This article is by the founder and Chairman of BNI Dr Ivan Misner and comes from their regular ezine SuccessNet you can find out more about BNI here & subscribe to the ezine here.
Ignore the Doomsday Headlines – Continue to flex your networking muscles.
Today’s news is full of economic soap operas. In the United States, Congress, the White House, and the pundits are debating the so-called bailout of yet another pillar of Corporate America. European nations and others around the globe are struggling with recessionary pressures. Voices everywhere seem to be spouting economic doom and gloom.
Now, please, lean in close and listen carefully. I’m going to ask you to do something difficult, yet very important: Ignore all those doom and gloom voices.
It’s not that I want to deny reality. Nor am I judging whether all those important voices are right or wrong.
What I am saying is, all those voices are sending you useless information. Not only are they urging you to be afraid … very afraid … they are completely ignoring the solutions on which you need to focus. There’s nothing like good old fashioned fear to freeze an entrepreneur in his or her tracks!
When Franklin Delano Roosevelt wisely said during America’s Depression that the only thing we have to fear is fear itself, he left something out. When you are in business, at any time in any nation, the other thing you have to fear is inaction. Not very poetic, I know, but it’s true.
Let others worry about the macro economic picture. You have a micro economy in which you are a vital and central player. Does the government or an economist know the ins and outs of your business better than you? Have you received any calls lately offering to bail you out with taxpayer money if your business slides to the brink of ruin? I’m guessing the answer is “no” to both questions!
You already know this in your gut: No bailout is coming your way … unless you do it yourself. No rescue plan is being prepared for your business … unless you prepare it yourself. And no solutions to your problems will be developed … unless you develop it yourself.
The more you focus on fear, the more afraid you will become. The more you focus on obstacles, the larger they will loom. And the more you focus on today’s global economic doom and gloom headlines, the less time, energy, and faith you’ll have to focus on building the prosperous, successful, well-networked business you really want.
A close friend of mine recently got hit by a car and spent weeks in hospitals and rehab centers. He says he learned a few things about fear during this time. When he tells himself, while perched on one leg to perform some ordinary task, “Wait … I might fall over,” sure enough, he falters.
But when he tells himself, “I have perfect balance,” something funny happens: He remains steadily upright longer than he thought possible.
Your business is not much different. If you tell yourself, “I can’t succeed in this economic downturn,” you probably won’t. But if you focus on specific solutions to the particular issues and challenges and opportunities of your business—your niche market, your current and prospective customers—you are likely to enjoy more success than all the naysayers put together would have predicted.
What the bigwigs of Wall Street, Pennsylvania Avenue, the London Financial District and the European Central Bank don’t seem to understand is this: Out here in the real world of entrepreneurial small business, “Givers Gain.”
Want to help the economy? Just turn to your BNI network, find someone who needs help, then give them all the referrals you can.
By sticking together and helping one another, we can face down the doom and gloom; we can build our businesses despite the headlines; and, we can show others around the world the economic power of persistent, skillful, and generous networking.
The Incisal Edge 