Take action to continue on the path of business success

My friend, John C. Maxwell, mentioned to me the other day, “when an opportunity presents itself, it is too late to prepare.” John is a master at saying so much with few words. You must invest the time, the effort, the money, and constantly grow your knowledge base to be ready.

There are so many people who attend workshops or study a courses, and weeks later the binders, the materials, the notes and the contacts are virtually forgotten. The binders are on the shelf next to last year’s binder. The materials are labeled and then boxed or filed. The notes are left on a hotel room table or on the flight home. The contacts met are not nourished into new relationships.

One of the reasons you work on your personal growth and professional growth through courses, seminars, workshops, or whatever works for you, is to stretch your mind. If you approach this process by being fully present and drop the daily distractions to focus fully and completely on the process, you will become invigorated. You will change.

One of the biggest problems with this process is what happens after you return to your daily routine of life and your work. This ‘new’ you that you found at your seminar or workshop begins to fade away. So how do you keep the ‘new’ you and the ‘new’ materials from just going up on the shelf next to last year’s ‘new’ materials?

The answer is accountability. One way to create accountability is to share with others what you are learning and how this will change how you act, think, interact with others, conduct your work life balance, market your business, or whatever it is you are learning. Speak with your employees. Speak with your family. Speak with your trusted advisors. Share with each of them what your intended specific action items are and when you intend to implement these action items. There is nothing like this type of sharing to keep you accountable to your word and intentions. It will become easier to do the action item than to have to explain to everyone why you did not complete the action item.

Human tendency is to follow the path of least resistance. You will be creating your perfect path toward completing your action items. The added component is you will be increasing the growth in every person you speak with and come into contact with. They will ask you questions. They know you. They will hear the excitement in your voice; the animation in your presence. You will be increasing the growth component from your process.

The process is the same if you are the CEO or Senior Executive at a large corporation or a professional in your own private practice. No one wants to spend the time and the effort to attend a great workshop, return fully invigorated, ready to place change and action items into practice, to only turn around three months later and realize all was forgotten.

You must, with intention, set into action a number of steps to continue along the path of success and to flourish in your growth. Consider the quote from John C. Maxwell and take his tip to heart. Determine how to apply this action to your business.