Cameron Woodward

Chump or Champ?

If an entrepreneur is convinced that she is the greatest  world-changing practitioner and feeds her ego beyond reality - sinker. 

The folks who lack the confidence to dream are held back from executing the campaigns that win them massive gains - sunk. 

Both attitudes are the result of fear, and keep them from making the jump from chump to champ.  One attitude is fearful of failing and loses driven-confidence. The other, is afraid of failing and compensates with an unrealistic ego. 

I’m thinking more and more that our game is about setting realistic goals that we’re willing to do unrealistic things to accomplish.

One foot at a time.

It’s running. Time that is.

Time.

It’s running out.

The distraction and fear of beginning is often blamed on resources; we make the usual excuses –

I just don’t have any money.

I don’t have the connections.

I just need the right type of website.

The scary truth is that money is not the most valuable or rare resource, it’s time, and it’s running out.

Let it sink in, we’re running out of time. All of us.

You want to do the work that matters – it’s time to start.

More important than talking about doing, is doing. 

Broken Builders.

Listen, 

You’re awesome, you really are. 

It feels so disingenuous to type it all out like that – but I mean it, I really do. The potential that you have to make the world a more creative, wonderful, and beautiful place is sickening. 

We’re something special. 

Human. Broken. Inspired. Creative. Builders. 

If you’re afraid, it’s ok, I am too. 

Ok, we’re scared together; now that we’ve acknowledged the elephant in the room let’s create in spite of it – 

Get it your passion out the door, no more excuses.

No words.

I have the honor of working with Invisible Children to see an end to LRA violence in East Africa; I consider all of the staff at Invisible Children as part of my family.

Today, I’m devastated.

My friend Nate “Oteka” Henn was tragically lost in a terrorist attack in Kampala on July 11th by an explosion at a rugby field where hundreds had gathered to watch the final game of the World Cup.

Nate served with Invisible Children for a year and a half traveling around the US advocating for children abducted and forced to fight as soldiers. 

My thoughts and prayers are with the Henn family.

Via the Invisible Children Blog;

Nate was not a glory-seeker and never sought the spotlight. He asked not to be made a hero of.           

But the life he lived inspires reflection and imitation.           

Nate’s life ended while living out this dream, a selfless dream of putting others first, seeking peace, and living a life of integrity. He will be forever missed, forever remembered, and his legacy will live on in our love and deeds.

For more information about the attack that hit Kampala, see this article from the New York Times.

For more information regarding Nate Henn and his memorial fund, see natehenn.com.

Create new markets.

As a business platform I find the internet to be the most prolific and exciting opportunity in the last century. Traditionally, industries have had definitive market caps, once you tap a resource, you’re all out – the only way to grow is to increase market share over a competitor – and take their slice of the pie.

The open web seems to fix (not entirely) a scaling issue, whereas resources are usually tapped and competitors fight for the greatest amount of market share, the internet remains a flow of information that allows for new and undiscovered business models.

A introductory business idea is that to grow a business you can take more market share or, continue to grow with a market and expand services to keep up with the demand of customers- Aol., Google, and Yahoo! all have massive portfolios of technology startups across the spectrum of services offered online – maps, email, search, profiles, and directories are a perfect example of large scale companies growing with a market.

But this is where the internet is interesting, although technology juggernauts (Google, Facebook, Apple, and Microsoft) continue to compete for market share on the largest proprietary web services – we’re not running out of web resource – it allows for the perfect medium for niche; small participatory communities to derive substantial revenues for incredibly specific services.

What are you interested in?

Nuts, twine, leather shoes, pens, wires, sheets, buttons, nails, stools, chairs…

Each and every one of these seemly inane objects can generate a substantial amount of revenue – it’s the power of the niche.

If you can dream it, you can do it.

Here’s a photo set of a resource that was once invaluable to both consumers and vendors; the Yellow Pages. Seth Godin told me that the Yellow Pages used to be so powerful for a business that yellow phones would be installed into a merchants company so that the owner could see just how much direct business was being forwarded via the all-powerful pages.

Ask yourself the question, when was the last time you reached into your dusty cabinet and thumbed through to find a place to eat, or get an oil change versus thumbing through your iPhone or Android to find the location, reviews, and precise GPS directions?

My neighbors have learned (after years of being exposed to commercials and banner ads) to completely ignore this big book of advertisements, a once powerful and valued business like the Yellow Pages has been rendered completely useless by the web –

Yellow Pages has two options:

Be the biggest.

Be the smallest.

The first option is almost immediately out the window, it’s called Yelp/Google. Yellow Pages lost when they had the resources and leverage yet kept from acting and innovating.

The second option is to be the smallest most exclusive, difficult, and high end guide to advertise with – building scarcity builds an audience. There is a secret bar in my neighborhood in San Diego, you need a code to get in – speak easy style. If I could only access this privileged information through Yellow Pages it would never be left sitting outside of my house for weeks.

It’s a different approach, different model, and different business; but the alternative is extinction; the Yellow Pages model is dead, dead, dead. I watched it starve to death outside of my door trying to get in.        

If its time to have a business vision for the new world we’re entering into – the time is now.

Note, the pictures of the Yellow Pages we’re taken over the span of three weeks. Really, its true, my neighbors didn’t even care enough about the Yellow Pages to even find the energy to throw them away.   

Press Publish.

Details are everything, ignore them entirely.

A friend recently told me about how he never pressed the publish button on his blog; the thought of a detail that could be added or the uncertainty of an unknown typo kept him from sharing.

Sadly, this is an all too common story.

It’s terrifying to be noticed, more than that, it’s petrifying to think about all the people we’ve convinced ourselves are going to think we’re terrible authors, photographers, painters, entrepreneurs, actors, and musicians –

It’s a hard job to be an artist; as a result, it’s hard to change the world.

If you’re sitting on a pile of writings, paintings, songs, or business ideas you’re passionate about and you’re not working on them, I invite you to email me (cameron@monikergroup.com) I’ve got something I’d like to share with you.

Sneak Peak: Start Now. 

Ignore the details; just get it out the door. Details in everything come later.

Don’t be stupid.

Perpetuating organizational greed by creating community cultures to generate substantial social pressure for employees to perform while under compensating is stupid.

Strong organizational community creates a group of employees whom often find personal identity and connection to a mission, purpose, and vision; this type of business relationship generates incredibly valuable emotional labor rooted in self-sacrifice and creativity. However, if your company utilizes this relational approach to business, but, continually makes decisions solely in the favor of the organization, in the long-run this is what you’ll get; unions, strikes, contempt, disrespect, and failure.

If the mission of your organization to create a shift in culture by way of a cause, product, service, or widget; fair compensation should be the foundation of your organization.

The rule of entrepreneurship is simple, if you can find someone who can do it better & cheaper – hire.

It’s a brilliant rule, but it must be used with caution and generosity – cheaper, yes; exploitive, no.

If your company borrows capital, it feels amazing – fancy marketing campaigns, pretty websites, and nice office furniture; but if you never pay it back – you go bankrupt.

Human capital is the same.

If you take human capital and never compensate your workforce – you’re bound to go bankrupt sooner or later.

Ring. Ring. Ring.

Imagine you’re in the middle of writing your opus; it’s going to change the world – all you have to do is write it.

You’re making progress, slowly and surely, and its going to impact thousands of lives.

Then -

The phone rings, you answer.

You talk with Aunt Linda for 15 minutes about next year’s family reunion in the Poconos – then, you’re back. Creating, producing, and shipping.

It happens again, ring. ring. ring.

It’s Bill, he says you have to know all about an amazing deal –

“Basically, is all equates to a short term high yield opportunity… blah, blah, blah.”

Ok, finally – back again, writing, producing art, in-the-zone.

Once more, it happens, the phone rings – you answer, you talk; except instead of returning to the most important work of your life, it’s time for dinner, picking up the kids, exercise, church, oil-change… life.

This scenario plays out everyday, until finally you’re dead. Your opus was never written, the world remains the same.

Nothing happened.

For most of us, we’re lucky – our phones hardly ever ring; but maybe you receive endless emails, Facebook notifications, twitter replies, and Youtube video responses – they consume us, distract us, and keep us from finishing our opus.

Turn off the computer; keep the phone off the hook, and log-out of Facebook.

Write your opus.

Build your company.

Lose the weight.

Do something that matters.

tangible discipline.

I’ve always been interested in a wide variety of ideas, studies, and disciplines. The glory and frustration of the human condition is our ability to understand incredibly complex situations and concepts, yet, we are still incapable of reaching any kind of “academic transcendence.”

Every answer leads to more questions; it seems the more we learn, the less we know.

The troubling conclusion is that specializing in one particular subject only rabbit holes into dozens, if not thousands, of equally fascinating disciplines.

Until recently the idea of concentrating on one field seemed, if anything, boring. Until I stumbled upon business – like all fields it touches on all the others:

Philosophy, economics, psychology, strategy, management, leadership, operations, sociology, anthropology, communication, accounting, finance, production, and dozens of others; the subject matter is diverse.

Business is best used when practiced; I’ve heard researchers refer to entrepreneurs as ‘practitioners’ – why do anything other than practice I wonder? I’m convinced business is the most powerful platform in the world, I want my studies to be diverse, and tangible. 

What are your thoughts?