Author: Bryan E Wilson

I am a student, steward, servant.

Where is your life going?

April 3, 2012

Where is your life going?

Galveston, TX – “If we do not change our direction, we are likely to end up where we are headed” – Anonymous  

Everything we do either brings us closer to our goals or further away.  Our life choices do have consequences, so be very careful and deliberate with your decisions.  

There is a popular website that anyone can use to help them move toward their goals and dreams.  www.simpleology.com is a great start when mapping your dreams, goals and accomplishments.  Give it a try for 30 days and see what happens.

– Bryan

Genius of Ben Franklin

March 14, 2012

Ben Franklin
Kennesaw, GA – I must be on a roll these days getting comments from folks about famous, historical figures who have impacted us in the 21st Century. Ben Franklin was a particular favorite of mine and there has been a resurgence lately of biographies and books about his common sense approach to business and politics.

Here is a letter that Ben wrote to a friend on how he made difficult decisions and how he rationally came to conclusions that he could understand and even explain to others:

To Joseph Priestley

Dear Sir,

London Sept. 19. 1772

In the Affair of so much Importance to you, wherein you ask my Advice, I cannot for want of sufficient Premises, advise you what to determine, but if you please I will tell you how. When these difficult Cases occur, they are difficult chiefly because while we have them under Consideration all the Reasons pro and con are not present to the Mind at the same time; but sometimes one Set present themselves, and at other times another, the first being out of Sight. Hence the various Purposes or Inclinations that alternately prevail, and the Uncertainty that perplexes us. To get over this, my Way is, to divide half a Sheet of Paper by a Line into two Columns, writing over the one Pro, and over the other Con. Then during three or four Days Consideration I put down under the different Heads short Hints of the different Motives that at different Times occur to me for or against the Measure. When I have thus got them all together in one View, I endeavour to estimate their respective Weights; and where I find two, one on each side, that seem equal, I strike them both out: If I find a Reason pro equal to some two Reasons con, I strike out the three. If I judge some two Reasons conequal to some three Reasons pro, I strike out the five; and thus proceeding I find at length where the Ballance lies; and if after a Day or two of farther Consideration nothing new that is of Importance occurs on either side, I come to a Determination accordingly. And tho’ the Weight of Reasons cannot be taken with the Precision of Algebraic Quantities, yet when each is thus considered separately and comparatively, and the whole lies before me, I think I can judge better, and am less likely to make a rash Step; and in fact I have found great Advantage from this kind of Equation, in what may be called Moral or Prudential Algebra. Wishing sincerely that you may determine for the best, I am ever, my dear Friend, Yours most affectionately, B Franklin

END

Winston Churchill and Peter Drucker on Leadership

March 14, 2012

Churchill
Drucker
Kennesaw, GA – Peter Drucker was an education icon who studied Business Leadership, taught strategy and economic modeling.  Some of his articles focused on Winston Churchill, who came to be one of the greatest leaders of the 20th Century.  According to Drucker, here is what Winston asked himself when formulating action plans and strategy:

A. What needs to be done?
B. What is right for the enterprise?
C. Develop action plans
D. Take responsibility for decisions
E. Over communicate
F. Focus on opportunity
G. Run productive meetings
H. Always use “We” rather than “I”
This list can be used by all of us as we accomplish our mission in business, life and even our relationships.
Bee-lieve,
Bryan

Relationships are the network

February 11, 2012

When I worked for Sun Microsystems, we had a tag line, “The network is the computer”. Well our relationships are our network that becomes our reputation and ultimately, our character.

I’m reading Michael Ellsberg’s book entitled, The Education of Millionaires. In it Ellsberg cites interviews with successful people who have learned how to leverage relationships to achieve success. Remember my favorite author, Richard Koch? He methodically and scientifically lays out how loose connections in our relationship network ties us to our accomplishments.

I urge you to read more Michael Ellsberg and apply what he advises.

PS. I haven’t forgotten my friend, Perry Robinson. Putting some things together for him now for his new business venture.

Good Habits that Successful People have in common

January 3, 2012

Kennesaw – I read a great book over the holidays by Thomas Corley, CPA who researched hundreds of clients and successful people to understand what traits they might have in common which could explain how they became so successful when many people never seem to get ahead.

Corley then took the research and created a little story that puts the habits into action.  Here are the ten habits that forms the attitudes that almost every successful person seem to have in common according to the research:

  1. Reinforce good personal habits and remove any bad ones that may be detrimental to your goals.
  2. Set realistic personal goals and create plans to meet and measure them.
  3. Devote time everyday to improve your mind such as reading good books and continuing to learn.
  4. Make health and wellness a lifetime priority.
  5. Daily nurture long term relationships that are important.
  6. Do everything in moderation.
  7. Do not procrastinate but have a “do it now” attitude.
  8. Engage in positive thinking and have a good attitude toward life.  Be an optimist.
  9. Save and invest at least 10% of net income.  Live in the now but save for the future.
  10. And make good life choices by applying self discipline to your thoughts and actions.

Take a moment to think of someone you know who is successful and see if these 10 habits apply to them.  Spend some quiet time and reflect on these habits and put a plan of action in place to achieve mastery of these traits that successful people have in common.

Remember the formula for Success:

S = T + O + P  (Success equals talent and opportunity and preparation)

Be merciful this time of year and you will be blessed

December 24, 2011

Christmas is a wonderful time of year for friends and family. I hope that you take a moment to reflect on the past year and think of the new year to come.

Let me leave you with a wonderful passage from Shakespeare’s Merchant of Venice, Act 4, Scene 1:

“The quality of mercy is not strained, It droppeth as the gentle rain from heaven upon the place beneath. It is twice blest: It blesseth him that gives and him that takes.

‘Tis mightiest in the mightiest: it becomes the throned monarch better than his crown; His scepter shows the force of temporal power, the attribute to awe and majesty, wherein doth sit the dread and fear of kings;

But mercy is above this sceptered sway, It is enthroned in the hearts of kings, It is an attribute to God himself; And earthly power doth then show likest God’s, when mercy seasons justice.”

Wm. Shakespeare (1554-1616)

Are Students Ready For The Future?

December 21, 2011
Kennesaw- Are we preparing our high school students for success in the 21st century?  When dreaming about the perfect job, not everyone wants to become an engineer and help design the next space shuttle for NASA.  A classical Liberal Arts and Sciences education is, of course, great to have but a paying career in a field where you can be passionately engaged is the ultimate goal for most Americans.  The latest edition of Wilson Quarterly (wilsonquarterly.com/article.cfm?AID=2012) dives into this area with some thought provoking observations.
The first glaring issue facing the American education system today is the horrendous dropout rate of high school students.  Should we be focusing on preparing our students for college when they are dropping out of high school at sixty percent (60%)?  My hope is that high school students should be able to learn about real world careers, and pursue technical internships such as IT operations, or business administration where skills can be applied immediately to the real world where most new jobs are found in the small business sector.  Entrepreneurs are the creative drive in the new economy. 
Creative educators have to prepare our students to succeed without having them go into student loan debt that will saddle them for years beyond graduation.  My hope would be to give students the ability to try jobs that they might like before they go to college as undecided and have to change majors three or four times before settling onto a career path where they will be starting out at an entry level position and barely making ends meet before  finding their passion and taking risks to peruse the American dream.
Mentorships are as necessary as scholarships.  If we could match up people with real world skills to mentor young people who would like to learn about the new skilled trades in today’s economy, they could then learn whether or not they would like to pursue technical careers or even liberal arts careers BEFORE they spend thousands of dollars drifting along taking core classes in colleges.  I hope that you take the time to read the article that I referenced above in the Wilson Quarterly and drop me a note or email.  I would love to hear your thoughts and ideas on how we can change the world together.

5 Factors for Success in Sales

August 23, 2011

I recently attended a day long sales seminar by John Asher (www.AsherStrategies.com).  It was a terrific overview of sales and typecasting the high performing sales professional.

The 5 Factors for Success in Sales are:

1.  Product Knowledge – They know their business, their client’s business and their competitors’ business extremely well

2. Aptitude – They are born with a natural talent for sales

3. Skills – They know and use the proven top ten selling skills

4. Motivation – They are self-motivated, are in the right type of position to continually sell

5. Sales Process – They are already working in companies that have best-practice branding, marketing, sales and customer relationship processes to support them.

AND……they have the values and discipline to follow through

– Dr. Larry Craft

Utilipath growth

November 10, 2010

Utilipath is a growing company headquartered in Mooresville, NC.  I’ve been very impressed with the leadership of this company and the ambitious goals that it has set for itself for the next decade.  Diversifying beyond the construction industry into products and services which augment its core offerings will be huge in the coming business cycles as we come out of this sluggish economy.