Power. Nap. Follow Me While Awake; However.

Power. Nap. Follow me while awake; however.

15 LIFE & BUSINESS LESSONS FROM CHINA'S RICHEST MAN - JACK MA

He is the recently named China’s richest man - the man who took Alibaba Group, China’s largest e-commerce business, to the biggest IPO in US history. His name is Jack Ma.

There is something interesting about successful Chinese entrepreneurs and leaders. I always find them to be much deeper and more humble than their American counterparts. After reading several articles about Jack Ma, I particularly admire him for starting out as an English teacher earlier in his life with no technical background, but great foresight, ambition, and determination.

Here are the 15 Life and Business Lessons from Jack Ma (translated from Chinese to English).

Your attitude is more important than your capabilities. Similarly, your decision is more important than your capabilities.

You cannot unify everyone’s thoughts, but you can unify everyone through a common goal. Let your colleagues and employees work for a common goal.

A leader should never compare his technical skills with his employee’s. Your employee should have superior technical skills than you. However, a good leader should have more foresight, higher tenacity, and higher endurance for failure than his employees.

Giving up is the greatest failure.

Only fools use their mouth to speak. A smart man uses his brain. A wise man uses his heart.

The world will not remember what you say, but it will certainly not forget what you have done. Don’t make complaining or whining a habit.

Adopt and change before any major trends or changes.

Your attitude determines your altitude.

A great opportunity is often hard to be explained clearly. Things that can be explained clearly are often not the best opportunities.

“Free” is the most expensive word.

When starting a business, you must have the ability to see, the ability to understand what is going on, and the ability to keep up with the pace.

When you’re small, focus and use your brain instead of your physical strength.

If you have a different mindset, you will have a different outcome: if you make different choices from your peers, your life will then be different from your peers.

The most unreliable thing in this world is human relationships.

Starting your company means you will lose your stable income. But it also means your income will no longer be limited, you will use your time more effectively, and you will no longer need to beg for favours from people anymore.

< This article was originally published in Chinese and was translated into English. Please share if you find this helpful.>

HOW TO STAY MOTIVATED AS AN ENTREPRENEUR

I believe motivation is highly subjective and that each person has a unique motivational catalyst. So this post isn’t actually written to motivate you (LOL). What this post will do, however, is give you 3 distinct suggestions on how you can generally stay motivated by yourself. These are based on observations made in my brief time working with entrepreneurs. Of course, like with anything, this is not a closed list.

1. Have Passion For What You Do:

You’ve heard this plenty of times, I know, it’s annoying to me too. But we wouldn’t hear it so often if it wasn’t so important.

Steve Jobs, when addressing a crowd at his alma mater, famously said “You’ve got to find what you love. And that is as true for your work as it is for your lovers.”

Do what you love, and not in an airy fairy, kumbaya kind of way. If you derive actual pleasure from what you do, you are likely to be more motivated than the average person. It follows that people who do what they love will approach their work with a guaranteed level of enthusiasm. I don’t think this needs a great deal of explanation.

2. Find A Suitable Co-Founder:

Some of the best companies in the world were started by co-founders (e.g. Apple, Microsoft, Procter & Gamble, etc.). Often, a start-up is launched and maintained through a combination of expertise, which, for complex projects, is hardly ever held by a single person. Sometimes it takes 2 or 3 people to start a project. So the importance of compatible co-founders cannot be stressed enough.

Like with every endeavour, there will be challenges that dampen the passion. The honeymoon period WILL end, and co-founders need to understand their effect on each other because this can serve as the necessary spark to push each other forward. During a slump in motivation, if you don’t feel more motivated after speaking with your co-founder, he or she may not be the right person for you to work with.

Some questions you should ask about your co-founder - When you are not feeling your best will they be able to take control? Do they create a mood which is conducive to productivity? How do you feel after talking to them about a hurdle you are facing? Do they actually have the capacity to perform the tasks that are needed to drive the project forward?

To achieve the best results, be brutally honest with yourself when answering these questions. Based on your answers, you may need to make some changes.

I left the first business I started at University because I could no longer work with my co-founder. The person whom I had originally chosen as my co-founder because of his technical knowledge of the (media) industry became the reason for my loss of enthusiasm. I am not sure what the root cause was, but my co-founder started developing a habit of killing the business relationships I had worked hard to build (and other bad habits, which are best left unmentioned). In turn, our reputation as a serious business began to take a knock. But this wasn’t yet the issue. The real issue was his inability to realise his problem, and then act in accordance with such realisation.

Needless to say, I was brutally honest with myself - I just did not believe that he had the capacity to perform necessary tasks anymore, so I cut all professional ties with him.

3. Figure Out Your Motivational Currency

I define motivational currency as: a positive response which fuels the desire to be productive.

For example, I run a consulting business. Now, as much as I love what I do, there are mornings which feel completely hopeless (because - life) and my reason for continuing has escaped me. However, my mood suddenly changes when I get up from my bed, check my mail, and find an email from an entrepreneur requesting my services. After viewing this email, I feel a new energy, a sense of purpose, which prompts me to keep going. I am motivated, and the email is my motivational currency.

If you are an outdoor event organiser whose event receives good reviews on social media and in the local papers, such reviews are your motivational currency because they prompt you to repeat the amount of effort put into your work, in pursuit of the same or an even better response from your market.

This type of “currency” is different for different businesses, and is usually controlled by external factors. We cannot determine when motivational currency will be forthcoming, but the more work we put in, the more motivational currency we are likely to receive. (i.e. the more good work I do for my existing clients, the more likely I am to wake up to an email requesting my services.)

Conclusion:

Staying motivated is, in my opinion, the most important thing for any entrepreneur. You can do anything you set your mind to with the right amount of motivation. Conversely, you can do very little without it. This is why it is crucial for entrepreneurs to find what motivates them, and have ready access to it whenever it’s needed.

So print this. Put it on your wall, and highlight the points which speak to you the most. Every time you feel demotivated, give it a quick read, and remind yourself of the ways in which you can regain your motivation.

As always, thanks for reading. I promise to make it a shorter read next time.

1K notes View Post

birdnhand20

7 years ago

Follow me at Smart $ Guides.