Posts by Early To Rise
Why You Shouldn’t Expect (Or Want) Our Goverment’s Help
Recently, Forbes Small Business magazine convened a meeting to poll some of its readers on how they felt George Bush has done with regard to small business. They rated him highly for his efforts to end estate taxation and for dismantling a Clinton proposal that would have forced small-business owners to comply with expensive and…
Read MoreWhat Is Your Valuable Skill? Are You A Master At It?
In all human endeavors, there are four levels of accomplishment: 1. Incompetence Regardless of how smart or gifted you are, to learn a new skill you must go through a period of not knowing — of taking the baby steps and stumbling. This is the very necessary stage of incompetence. Being incompetent is nothing to…
Read MoreMultitasking: One of the Most Odious Words Coined in the Last Decade
Let’s spend a few moments today talking about something you should NOT be doing and its opposite — which is the core habit of all successful enterprises. Of all the hot air that inflated the New Economy bubble (new myths about how businesses grow, what they should be about, the ergonomics of the new office,…
Read MoreWhat A Jerk? What A Star!
“The perfection preached in the Gospels never yet built an empire. Every man of action has a strong dose of egotism, pride, hardness, and cunning.” – Charles de Gaulle (quoted in The New York Times Magazine, May 12, 1968) A recent issue of the Harvard Business Review featured a case study of a certain Andy…
Read MoreYour Business Is Like A Growing Country
“Stretch your foot to the length of your blanket.” – Persian proverb Think of your business as a small city-state in a vast wilderness. The wilderness is rich in potential but uncultivated. You understand its great possibilities. And you understand too that although it is now free to whoever grabs it, it will one day…
Read MoreGroup Compensation For Maximum Performance, Teamwork, and Teaching
“All that we do is done with an eye to something else.” – Aristotle (Nicomachean Ethics, 4th century B.C.) If you’ve spent any time managing a business, you’ve spent time wondering about compensation and performance: What is the best way to pay employees? If you want to get the most from your employees, do you…
Read MoreGet Away From The Day-To-Day And Find The Answers That Elude You
“We think we learn from teachers, and we sometimes do. But the teachers are not always to be found in school or in great laboratories. Sometimes what we learn depends upon our own powers of insight.” – Loren Eisely (The Star Thrower, 1978 The other day, RW said to me, “You know, I never fail…
Read MoreDon’t Give Up Money And/Or Time That Is Your Due
“In every work a reward added makes the pleasure twice as great.” – Euripides (Rhesus, circa 455-441 B.C.) A guy I know just got fired after seven years on the job. There were different theories about why he was let go — insubordination, sub-par performance, his attitude, a suspicion of disloyalty, etc. No one disputed…
Read MoreBeating The Blues
“Our aches and pains conform to opinion. A man’s as miserable as he thinks he is.” – Seneca (Letters to Lucilius, 1st Century) I admit it. I’m a moody bastard. But I never made a nickel being negative, so I have trained myself to recognize my bad moods and try to get rid of them…
Read MoreThe World’s Most Valuable Skill
If you want to be wealthy, Ive mentioned (in past messages) the four things you absolutely must do … 1. Master a financially valuable skill. 2. Develop a high income. 3. Invest conservatively in other businesses. 4. Invest aggressively in a business you know. Today, I’d like to talk about THE most valuable skill you…
Read MoreAre You As Smart As A 19th Century 8th Grader?
“I was thrown out of college for cheating on the metaphysics exam; I looked into the soul of the boy next to me.” – Woody Allen 8th Grade Final Exam: Salina, Kansas, 1895 Part I: Grammar (1 hour) 1. Give nine rules for the use of Capital Letters. 2. Name the Parts of Speech and…
Read MoreExtreme Success: It’s All About Passion
“If you don’t get up at 3 a.m. and want to do your work, you’re wasting your time.” – Harold Edgerton Take another look at today’s quote by Harold Edgerton, the pioneering researcher in the field of stroboscopy and ultra-high-speed photography: “If you don’t get up at 3 a.m. and want to do your…
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