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Ready, Fire, Aim!
Sunday, 27th February 2010
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“Ready, Fire, Aim!” I’ve used this phrase on three different occasions this week to motivate a few friends who have been doing a lot of thinking in relation to starting a business. Now thinking first before you act is very good but there comes a time when you’ve done enough thinking and it’s now time to take action. The tricky bit is figuring out when that time is.
I first heard “Ready, Fire, Aim!” when I met Anh Do last year. He told this really crazy story about the soldiers of the Vietnam war. Back then the American soldiers had the popular M16 assault rifle while Vietnamese soldiers had AK 47s. Now the AK 47 is not a precision weapon, meaning that you can fire it but you’re never quite sure where the bullets are going to land. So what Vietnamese soldiers used to do was get READY to shoot the enemy, then they’d FIRE to see where the bullets landed. Then after seeing where the bullets landed, they’d readjust their AIM and fire again this time hitting their intended target. It was an interesting story and it sums up one of the major concepts of entrepreneurship today - act now!
Back in the day, old school business people did a lot of planning and thinking and analysing and after all of that was completed they’d begin their business. These days entrepreneurial culture tends to rely less on excessive planing and more on taking action i.e. the “Ready, Fire, Aim!” principle. Entrepreneurs now get an idea, develop it very quickly and get it out there and then start to see the results and fine tune the idea to get better results. One of the biggest reasons for this is the speed of which businesses can be set up today due to the digital communications revolution.
The danger with the planning mentality is one of caution. Given recent global economic events society has become more cautious and a lot of people have become more scared to take that first step to start a business. Through my Technology Training Workshops I’ve met a lot of great people who have realised that they want to get more out of life and they’ve thought about starting a business. Some of them are already in business (Good on them!) but others are going through the whole planing stage and after speaking with them I feel as though some of those people might not ever end up starting their business because they’re not convinced they’ve done enough planing. It really is a fine line.
Don’t get me wrong. Planning is still very important in business if you really want to succeed but it’s important to remember that you have to plan for the right thing. Someone who analyses and plans everything down to the last detail is going to get a nasty surprise when they start their business and something happens that they didn’t plan for. If you’re going to plan, plan for the fundamentals and then worry about the finer details later.
So for those of you who are thinking about starting a business, my best piece of advice is to answer the following question:
“What is the absolute worst thing that could happen to me when I start my business?”
When you have your answer, start planing your business to protect that disaster from happening. For example if you answer that question with “No one will come to buy my product”, your plan should begin with marketing exercises to help you understand who your ultimate customers will be and how you will reach them.
Keep in mind that the world of business is one of risk and reward, if you don’t take any risks then you will not be rewarded.
So this week I challenge you to adopt the “Ready, Fire, Aim!” principle into your week. It doesn’t matter if you’re going to start a business or not, the phrase can be used for making decisions too.
Let me know how you go and post a comment down below.
Dream, Build, Inspire, Lead!
AJ~
Author: AJ Kulatunga
Category:
Build, entrepreneurship, business, start-up, business tips, business advice, Anh Do
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Safety Net
Sunday, 20th June 2010
Car troubles are always a worry regardless of whether you have a new car or an old one. Sometimes there’s no conceivable reason for a car to break down - especially when everything seems to be working fine one minute and then the next your car won’t start. One of life little mysteries I suppose but there’s an important lesson to be learned here.
I’ve just gotten back to Dream Central after having my friend’s car towed. The car suddenly stalled and wouldn’t start again. As it’s an automatic with full electrics there’s very little that we could do to have a look at the problem. My friend called up the roadside assistance people who took 45 minutes to get to the car (which isn’t too bad for a Sunday). When they got there he asked us to lift up the hood and start the car and then told us there was nothing he could do for us except to organise a tow truck - which took another 45 minutes to get there but at least they actually did something for us and towed the car away.
When you think about what just happened, it would appear that having roadside assistance membership is completely useless and that’s exactly what my friend said. But see the thing is it’s not just about getting your car fixed. It’s about feeling safe and secure that when disaster strikes you can contact someone who can help you out and support you. Sort of like a safety net for you. It’s a bit like paying insurance. Millions of dollars are spent everyday on making payments for events that might not ever occur- but if they do occur at least you know you are covered. It’s all about peace of mind and how you value feeling safe and secure. So that got me thinking, do you have a safety net in your life?
As with insurance there’s a mixed bunch of thoughts about having a safety net. Lots of people out there don’t believe bad things will ever happen to them so they don’t bother having a safety net and they just take disasters as they come. Others believe that bad things are a part of life and just expect bad things to happen all the time and deal with them. Then there are a few of us who acknowledge that bad things sometimes do happen in our lives for no apparent reason and if we want to continue to Dream,Build,Inspire,Lead! then we need to plan for some of those bad things. We need to have our own safety net.
Now having a safety net could mean a bunch of things for different people. It really depends what you value the most to get you out of your disaster. For me personally it’s having my Disaster Recovery Fund, which is pretty much some savings that I put away when I can to help me out if something bad happens in my life. For others it might be having a special network of friends and family to tap into if disaster strikes. It might even be a special place that you visit to chill out and get your head back in the game. It’s whatever means something to you to help you get through a disaster in your life.
So this week I challenge you to put together your Safety Net. Make sure that you’re covered so that if and when disaster strikes in your life you’ll know that you’ve already got something in place to help you move forward.
Dream, Build, Inspire, Lead!
AJ~
Author: AJ Kulatunga
Category:
Build, safety, security, insurance, car,
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Be Authentic
Wednesday, 16th June 2010
Hi Folks! I’m really sorry for the extremely late posting. Things have been a bit crazy over here and I didn’t get a chance to post up an entry for this week. Hope you can forgive me! This week I’ve got something cool for you. A quick interview with the legendary Warwick Merry - The Get More Guy.
Warwick is a professional speaker that focuses on “Getting More” as his topic. So his speaking topics include Get More Energy, Get More Results and a host of other topics that are designed to help you get more out of your business and your life. I was lucky enough to have lunch with Warwick while he was up here in Darwin and we had a lot of great laughs. He’s a great guy.
Amongst the laughs and the stories Warwick mentioned something really interesting. He spoke about the concept of authenticity and it really got me thinking. See for those of us who play to win in life it’s quite easy to succumb to the glamour and glitterous world of being successful and unless you’re grounded properly there is a strong chance your ego will soon start to outweigh your bank account. That’s when problems start to happen and usually you’ll be the last to notice it.
Warwick spoke about the importance of being authentic and congruent in all of your messages. So basically a “this is who I am take it or leave it” attitude and I think there’s something remarkably calming in that thought. I know tonnes of people who behave VERY differently at work to a social setting. Sure you might need to be professional at work but that doesn’t mean you have to be boring and stiff. Bring your personality into your work and if you feel you can’t, then perhaps you need to think about why you feel that way. I can’t imagine the stress involved in feeling as though you have to be someone else during 9am - 5pm.
Going back to Warwick, after lunch I had the opportunity to hear him speak later on that night and he delivered his “Get More Energy” speech. I’ve never laughed that hard in a professional presentation before in my life and it wasn’t just me. The entire room thoroughly enjoyed him and his topic. Can you guess the secret of his success? Yep. He was authentic. “This is who I am, this is what I do, here are some stories about me and what I’ve found and you might be able to relate to them.” It’s an ingeniously simple formula - and it works!
Warwick was kind enough to let me interview him for Dream,Build,Inspire,Lead! so here’s the clip:
So this week I challenge you bring in a level of authenticity to your life. Be congruent in your messages both in and outside of work and see what results it brings you. Good luck!
Special thanks to Warwick Merry for being himself and Michelle O’Hara from Intimo for helping me film the big guy in action.
Dream, Build, Inspire, Lead!
AJ~
Author: AJ Kulatunga
Category:
inspire, lead, Warwick Merry, Get More, authentic, congruent,
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Love or Fear
Sunday, 6th June 2010
I was talking to a friend the other day about decision making and she said the most interesting thing - all decisions are based on either love or fear. I’m not sure if I agree with that but I thought it would be an interesting topic to look at this week. Do we actually base all our decisions on just two emotions of love or fear? Or is there more to it?
My friend was referring to the book series “Conversations with God”. The story goes that the author, Neale Donald Walsch, was at a point in his life where things weren’t going well and he was so angry that he decided to sit down and write a letter to God and ask him exactly why his life wasn’t working out the way it should. He wrote a series of questions down and soon began to find answers for each one and this became the foundation for the book series.
I’ve never read the books myself but they sound interesting and I’m fascinated by the hypothesis that all of our decisions are based on either love or fear. After looking at the major principles behind the Conversation with God series, Neale refers to these basic emotions as the “primal duality” which I suppose extends from human evolution and maybe there is something to it. You’ve never seen a depressed Lion have you? (Exclude Madagascar!)
Neale goes on to examine the scenario of a parent who saves a child from being killed in traffic. Do they do this out of love or fear? Essentially it’s a combination of both as it is the parents love for the child that overcomes their fear of their own death in order to risk saving the child from their death. It would appear in this case that love overcomes fear.
And as a the great philosopher Lennon once said “All you need is love!”, although I’m not convinced.
In a final attempt to understand the whole concept I looked back on all the major decisions that I’ve made in my life so far and weighed them up against love vs fear. It would appear that every single one of them had the basis of “for love” or “for fear” attached to them. Interesting...
So what do you think? Is there any truth to it? Do we make all our major decisions based on love or fear? Or is there more to it? This week I challenge you to think about all of the major decisions in your life and weigh them up against love or fear.
Let me know what you think!
Dream, Build, Inspire, Lead!
AJ~
Author: AJ Kulatunga
Category:
Inspire, Conversations with God, Neale Donald Walsch, Love, Fear
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