HOW TO

GET TOTHE TOP

BY DAN SULLIVAN

AND STAYTHERE10STRATEGIES FOR DEVELOPING A

MULTIPLIER MINDSET

How To Get To The Top And Stay There: 10 Strategies For Developing A Multiplier Mindset

Sullivan, Dan (1944- )

Entrepreneurship, coaching, business, self-development

TM & © 2010. The Strategic Coach Inc. All rights reserved.

No part of this work may be reproduced in any form, or by any means whatsoever, without written per-mission from The Strategic Coach Inc., except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articlesand reviews.

Published in Toronto, Canada. July 2010. The Strategic Coach Inc., 33 Fraser Avenue, Suite 201, Toronto,Ontario, M6K 3J9.

This publication is meant to strengthen your common sense, not to substitute for it. It is also not a substi-tute for the advice of your doctor, lawyer, accountant, or any of your advisors, personal or professional.

Introduction Why A Multiplier Mindset?

Chapter 1 Focus On Vision And Multiply Progress

Chapter 2 Focus On Free Time And Multiply Productivity

Chapter 3 Focus On Delegation And Multiply Income

Chapter 4 Focus On Relationships And Multiply Opportunity

Chapter 5 Focus On Strengths And Delegate Weaknesses

Chapter 6 Focus On Habits And Forget About Discipline

Chapter 7 Focus On Cleanups And Multiply Energy

Chapter 8 Focus On Value And Deepen Relationships

Chapter 9 Focus On Results And Transform Obstacles

Chapter 10 Focus On Capabilities And Multiply Confidence

Conclusion What’s Next?

About The Author

About The Strategic Coach Program

Contact Strategic Coach

CONTENTS

Asa successful entrepreneur, youare exceptional. That is, you areliterally an exception because of

the fact that you work for yourself andhave achieved a level of personal suc-cess the majority of people working injobs will never achieve. You’ve provenyou have the ability to transform yourideas into reality — inventing oradapting the structures you need,forging new relationships, and creatingvalue for an audience that shows itsappreciation by writing checks.

Like most entrepreneurs, however, twoother things are probably also true aboutyou: You know you could go further, andyou know that to get there, some thingswould have to change.

But what? How do you transcend theobstacles — the complexities and pres-sures, the bureaucracy and limitations —that have accumulated as your businesshas grown? How do you differentiateyourself from the competition and posi-tion yourself to take advantage ofchanges in your industry, the market-place, and the world?

Ninety-five percent of the businessowners in any given industry will bestuck achieving an average kind ofresult. No amount of working longer orharder will take them above it, andthere’s no wisdom within their industryabout how to get above this level,because most of the people in it haven’tdone it themselves. The industry wasdesigned specifically to safely repro-duce the averages.

But there’s an upper echelon — a topone percent — of entrepreneurs inevery industry who are experiencing

something very different. They havewhat I call a “Multiplier Mindset,” andthis enables them to bring in a lot moremoney, act with more freedom and cre-ativity, and enjoy their experience ofbeing an entrepreneur a lot more.

True to its name, this mindset is aboutmultiplying your results in every areawhere you’d care to do so. I call it theMultiplier Mindset™ because it’s a wayof thinking that naturally increasesresults. When you think in terms of mul-tipliers, you’re always finding ways to getbigger and bigger results from the sameor less effort. It’s about both productivityand leverage, and it happens both con-sciously and unconsciously.

Strategic Coach® is designed to step inwhere the education system andindustry training stop short, to showentrepreneurs how to transcend theircurrent limitations, build enormous suc-cess for themselves, and positivelyshape the future of our society throughthe value they create and contribute.

Twenty years of proofThe entrepreneurs in the StrategicCoach® Program represent the best ofover 60 industries. They are the top per-formers and producers, and the mostinnovative leaders, who bring new busi-ness models and approaches to every-thing from financial services to dentistryto manufacturing to health care, educa-tion, marketing, and virtually any otherindustry you can name. And, since manyhave been in the Program for ten yearsor more (some for as long as 20!), we canreport that not only do they get to thetop, they stay there. The reason they’reable to do this is the Multiplier Mindsetthey’ve cultivated within the Program.

Why A Multiplier Mindset?

What follows are ten multiplier strate-gies that are at the heart of the StrategicCoach Program. Any entrepreneur whoconcentrates on doing these ten thingswill develop a Multiplier Mindset,which they will use to multiply what-ever results matter most to them. Thismight mean growing their business tentimes or more in ten years, scaling theworld’s highest peaks, being a greatparent while also running a thrivingbusiness, or making a unique mark intheir industry or community.

Each entrepreneur is different in theirgoals but very similar in some funda-mental ways in terms of what it takes toget them there. It’s this similarity thatwe’ve learned to focus on at StrategicCoach. Over the past 30 years, more than13,000 entrepreneurs have proven theeffectiveness of these principles in theirbusinesses and their lives. The creativity,wisdom, and heart with which they’veapplied them have been an inspirationto me and to the Strategic Coach team. Ihope you find them useful too.

- Dan Sullivan

In order to multiply your results in allareas of life, it's critical that you havea compelling and exciting vision of

your future. If your future vision isn’tsignificantly better than what your lifelooks like now, why change anything?

Entrepreneurs with a clear, well-articu-lated picture of the future have a distinctadvantage. Vision, especially a vision ofsomething bigger than yourself, has away of drawing the most useful talentand resources to you and igniting thepassion of like-minded individuals whocan contribute to making it a reality.

As an entrepreneur, your ability to takeadvantage of the endless multipliersavailable through technology, systems,structures, and relationships isdependent on having a concept of your-self and your future that’s bigger thanwhere you are right now. Progressdepends on your ability to see a biggerfuture in any situation. When you knowwhere you’re going, you instinctively

start looking for — and finding — themultipliers that will get you there.

The most direct and powerful way we’vefound to evoke a compelling vision of thefuture is to ask a very specific question:

"If we were meeting here three yearsfrom today, looking back over those threeyears, what has to have happened, bothpersonally and professionally, for you tofeel happy with your progress?"

Why three years? It's the year after theyear after next. One year can feel a bittoo short to make major improve-ments, and five years can seem too faraway and unpredictable. Three yearsfeels about right: You can imagine lifebeing a lot better without it being acomplete mystery.

Unless it's something you revisit regu-larly, your vision is going to get lost inthe shuffle. It just happens. There are somany day-to-day concerns demanding

Focus On Vision AndMultiply Progress

Strategy One:

Oneof the major issues foralmost all entrepreneurs isincreasing their revenue, cash

flow, and personal income. We’re goingto say something here that may beshocking, even scary, to you. Are youready? The secret to dramaticallyincreasing your productivity and yourincome lies in taking more free timeaway from your business.

It may seem counterintuitive or evencrazy to think of free time— time awayfrom all business-related thinking andactivity — as essential to productivity.However, over 20 years of experiencewith entrepreneurs from over 60 indus-tries has shown us that entrepreneursare at their most creative and productivewhen they’ve had real time off. Theymake better decisions, see opportunitiesmore clearly, and make more money.

How does this happen? Taking free timeallows you to recharge your mental bat-teries and approach problems andopportunities with renewed ingenuityon your return. Conversely, when you’retired, everyone else seems stupid, andeven simple tasks take longer.

Imagine it this way: If you looked at yourwhole year, 365 days, then took anumber of days for working completelyoff the board, you’d have to be a lotmore focused and deliberate in order toaccomplish your goals in the remainingtime. You’d find more strategic and effi-cient ways to get your work done. You‘dsay no to time-wasters and to activitiesand people who don‘t deserve your bestattention. Too often, we live out theadage, “Work expands to fill the timeallotted.” And when any day can be aworkday, it’s easy to find yourselfworking all the time.

In today‘s knowledge economy, doingthings the same way over and over againdoesn’t give you a competitive edge. Youget that edge from combining ideas andtechnologies in new ways and coming upwith original solutions that clients andcustomers are willing to pay for. If you‘retired, how easy is it to come up with acreative, innovative approach? Fatigue,burnout, and a lack of energy decreasecommunication, originality, and risk-taking. If you really want to grow yourbusiness, you actually need to get awayfrom it. As scary as taking time off may

Focus On Free Time AndMultiply Productivity

Strategy Two:

your immediate attention that stayingconnected with your vision can be areal challenge.

Regular, focused attention on, and con-versation about, your vision has a dra-matic effect on your progress. Withoutthis focus, you can still grow, just moreslowly. With it, you'll experienceexciting improvements in your client

base, your health, your personal rela-tionships, the quality of your supportteam, and your satisfaction with yourwork and your life. That’s why, everyquarter, participants in the StrategicCoach Program articulate, clarify, anddiscuss what's most important to themwith other highly motivated, growth-oriented entrepreneurs.

be, it shifts your thinking, your motiva-tion, and your capabilities in importantways that help you accomplish more inless time and raise your whole companyto a new level of productivity.

And while we’re on that subject, let’stalk more about how this affects therest of your company. One of our say-ings at Coach is, “You never know howgood your team is until you leave.“ Ifyou‘re always there as the go-to personand decision-maker, your team willnever exercise their decision-makingmuscles, and never gain the confi-dence from having true responsibilityand accountability.

When you take time away from yourbusiness, you give your team membersan opportunity to gain confidence andcapability in your absence. After all,your greatest innovations as an entre-preneur were probably a result oflearning from mistakes! When you goaway, and your team finds ways tohandle whatever situation arises, theyfeel a tremendous sense of ownership

over their growth and become person-ally invested in the contribution theymake to your organization. You mightbe surprised at how often we hearentrepreneurs who’ve figured this outsay, with a big grin on their faces, “Myteam is happy when I’m gone — theyget more done!” It’s a tremendously lib-erating feeling to know that your teamhas the day-to-day running of the busi-ness under control and that you canfocus on strategizing for growth, cre-ating new solutions to bring in morerevenue, or doing whatever you lovemost that creates the best results inyour business.

Though it may seem like a radical con-cept, the time you take off is alwaysmore than made up for in the produc-tivity gains that result. We’ve seen this invirtually every industry and with everysize of entrepreneurial business. One ofthe first things we do with every entre-preneur in our Program is help themplan and take more time off, even if it’s aleap of faith at first.

Frank Sinatra didn’t move pianos.Most top performers spend only arelatively small percentage of their

time achieving the results they’re knownfor. The very best spend the rest of theirtime doing things to prepare them to bethe best when they’re“on stage.”Delega-tion of all the other“stuff” that isn’t con-tributing to your doing what you do bestgoes hand in hand with being able to takemore time off and multiply your results in

all the most important areas you’ve iden-tified in your life and business.

One of the best ways to simplify your lifeis to restrict the number of things youdo. If you don’t, here’s what you’ll prob-ably end up doing: You’ll compile a listof 15 things you have to do today. You’llget ten of them done, which might seemlike it should be a good day, but youwon‘t feel any sense of accomplishment

Focus On Delegation AndMultiply Income

Strategy Three:

because you missed five.

Guess what? If you don’t change yourapproach, tomorrow’s going to be thesame. Even if you‘re enormously suc-cessful by other people’s standards, youwon‘t feel it on the inside. And thatundermines your energy, your confi-dence, and your ambition. How aboutfocusing instead on accomplishing justthree crucial results? If you took off 155Free Days™— 24-hour periods freefrom all work-related problem-solving,communication, and action — youwould have 210 days left on your cal-endar for working. Multiply that bythree important results each day, andyou would be aiming to achieve 630 cru-cial results in a year. That would be apretty good year, wouldn’t it?

Try this: Start your day with the intentionof getting three important things donethat day. If a fourth gets added, you put iton your list for tomorrow. If you finish allthree by 1 p.m., you’re finished for theday. You don’t change the rules of thegame while it’s under way — which is

what many of us are guilty of doing.When you restrict yourself to just threekey priorities, your mind focuses itself: “IfI’m just doing three important things,what deserves to be one of them?”And ifyou’re not going to do all the other thingsthat don’t make your top three list, whois? Somebody else is! This is how youdetermine which activities to delegate.

Building the skill of delegation allowsyou to have a clear mind and be fullypresent in your activities. Delegationalso helps you grow, because your stan-dard of what qualifies for your “impor-tant” list keeps going up. Your measureof an important activity now is muchhigher than it was ten years ago — andyour current income will demonstratethe effect that has had on your growth.

If you want your company to grow tentimes over the next ten years, you haveto focus on doing three things and dele-gating the rest. As you grow, your threethings will be of a different nature, a dif-ferent quality. But it will always be three.

Oneof the biggest limitations onthe size of your future is gettinglocked into a certain type of rela-

tionship— a particular quality of clientbase and centers of influence that don’tgrow or get any better. Youmay have biggoals, but if you’re pursuing themwhilemaintaining the same kind of relation-ships, they’re not going to happen.

Some people take a scattershotapproach, figuring that if they simplyhave more relationships, they’ll have

more income. What generally happens,though, is that they find themselvesoverwhelmed trying to maintain allthese relationships and give them equalservice. As you grow your business,there comes a point where you’re nolonger obliged to work with everyonewho walks through your door. Some ofthose relationships are just too costly —either financially or emotionally.

This is the Pareto principle at work:Twenty percent of your clients generate

Focus On Relationships AndMultiply Opportunity

Strategy Four:

80 percent of your income, while 80 per-cent generate only 20 percent of yourincome. Ironically, those 80 percent whoprovide so little also dominate 80 per-cent of your time.

A small core of your client base repre-sents the kind of people you want towork with in the future as you grow.One approach that’s worked well forentrepreneurs in the Strategic CoachProgram is zeroing in on that core —the top 20 of their very best relation-ships, those current clients or prospectswho truly appreciate what they do andare willing to reward them for it. Theseare the people who won’t just use youas a source of free information or as aprovider of commodities; they’ll valueyou for your wisdom, and see you as apartner in making some important partof their life better or easier.

So once you’ve identified your top 20, youcan systematically find ways to delegate ordownload all the other relationships,freeing yourself up to devote focusedtime and attention where it will be bestrewarded.Whatever incomemight be lostinitially will be soon replacedmany timesover by the remaining, more valuable,more profitable clients.

Many entrepreneurs are just one relation-ship or 20 away from an incredibly greatopportunity, but they have to be willing to

focus their attention onmaximizing theirbest relationships to get there. These arethe clients, customers, prospects, connec-tions, suppliers, centers of influence, andstrategic partners who will respect yourefforts, reward you for them, and referyou to other people like them.

Another very important set of relation-ships we encourage entrepreneurs toinvest in are the ones they have withtheir spouse and family. At the outset,these are the most important — theones we actually stand up in public andcommit to. Yet with all the demands ofrunning a business, it’s all too easy to letthese slip into the background.

Focusing and restricting your time andattention with clients has the strategic by-product of giving youmore time to spendon the personal relationships that bringsome of life’s greatest rewards. Manypeople who own and run a businessthink they have to choose among theirrelationships, and in a sense they’re right:You have to choose to have good qualityrelationships— in every aspect of life.

The old saying goes,“Time equals money,”but this is not true. Time has never writtenyou a single check. Rather, relationshipsequal money. All the checks you’vereceived and all the new opportunitiesyou’ve been offered have been becauseof the relationships you’ve developed.

Focus On Strengths AndDelegate Weaknesses

Strategy Five:

Most of us were taught inschool to work on our weak-nesses. The problem is that,

after years of doing this, what youend up with is a lot of really strongweaknesses!

There‘s so much more to be gained byfocusing on your strengths, the activi-ties in life that you’re just great at.When you‘re working at them, you haveconfidence, momentum, energy, capa-bility, expertise, and enthusiasm. When

you‘re spending time on activities youaren‘t good at, it drains your energy andsaps your creativity, and you have little toshow for all your time and effort in theway of results.

Focusing on your strengths is one of thegreatest multipliers at your disposal. Yourstrengths are built-in. The challenge is inrecognizing these assets, because to youthey seem so natural: “Can’t everyone dothis?” In fact, no, they can’t. So there arehuge returns to be gained by identifyingyour natural talents and focusing yourtime on doing just those things, leavingthe rest to other people and systems.

When you surround yourself with thepeople and technologies that excel at allthe things you don‘t, you have a muchmore productive system— one that hasfar fewer bottlenecks, roadblocks, ineffi-ciencies, and frustrations.

So what stops us from just doing whatwe‘re good at and putting that supportin place? Again, it often goes back toour early training and the belief thateveryone has to do things they don‘tlike doing. The problem with that beliefis that we don‘t ask, “Why?” or “Whoelse could do this better?” or “How elsecould this get done?” It keeps us fromgetting resourceful, and keeps us fromgrowing and expanding our gifts. Theother thing that stops people is a fear ofdelegating — or of investing in peopleto whom to delegate.

The solution to both of these blocks isdeveloping a new set of habits that willallow you to spend more time in yourareas of greatest ability. Recognize,assess, and focus on your strengths.Make good decisions that will put youinto a position to fully use and leveragethem. Pick the opportunities, relation-ships, and customers that make the bestuse of your strengths and talents, thendelegate all the other parts of yourprocess to people who have greaterstrengths in those areas.

For instance, if sales is where you excel,you’ll benefit from delegating the admin-istration and maintenance of existingbusiness and focusing on what brings innewmoney. If deal-making is your forté,don’t get bogged down in the implemen-tation of what you’re selling; rather, builda team who can follow through on thosedetails while you go out and secure morenew business. Likewise, if innovation isyour biggest contribution to the growthof your company, the expense of dele-gating day-to-day operations to teammembers is far outweighed by theopportunities you can cook up when youhave the time to do that creative work.

One of the things entrepreneurs workon in the Strategic Coach Program isidentifying their strengths and puttingstrategies into place to allow them tospend more time working on what theydo best, while delegating the rest to teammembers who have strengths in otherareas. Both entrepreneurs and teammembers benefit from this partnership,which is something you might not recog-nize at first. Every time you hold on tosomething that’s not a strength for youbut is for someone else, you’re actuallydepriving that person of an opportunityto do something they love and to excel atit. Believe it or not, there’s someone outthere who loves to do everything youhate doing. It may be hard to think thatsomeone could love filing or paperworkor cleaning up your messes and organ-izing you, but for a talented administra-tive assistant who’s in the right job, that’sjust what lights them up.

Focusing on your strengths and dele-gating weaknesses is an ongoingprocess, because as you do it, you keepseeing new areas where you want tofocus even more and new things thatyou want to let go of. The trick is to makeit a habit and train your team to helpyou, so you’re always making sure thatyou stay focused on the activities thathave the greatest multiplying effect onyour results!

Have you ever thought, “I wish Iwas more disciplined”? Here’sgood news: Discipline is not the

problem. You are totally, completely, 100percent disciplined … to your existingset of habits.

Successful people have successfulhabits. Unsuccessful people haveunsuccessful habits. The biggest factorin achieving great results is the qualityof your habits. Your current habits pro-duce the kind of results you enjoy now.If you want to see a different kind ofresults in your life, you don’t need morediscipline; you just need differenthabits. So being aware of your habits,and understanding how to changethem, is an absolutely vital part of beingable to multiply your results.

In the Strategic Coach Program, we helpentrepreneurs become conscious oftheir habits — because most of us havemany habits we never think about —and decide if those habits are sup-porting the future they want or not. Ifthey’re not, there’s a proven process forhelping to change them: If you take anypart of your behavior and modify it —do something different — for 21 days,you will establish a new habit. That’s allit takes: 21 days. After doing somethingnew for three weeks, it will begin to feelcompletely natural to you. Peopleinvolved in language training, nutrition,and fitness rely on this principle.

The challenge is that it works best whenyou change only one habit at a time. A lotof people get into trouble here, jumpingin with both feet and trying to changedozens of interrelated habits at once. Ifyou focus on changing just one habit,you’ll find that other habits will change

simultaneously. For instance, let’s sup-pose you have a problem with lateness.Well, for the next three weeks, show upten minutes early for every meeting. Bewaiting! To do this, you may find that youneed to develop a better sense of how towatch the time or a system to havesomeone prompt you when it’s time foryour next appointment. At the end ofthese three weeks, you’ll not only enjoy adifference in your performance, you’llalso have an increased sense of confi-dence and peace of mind.

If you changed just one habit everythree weeks for one year, you could fun-damentally alter 17 key aspects of yourlife. Given how much one small newhabit — like being prompt — can changeyour daily experience, just imagine theripple effect 17 changes could have.

Success in life is really a function ofhaving goal-directed habits. The key tomultiplying your results in all areas is tobe constantly cultivating new habits thatsupport these bigger results. These mayinclude the habit of saying no to thingsyou shouldn’t be doing, or taking time offregularly so you can be at your most cre-ative and energetic. Maybe it’s trustingyour teammembers to handle keyaspects of your business so you can focuson growth or strategy, or not blowing upat themwhen they make mistakes.

The truth is, there are thousands of habitsthat make up aMultiplier Mindset. By cul-tivating increasingly supportive habits,quarter after quarter, year after year, yougradually transform your way of thinkingand acting into one where muchmore ispossible and bigger things happen. Disci-pline has nothing to do with it. It all hap-pens one new habit at a time.

Focus On Habits And ForgetAbout Discipline

Strategy Six:

In the process of creating your cur-rent degree of success — by makingchanges and taking advantage of

opportunities — you’ve probably alsocreated a few messes.

Here‘s our definition of a mess: An obli-gation to something or someone you nolonger have any commitment to. Youcan picture it as a formula:

M = O - CMess equals Obligationminus Commitment

A mess is an unresolved issue in yourmind, and usually, if you have one mess,you have more than one. Messes couldbe something big or just a lot of smallthings. For instance, maybe you started aproject but didn’t follow through on itbecause you simply didn’t have any“juice” for it anymore. So you decided— consciously or unconsciously — thatyou didn’t want to do it, but you haven’tsettled the matter, so it became a mess.

Eventually, your brain gets bogged downwith all this “stuff.” To free up the mentalspace your messes are taking up, you’vegot to go back and clean that project up,throw away the files, and get rid of it.Messes come in a lot of forms: legalissues, mishandled relationships, aban-doned or waylaid projects, problemsyou’re avoiding because you don’t wantthe hassle of dealing with them, healthissues that result from not taking care ofyourself, and the list goes on.

Something that contributes to messesfor a lot of entrepreneurs is having a

delegation system that flows in thewrong direction: The staff go home onevenings and weekends, and since theentrepreneur is there all the time, any-thing that wasn’t finished gets takencare of by them— the “night worker,”the “weekender.”

One unconventional structure for pre-venting messes from happening in thefirst place is something we call The No-Office Solution™: By getting rid of youroffice, you eliminate the place wheremany of these things would pile up. Thesolution is to work off-site or in a board-room. Your assistant gives you yourwork at the beginning of the day, thenyou give it all back to them at the end. Ifsomething comes up while you’reworking, the team takes care of it.

Few entrepreneurs make money frombeing in their personal office. In fact, formany, it can become a place to hidefrom opportunities! They can be end-lessly busy in there, dealing with thepiles of “stuff,” but they’re actually attheir lowest level of productivity. Theirbest results happen when they’re upand about, creating opportunity withsomeone else or empowering them insome way.

How much more productive could yoube if you didn’t have any messesweighing on your mind? Think aboutwhat the quality of your days would belike if you were totally committed todoing everything on your plate — if, infact, you looked forward to handlingeverything you needed to do. This is thebenefit of focusing on cleanups. Though

Focus On Cleanups AndMultiply Energy

Strategy Seven:

it may take an infusion of energy at thebeginning to tackle accumulated stuffand messes, once you clean them upand develop the awareness and strate-gies to keep new ones from taking theirplace, the influx of energy and freedom

you experience will more than cover theupfront cost. This is an investment inyour future growth and freedom thatpays off in countless ways from themoment you take action and do it.

This strategy is a direct response tothe danger of commoditization,which is present in every industry

to a greater or lesser degree. In today’snetworked, electronically connectedworld, there has never been more choiceor more comparison shopping. Virtuallyall products and services are eitheralready commodities with little or no dif-ferentiation in the eyes of consumers, orin the process of being commoditized. Iprobably don’t need to tell you thatbeing an entrepreneur who is squeezedby commoditization isn’t much fun. Mar-gins go down, competition goes up, andyou find yourself working a lot harder forless, often focusing more on marketingat the expense of providing your clientswith real value.

It is possible to escape from this trap andto find and stay in an area of the market-place where there is no significant com-petition. The key is to understand whatreally creates value and to keep evolvingyour business to do that rather than justselling products and services.

The three things every individual is mostconcerned about can be summed up as“D.O.S.”where D stands for dangers —the possibility of losing something; Ostands for opportunities — just the

opposite, the possibility of gainingsomething; and S stands for strengths —the capabilities and resources they have,which they may or may not be takingadvantage of.

Value creation in the 21st century meansproviding direction, confidence, andcapability where people are feeling iso-lated, confused, and frustrated. We liketo say that the problem is never theproblem; the problem is that peopledon't even know how to think about theproblem. They feel isolated in their con-fusion and frustrated by their inability tomake progress, and this erodes theirconfidence.

When prospects come to you, they'renot looking at your product or service.They couldn't care less about those. Infact, most people would happily spendtheir entire lives without learning aboutthem, except that they’ve reached a pointwhere they suspect that, somehow, youare the solution to their D.O.S.® issues insome area of life.

Most businesspeople are entirelyfocused on selling their product orservice, and because of this, they missthe fact that potential or existing clientsand customers are usually more than

Focus On Value And DeepenRelationships

Strategy Eight:

willing to tell you what their D.O.S. is —if only you’d ask! And if you ask themabout their D.O.S. and they’re not willingto tell you, that also provides you withextremely valuable information: Forwhatever reason, they’re not willing tohave a relationship with you.

If they are willing to tell you about theirdangers, opportunities, and strengths,you have the chance to become one ofthe most valuable people in their life.Just by asking about the things that keepthem up at night and the things they getexcited about, you bring them clarity:Most people are too busy reacting totheir issues to be reflective about them.But this isn’t just an interesting conversa-tion (though it often proves to be thebest discussion people have ever hadwith their clients); together, you aremining the raw material that will trans-

form their biggest issues and make itpossible for them to achieve the futurethey want.

All the best opportunities to expandyour business and multiply your resultsare connected to your clientele’s D.O.S.issues. Ask, listen, and learn to act onwhat you hear, and their response willhelp you grow in ways you might nothave imagined — and that your competi-tion won’t be able to understand.

The most genuinely interesting peoplein the world are those who are mostinterested in the growth and success ofothers. By being interested in making adifference for others, by being adependable source of clarity, solutions,and confidence, you will naturally attractgreat people to you and enjoy deep andlasting relationships with them.

When visualizing a goal, it’s nat-ural for your mind to immedi-ately bring up all the obstacles

that stand between you and the achieve-ment of your vision. This, in and of itself,is not a problem. The problem ariseswhen people let these obstaclesbecome a source of fear, frustration, oroverwhelm, to the point that they putthe goal aside, telling themselves they“just can’t think about that right now,”even though the result of achieving thatgoal would be a major win.

Here’s the good news about obstacles:All those things that seem to oppose yourgoals are actually the rawmaterial for

achieving them. If we stay focused on theresult, really zeroing in on the measur-able, tangible ways things will be new,better, and different when we get there,it’s easier to broach the obstacles with asense of purpose. The first step is toacknowledge as many obstacles as youcan come up with and tell the truth abouthow things are—which may conflict withhow you want things to be, how you canimagine they could be. This brings me tosomething else I often say, which is, “Allprogress begins by telling the truth.”

Looking at them one at a time, theobstacles are not as daunting, and it’seasier to strategize solutions. Because

Focus On Results AndTransform Obstacles

Strategy Nine:

you’ve clearly articulated them, you canalso enlist the help of others moreeasily. Staying focused on the resultreminds you and others of what thepayoff is for this effort.

Like all the other Multiplier Mindsetstrategies, this kind of thinking eventu-ally becomes habitual once you do itenough. When this happens, obstaclesno longer stop you, and any angst asso-ciated with them goes away. In fact, youlook forward to getting them all out soyou can create a plan. They justbecome material to be used to helpyou move forward.

And this is not just something you doinside your business. It’s also at the heartof what you do for your clients and cus-tomers when you’re creating value forthem and not just peddling products andservices. When you can help a client orcustomer focus on a result they’d like tosee in their life, and then help themtransform all the obstacles they seeopposing them, your business with themtranscends the transactional, and youbecome a trusted advisor or partner insome area of their life. When they knowthey can rely on you for this, you have acustomer for life and a great source ofreferrals.

Confidence is the electricity of theentrepreneurial world. To getwhere you are now, you’ve prob-

ably taken on all kinds of things evenwhen you weren’t sure you had theknowledge or skill to pull them off. Butyou felt confident, and you created theresult. Seeing this, you gained evengreater confidence, which allowed youto do even more.

When you don't feel confident, every-thing seems more difficult, and yourability to accomplish anything is greatlydiminished. Because confidence is thefoundation of all our other abilities, thenumber one responsibility of everyentrepreneur is to protect his or herconfidence. The way we do this is bygrowing our capabilities and giving our-selves credit for our progress.

Many people talk about confidence as acharacter trait, something you’re eitherborn with or aren’t. Here we’re talkingabout confidence as a resource you canconsciously develop through activitiessuch as:• Reviewing your past achievements andusing those, rather than ever-shiftingideals, to evaluate your progress.

• Taking the time when you encountera setback to review the experienceand find new insights and improve-ments for the future.

• Articulate your strengths, talents, andpassions, as well as those of yourteam members, and establish new“capability goals” to take advantage ofthese assets.

We’re living in a time when manypeople’s confidence is at an all-time low.

Strategy Ten: Focus OnCapabilities And MultiplyConfidence

Strategy Ten:

Many of the structures, industries, insti-tutions, and environments that peopleonce relied upon as the foundationsthat would always be there to supportthem are either disappearing or under-going radical transformations withuncertain outcomes. Those who caninspire confidence amidst this uncer-tainty are able to generate loyal andgrateful followings of trusting clientsand customers. But to generate confi-dence for others, you first have to knowhow to do it for yourself.

Learning to generate your own confi-dence allows you to be freed up from

the negative emotional influence ofunexpected and unpredictable externalchange. Instead, you have your full fac-ulties available to adjust and see theopportunity that almost always accom-panies such change. When others areparalyzed, you can be clear and focusedon your clients and on how to createvalue, even if the game has changedradically. Over the past two years espe-cially, we have seen countless entrepre-neurs in the Strategic Coach Programgain huge competitive advantages fromhaving developed this particular facet ofthe Multiplier Mindset.

You’ve now been introduced to the Multiplier Mindset. What ideas about yourbigger future does it bring up for you? How would you like to multiply yourown results, enjoyment, and impact as an entrepreneur?

More than 13,000 entrepreneurs who have participated in the Strategic Coach Pro-gram have used the principles in this book to dramatically increase their income andfree time, which in turn has allowed them to invest in delegations, cleanups, capabil-ities, and, ultimately, a life of greater freedom and satisfaction.

This online book has given you an introduction to some core strategies of the Program.Your ability to apply these strategies is multiplied exponentially by participating in aworkshop with a group of other successful, like-minded entrepreneurs, taking time outeach quarter to strategize about your future, and learning how to use a vast array oftools to develop each aspect of your business and your quality of life as its owner.

To build on what you’ve learned here, and to give you a better feeling for what it’s liketo work with our coaches, we’re inviting you to take part in a free webinar withShannonWaller, an experienced coach and one of the designers of the Strategic CoachProgram.

To reserve your place on our next webinar, please call Lisa Teeter at 1.866.343.2205 or902.544.1396, or visit http://www.strategiccoach.com/events/webinars/

What’s Next?

DanSullivan is the founder and president of TheStrategic Coach Inc. and creator of the StrategicCoach® Program, which helps accomplished entre-

preneurs reach new heights of success and happiness. Hehas over 30 years of experience as a strategic planner andcoach to entrepreneurial individuals and groups. He isauthor of over 30 publications, including The GreatCrossover, The 21st Century Agent, Creative Destruction®,andHow The Best Get Better®, and co-author of The Lawsof Lifetime Growth and The Advisor Century.

About The Author

The Strategic Coach Program isknown in entrepreneurial circles asthe place where “the best get bet-

ter.” The constant improvements thatentrepreneurs experience within it arenot just in business, but in all areas oftheir lives.

The Program consists of quarterly one-day workshops with a group of estab-lished, growth-focused entrepreneursfrom a variety of industries, led by acoach who is also a successful entrepre-neur and is using the tools and conceptsof the Program to grow his or her ownbusiness. Our coaches are all currentclients in advanced years of the Pro-gram, who, as a result of increased freetime and income, are able to devotesome of their time to coaching others.Strategic Coach operates hundreds ofquarterly workshops in the U.S, Canada,and the U.K. and has coached over

13,000 entrepreneurs in its more than20 years in business. The vast majorityof participants join because of theprogress they have seen in other entre-preneurs already in the Program.

Many entrepreneurs consider StrategicCoach to be an ongoing process theyparticipate in to encourage and supportgrowth and achievement in all areas oftheir lives. One individual put it thisway: “Until Strategic Coach, running myown business was always a lonely expe-rience that was getting lonelier andharder the more successful I became.Now I have a place, filled with the bestfriends in the world, where I rejuvenateand refocus every 90 days. It’s what wasalways missing. Now that I’ve got it, I’mstaying for life.”

The Strategic Coach Program is designedfor entrepreneurs who are already estab-

About The StrategicCoach® Program

Toronto:33 Fraser Avenue, Suite 201Toronto, OntarioM6K 3J9 CanadaTelephone: 416.531.7399 or 1.800.387.3206Fax: 416.531.1135

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Email: info@strategiccoach.com Website: www.strategiccoach.com

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lished and who have reached a certainlevel of success. To qualify for the Pro-gram, you must be a business owner,high-commission salesperson, or profes-sional in private practice with a minimumof three years in business and a mini-mum net personal income of $100,000or £80,000 in the past year. Workshopsare offered at minimum income levelsof $100K, $250K, and $500K+ in NorthAmerica, and £80K in the U.K.

Participants derive many unique benefitsfrom Strategic Coach, but most reportfour big improvements: constantly in-creasing income and profits; significantand, in many cases, unbelievable jumpsin the quantity and quality of free time;the ability to focus increasingly on theirmost productive activities; and an ever-increasing impact on the world outsideof their businesses.