Explain yourself

If you were invited by Quest on CNN for a 5 minute interview about your business/yourself, how will you use this time? (http://questmeansbusiness.blogs.cnn.com/)

I watched last night as the CEO of a prominent online business fumbled away his 5 minutes and only left unanswered questions about his business after the interview.

Even as an individual or business we should work on a selling formula to make use of ANY opportunity to summerise our core focus in a clear way.

In writing this blog I realized that I need to work on this in my own life. Imagine you are given 1 sentence to describe who you are, or the sole purpose of your business…scary thought… or is it?

Silver lining

The newspapers are full of the current bleak economic down turn and retrenchments across all industries.

How about I share some good news with you.


After launching Ambitionblog last week we already have 30 job advertisements with 220 profile holders (potential job seekers) registered on the site!
Feedback we received from our personal networks is that there is a need for specific skills like teachers and pharmacists at the moment.
We need to get these jobs filled, please ask your circle of friends if anybody knows about the above mentioned ”skills set” and get them to register on http://www.ambitionblog.com/
Help us in our quest to link great people with great companies!
Appreciating your support!

Keep on going and going…

I am not a jogger but what I have learned when I feel like switching over to walking is to get a beacon to aim at in the distance and to start counting the paces…when you reach the end you feel great.

To start a business you need to keep on going and going…

• Know where you are going and measure the steps, everyday you are one step closer.

• Stay calm and keep yourself busy with the right things. When you keep on doing the right thing, you will build momentum.

• Sometimes you don’t have a choice between quitting and continuing, it will take the same amount of energy (If you give up you will have to use the energy elsewhere.)

• The true opportunity, the break through, the WOW does not come out of the plan but out of executing the plan and leads to something great you could not foresee.

The true opportunity is discovered in the activity of doing the right thing again and again…

Your turn to blog…

Phase one of the ambitionblog website is complete!!!
I have sent you many blogs about the birth and growth of our business (and my personal growth…) and will continue doing so in future.

My turn to listen. Register your profile on http://www.ambitionblog.com/

(Please note that you will be building a footprint of yourself and this might take some time…Don’t rush)

Appreciating your support and looking forward to your comments.
Charl

Go for it

I joined 3 mountain bike fundies for a ride in the Kogelberg recently. (Kleinmond, Western Cape)
I do not currently own a mountain bike and had to use an old “Hypermarket” special with tekkies and green hat as helmet.
As a passionate cyclist I easily kept up with the pace and enjoyed the outing!(despite the lack of shocks and gear...)


Should I ever want to ride competitively I will probably need to buy the correct equipment.

What did I learn?

To get up and go and start to do something you don’t need the best equipment. If you want to start a business or have a brilliant idea to implement at work, you don’t need all the funding and systems in place to start. Just get going, and start gaining momentum. Phase two will be to “upgrade” the tools.

Tourists only

On Friday during the Easter Weekend we jumped on the red Hop On – Hop off open top Cape Town bus. As a true Capetonian I thought I would not learn anything new on this trip. (shouldn’t this bus only be used by overseas tourists?) What a surprise!

I learned so many new things about the Mother city.

In your business/career are you comfortable with being a local, or do you have the guts to put on the tourist cap once in a while?

What is in a name?

When last did you think about your name? How important is it to you? Today I experienced this after a meeting with a prominent company. At the end of the meeting the top executive mentioned our names in his good bye. On reviewing the outputs of the meeting the mere thought that the executive remembered our names put the meeting in a new light.
I have decided to make a renewed conscious effort to remember and to use a person’s name in conversation.

How do you manage?

How do you build a house? First you plan the look and feel, then you organise all the materials, you activate by building and all along you control the project by checking the progress.

This is a practical example of the management functions we are implementing:

• Plan (with the output in mind)
• Organise
• Active
• Control

Brand building

How do you market yourself?

We went to the KKNK in Oudtshoorn the weekend to do some promotion work for Ambitionblog. We ended up in one of the VIP tents. All the who’s who of the Afrikaans singing community were there. Except for all the bling, I learned something from them. Every step they take is to promote and sell themselves, each one of them is building his own brand. This is extreme personal selling, but should not be exclusive to stars!

To build your own brand (personal or business) you have to believe in yourself and promote your OWN unique talents, skills and expertise!