Most people are affraid to make mistakes. This is only logical. After all, no one likes it when they look bad. Because of this, they will often refrain from doing certain things where they feel the chance of success is small. Or rather: they don’t take action. So I wanted to share with you an amazing story that explains how you can increase your success, by not worrying too much about mistakes.
Taking action is more important than taking the right action
First of all, I have experienced that taking action is much more important than taking the right action. Mistakes can be mended. Missed opportunities however, rarely come again.
Let me give you a first hand example. In my first company we had a problem to solve. We didn’t have a good distribution network to sell our product through. When we came in contact with someone who could help us, we made a wrong decision. We took him onboard, while he couldn’t commit 100% to our company.
Do I look back at this as a mistake? I do. Do I regret making that mistake? No I don’t.
If we hadn’t taken action right then and there, we would have missed our window of opportunity. Now we missed our window of opportunity because we couldn’t get sales to work the way it should have. But at least I took action, made a mistake and learned from my mistake.
When I ended up in a similar situation a while ago, I knew exactly what to do. Had I waited back then and not taken in the sales person, the company would probably still have failed. But I wouldn’t have learned such a valuable lesson!
Results within 24 hours
The other week I got back in contact with a friend that I hadn’t spoken to in about ten years. She is currently unemployed and has been looking for a job for a long time. We got talking about my businesses and how I started my current company after I stopped with the previous one.
Since she’s an artist, the conversation shifted towards interesting things in the market for artists. We talked about independent artists and how they work, which business models there are which can be used, et cetera.
Apparently this inspired her, as I got a message from her the next day, telling me she had decided to take action. She had spoken to someone she found through LinkedIn, who started a clothing brand: Supa Dupa. He was very enthusiastic about her artwork, and she is currently starting to do some designs for them!
Talk about fast results just by taking action!
Tue, Dec 14, 2010
Becoming Successful, Self Improvement