't confuse time wasting activities with leisure time. "Taking time out" is a very good use of your time - it's when you will have your best ideas.
104. Understand that to be the best, you need to undergo continual study in your chosen field.
105. Read the relevant journals in order to keep abreast of developments in your field. Also, regularly study the newspapers which take the opposite political view to your own - you can't counter arguments in a debate unless you understand how the opposition is thinking!
106. Recognise that the customer is king. He or she doesn't exist to keep you company in business - rather you and your company exist to keep your customers satisfied. Remember that superlative service keeps customers.
107. Recognise that networking is for business - and that social activities are for your private life. Combining the two will result in little new business and less-than-satisfactory socialising.
108. Set yourself the target of having a conversation with at least three people that you don't know at every networking event. This will help you avoid the pitfall of only talking to people with whom you feel comfortable.
109. Follow up on your new contacts - doing so the very next day creates a favourable impression. You will be perceived as "someone who gets things done and makes things happen".
110. Avoid networking groups where all the members spend their time talking about the cricket or football - and are too embarrassed to talk about business. You are there to win new business.
111. Spend a few minutes creating an interesting one-minute "speech" which sums up your business - and which you can use every time someone asks you what you and your company do.
112. Understand that the key "buying" motivation is fear. Build in the "fear factor" to your one-minute introduction speech by outlining how other businesses are losing out by not using you!
113. Know that once people are already buying from you, they can be motivated to keep their business with you by your guaranteeing their continued security, satisfaction and peace of mind. (And this doesn't mean a threatened visit from the heavies!)
114. Help your clients to solve their problems. People want to make their lives easier - and they are often willing to pay you to do just that.
115. Be gracious with people and ruthless with time.
116. Ensure that all your correspondence, sales literature and "give-aways" have your correct contact details clearly marked.
117. Encourage potential clients to buy from you by pointing out the action they need to take next.
118. Understand the strength of win-win - and use this philosophy to create strategic alliances with other like-minded companies. Use the strategic alliance to cross sell products and services - and in this way both organisations will reach a wider audience.
119. Keep an eye on the money - it's not just winning the work that benefits the bottom line, it's also chasing the invoices!
120. Learn from an extensive survey carried out in the US, which found that all businesses failures were primarily due to lack of sales.
121. Recognise that it is easier to save money that to earn it - so watch the expenses...Too many businesses focus all their attention on winning new work, and fail to appreciate that unnecessary expenditure has a negative impact on profits.
122. Understand that most customers and clients like to feel that they are in good company when they are buying your products and services. Testimonials, referrals from satisfied customers and positive public relations are all worth their weight in gold. Start collecting now!
123. Know that there is a limit to how much money you can earn - and no limit to how much you can make. It therefore makes sense to look at how you can create "product" - something that you make once and sell over and over again. The best way to predict the future is to create it…
124. Look at ways to transfer knowledge to potential and existing clients in ways that bring in money...For example, record and duplicate CDs/cassette tapes containing vital information that your clients can use to succeed in their businesses. Invite them to listen to the tapes in the car - and make sure that all your contact details are not only mentioned on the recording – but also printed on the CD/tape.
125. Sell the "sizzle" and not the sausage. Whet people's appetites with a taste of what you can do for them - but remember that you need to be able to charge for the "missing ingredient X".
126. Keep the perceived value of your service high, even if you decide to discount your prices. Find a good reason for your discounts - "special rates for smaller companies" for example, often goes down well. Never, ever discount your rates without a valid reason, the client will think you were trying to fleece him.
127. Value yourself, your expertise and your time. Don't waste time trying to "convert" closed minded-people who are never going to do business with you.
128. Finally, live your life knowing that it is all about the journey and not just about the destination!
:: Bing Wednesday, March 21, 2007
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: 6:53 PM
