In the early 1990s, I was a State Farm agent in St. Bernard Parish. (A
Louisiana Parish adjacent to the east side of Orleans Parish) I had not
been an agent more than four or five years. I vividly remember that day
whereby we had a visiting agent come in and speak to our business group.
On this particular day our speaker was named Jay Butler. Jay Butler had
recently retired. He was from the California area if my memory serves me
correctly. His passionate purpose was to travel across the country
discussing some interesting ideas and giving back to his State Farm
“family”. Jay knew that he was in his final months fighting pancreatic
cancer. And because he knew his time was limited he actually worked 7 days a week graciously meeting with clients on Saturdays, Sundays or anytime.
All of us at one time or another have been told, “you know if you go to a
seminar or a workshop and you pick up JUST ONE GOOD IDEA then it was worth all your time.” Well on this particular day, the ONE GOOD IDEA that has
stayed with me for so long and I believe it can help you today is simply
this.
Dislikes/Likes
Take out a Yellow Pad and draw a line down the center of the page. On the
left side of the page start listing all of the things that you do not like
to do in your current job. So, take some time, maybe pause from reading
forward, and really think of all the things that you do not like to do and
write them down.
Now after really working hard on listing the “DISLIKES”, now turn your focus
to the right side of the page. Your “LIKES”. Vertically write down all the
aspects of your job or your career that you really do enjoy & like to do.
Maybe even love to do.
Although this idea’s simple, it is profound. Some of you wont take this
exercise serious enough. Because you long for and search for “the answer”.
And for it to be “the answer”, it has to be more complicated.
WRONG!
Here’s the key points.
1. Every day, when you wake up, you need to spend your time focusing on only doing the things you like to do. Resolve and commit to hiring and creating a team of people that their strengths are the things that you do not like to do, and let them do it. Did you really catch that last statement?
2. You cannot amass major income without first mastering the ability to
delegate. But you need to delegate your DISLIKES to team members that are
strong in that area. Their LIKES must be your DISLIKES.
3. You will constantly need to scout and recruit new talent. You don’t do
that just once a year, because you never know when you will lose a team
member. Things happen, people get jobs in different locations, sickness,
health problems, death, accidents. Many perils in life can happen, so you
always must continue to look for people who would be an asset to your team.
But what you cannot do is continue to fool yourself and live under the
illusion that you’re going to ever be strong in the areas that you’re weak.
4. There’s a man by the name of Dan Sullivan. He’s the co-owner with his
wife in their company, “The Strategic Coach”. And one of Dan Sullivan’s
philosophies is simply this: If you spend your entire life focusing on your
weaknesses, what you’re going to have at the end of your life is a long list
of strong weaknesses, but they’re still going to be weaknesses. You are
hard-wired for success, but you have to determine what it is that you’re
good at, and only do that.
The Jay Butler story is an excellent story about giving back to us in his
last year of life, when he knew that he was terminally ill. And the ONE
GOOD IDEA that I’ll always remember is to focus on the things you do well
and delegate to others the things you do not do well that they actually are
strong in.
This message brought to you by Marvin LeBlanc
“Be significant today. And remember significance is almost always
intentional. Significance is almost never accidental.”
Have a great day.
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