Lessons Learned from Belize

If you think someone is screwing with you, they probably are. This is a lesson learned from Chi, the pool bar bartender at our resort. On day one, he had made a couple of comments that left us scratching our head. By day five, (and this is a funny one), he convinced us that concierge would be more than happy to deliver a barbeque to our condo so we could cook dinner. Let’s think about that for a second … when do hotels deliver barbeques. This didn’t dawn on us until we were actually at the front desk asking for one and they were looking at us like we were complete nut jobs. I wasn’t going to let this one slide so when I ran into Chi later on, I promptly thanked him for his fabulous idea and told him we would back later to borrow some lighter fluid. The look on his face was priceless. My point? If you have someone, a potential client, anyone who is giving you the run around in the form of multiple rescheduled meetings, etc. focus on something else immediately. It is not worth your valuable time when you can be focusing on business that is generating real results. My other personal favorite is one of the first clients I ever had who would always tell me the check is in the mail and then later on say the dog ate it, or another of the wall excuse to explain why it did not show up. Weed timesucks out of your business … especially the financial ones.

It’s good to get out of your comfort zone, but don’t get in over your head. This may seem like an obvious lesson here, but every once in awhile, I tend to just to go for it. Here you go: if you are afraid of heights, you should not go zip lining. Period. Lesson learned. In business, getting out your comfort zone is a good thing, because amazing things can happen. I for one never thought I would be involved in the production of a television pilot and guess what … television shows just don’t magically appear on t.v., there is a bunch of behind the scenes work that goes on. Many business owners like to get out of their comfort zone and try new things. Many of them however, fall into the trap of trying too many new things at once and then whoopsie, what happened to their billable work. To avoid getting in over your head, I highly recommend getting a business coach to keep you on track. If you cannot afford one, join a mastermind/accountability group. This will help you stay focused on priorities and on track while you are working on new things. Even if you have self-professed A.D.D.

If your gut tells you it is a bad, idea … it probably is. While in Belize we had the opportunity to go swimming with sharks. My b.f.f. spent the better portion of the day prior convincing the group on why we should do this. Well, one day later sitting on the edge of a boat with my snorkle gear watching a deckhand feed the sharks in the water we were about to jump into I thought … hm., maybe this is not going to be one of my smartest choices. Anyway, it turns out these sharks were not dangerous (I keep telling myself that) and the look on my parents face when I told them of such activity still has me rolling. My point? There are a million ways to spend your time and marketing dollars and if your gut tells you it’s a bad idea, it probably is. I have clients who will call asking for advice when certain opportunities come up. The worst of the worst have been 20K spots for infomercials, an opportunity to be on Lifetime, but you have to fly out to Florida and pay for the spot; and last, but not least, the home made marketing materials. The question here usually is,”Is this O.K. to hand out?” The answer to all of the above was “no” and usually when a clients calls and asks … they already know.