One Strong Belief

Disappointment and repeated failure are both essential to obtaining happiness and eventual success. When a whopper of a setback presents itself (and it always does), if you have not honed your ability to deal, you will find yourself in trouble. Don't we all know that star high school quarterback who peaked in the 12th grade? He won and won and never lost in a meaningful way. And then he went out into the world. And he stopped winning. And now where is he?

If you insulate yourself from failure and always do the expected, or right thing, you are totally missing out on life. Failure can be a grand motivator.

My high school's AP art teacher rejected my application to join the AP art class. I now have an Masters of Fine Arts and work with some of the most talented artists around.

I failed out of college. Yup. Failed. Can't say that I didn't have fun doing it. But the next semester, I made the Dean's List. Doubt I'd have done that if I had not failed first.

I spent 7 years building a business, only to discover that the model was going extinct. In the face of disappointment (7 years! Hard work!) I changed the entire game plan and helped start a new company. The new company? Built on my experience from the first, but way better. We're a group of designers changing an industry.

Grab hold of your failures and turn them around.

Today

Today is a perfect day to start.

What you don't do

This is really key to everything I do. I think that sometimes it's just as important to know what you don't do as it is to know what you do *do*. I'm not suggesting that you shut down your mind to ideas and never change what you are doing. I'm just saying that sometimes you can get distracted. If you have a clear picture of what you are doing, choices get a lot easier.

Example - my company Fontaine Maury creates personalized products. I am often tempted to create bulk or stock items that are not personalized. And someday, maybe we will. But for now, we're keeping it all personalized. It helps me rule out new product ideas that pop up in my daydreaming. All the time. Really. Daily I dream up new product ideas and designs. The ones I don't do are almost more important than the ones I go with.

I'd love to license our designs for another company to put on their non-personalized product. But not us. Nope.

Are you selling meteors to dinosaurs?

Cartoon by Hugh MacLeod

Do people really do this?

I just read an article in Printing Impressions, a printing industry trade mag. It was called "Stop Disruptive Distractions" by Harris DeWese. The main point is that if you remove distractions you will gain 3 to 6 hours in your day. Which sounds like a good plan. It is directed to Sales People- who presumably are paid on commission.

Here are some of the things he says (I paraphrase):

Stop leaving the building to smoke
Stop talking about sports, real or fantasy, your boss, your co-worker
Stop shopping online
Stop playing computer games, doing crosswords
Stop reading the newspaper - you can read industry specific things

Really? Do people do these things for hours on end?

Then he continues:

Stop sleeping on the job
Stop going to the club (I'm thinking he means golf?)
No gambling or printing recipes
No hanging out in bars or casinos
Break off any extramarital affairs

Geeze, all I want my employees to stop doing is texting and facebooking too much. And they don't even do that to excess.

Granted, I'm a business owner, not a sales person, but I'm wondering if people really engage in this behavior? Can they get away with it in a small business? Or are they toiling in obscurity in larger organizations? What does this say about the state of the printing industry?

I'm lucky to own my own business and work with the fine people that I work with.

Today

Today I spent time writing down all of my ideas for 2010. Lots. Of. Ideas. Then I spent time highlighting ones that were special. Not just new-ish product, new-ish ideas, but the ones that I think are really great. It's an exercise that I hope will help me sharpen my focus the over next 12 months.

Some emerging ideas from my exercise:

Connect - connect to my customers and connect my customers to each other
Green - develop products that have a positive earth impact
Unusual - business ideas that are worth talking about - like Zappos delivery and return policy
Limited - product that is limited in production numbers or limited in who it is sold to
Right Place Right Time - items in the hands of people when they need it
Giving - product with a charitable purpose

can't wait for 2010 to unfold, I think it's going to be good.

Do you Springwise?

Where do you go to keep up with trends? Becasue I live in a small town, I try extra hard to keep up with what's going on in the bigger world.

Springwise is an awesome trend spotting web site. They have an entire category dedicated to retail! 


Check out this cool post on custom lip balm.