It’s as though God himself has allowed me to play among the levels of business the last eighteen months for a bird’s eye view of life.  It would be easy to believe, say, at the beginning of a business that well, those “million dollar entrepreneurs” have something the beginner doesn’t have.  The answer is yes they do, but the items they have may be a complete surprise to the one beginning.  Here are a few of the notes I’ve taken on a few of my favorite successes….at every level of business and personal success:

• Business without working and serving  people you enjoy and have fun with is futile. Lesson learned from @AllanBranch and @StevenBristol as I watched and helped out at #LessConf 2010…For two years now they have continually shown that the basis of their success is that they combine excellent services and skillsets with a continual nod to making sure that they engage with people not just profits.
• Leaders learn what is involved, they may not continue to do tasks forever, but a working knowledge of your business components matter. Most of what has to be handled in the beginning can be learned from YouTube, Mp3s, or the wealth of free teachings on the internet….likewise, 2 solid hours with a 1:1 or small group on a specific goal can solve most issues in software, hardware, finance,  and life on a blog/website or lets you know where to go to get the solve and appropriate prices to do so. @Peldi @LollyDaskal @StevenBristol @RandyElrod @SarahLCook all are humble learners yet powerful teachers and leaders.
• You become who you get comfortable with being. Are you holding onto beliefs that are comfortable but not accurate to your abilities now? Are you more willing to seek comfort than get comfortable with becoming a new you?  @DavidBullock of CEO Mastery Series taught this rich lesson….an engineer by training, he looked at the systems he continually was hired to correct, and applied the same thinking to realizing he was extraordinary at helping CEO’s and large companies align their business systems. @ThelmaW has a lifetime of successful leading in multiple settings because she recognized growing people is a gift of hers.
• Most of what would work in your life would reveal themselves if you embraced your already existent gifts. Too many, too often, have accepted someone else’s idea of what they are best at as opposed to embracing what they enjoy most as a possibility for career focus.  I hear time and time again “when I stopped trying to ….and embraced what was simply enjoyable from my life experiences this path came forth”  @RandyElrod @SarahLCook @MichaelHyatt @JesseLamb @Dave_Carpenter are all examples of this reality at varying stages of their found paths….
• If you are experiencing repetitive walls in multiple scenarios, then perhaps YOU are the common factor. Self Sabotauge, Ineffective Environment, …many great minds and talents are trying to work in an environment that doesn’t “get” them or have the aptitude to appreciate their gifts. Where is your nest? Where are the people who “get” your work or your you existing….if that answer is “not here” then virtually, physically, or emotionally find a new space.
• Keep your goals your own. Folks spend a good bit of time telling me that I should this or that….Be who you are, not who they wish you to be.  @StoreEnvy, @WooThemes @LessAccounting, #GTChat #TCK  Southern Lady Magazine, @Cybraryman1 are all great examples of this philosophy, they all have created their businesses to support their own goals, their own way….not mimicking something they are not.  @SmallBizLady is another strong example of this.

Somehow I believed when I first began on my own in business that when I met or worked with million dollar clients or agencies, they would be somehow “different.”  The joy has been that they are simply folks too….sometimes more successful by positioning, other times by hard work and achievement, and yet other times simply because they set the goal to be and when that didn’t work, the failing of that project lead them to new perspectives in a project that worked! Whether it was a recent start up I had the privilege to work with that quickly reached a 60 million bank evaluation, a speaker who is expanding his or her audience, a creative’s company, or a traditional business setting…the basics matter.  Without core elements of your beliefs, existence, practice, and business in alignment….there’s trouble ahead.

Most of the off shoots of finance, cash flow, and long term sustainability of your life and your business existence are hinged upon this alignment.  Each of the Fortune 500 and above clients will readily engage that this was an essential element of their growth to where they live now…and a continuing theme to tweak in their lives. When I am privileged to have conversations with my clients and others personally, each one continues to say the answers to their current issue is always found in returning to refocus the basic premises of their goals….and that’s true regardless of their income and happiness level.

The concept of transparency is generally accepted as being forthright and open about what one is doing and the motives for what is being done with others.

The popular concept of the term implies it has positive connotations that are, in its best practice, leading to the highest grounds of moral involvements, business profitability, and success in the larger picture.  However as I have had time to think through the lively dialogue of Lolly Daskal’s #leadfromwithin conversations on Tweetchat, I have been reminded that there were a few premise issues with what was implied, if not inferred.

Transparency brings to mind for me a window, one in which each person on either side of the glass can see through the glass. There is no shading, no artificial involvements in changing what is perceived from the other side.  Now if two computers with equal software were loaded that way on each side of the window, perhaps that would be a true fair assumption that each side perceives the same experience.  However, in human relationships one must account for transparency being affected by each person’s pre-conceived experiences, notions, and access information about  what they are seeing.  Each individual brings to the window their own experiences and dialogue in their thinking what it is that they are seeing. The picture before them may trigger responses from their memory or experience that has nothing to do with the scene before them.  In this way transparency intended by one party may be received or perceived entirely differently than it was intended.  The human brain is an amazing machine.

Ah the complexities of human relationships…our lifelong experiences, our physical senses, and what is before us combine with our current acceptance of them to literally affect how our brain focuses what it comprehends and understands.  This is also true in relationships, in how the brain perceives the pictures it sees, in how our body responds to situations, as well as how the speed of our very heartbeat and pulse flow…react to it.

In this world I believe that the more transparent we can be, the more likely, the more at peace we personally are. Duality in any subject field is twice the work.  Who we are and why we do things I believe is a life long involvement in study.  We grow, change, experience new situations and realize as we learn that perhaps old perceptions were tainted by the level of our experience at that time. In the best of days we recognize our inaccuracies and course correct our beliefs, actions, and attitudes as we do, and are better people for it.

As I return to my mind’s picture of two people on either side of a mirror experiencing the clear view of each other….I muse the following questions:

Are we seeing the whole picture of what is before us?

Are our own experiences and expectations projecting into what our mind perceives we see?

Do our words and actions tell a universal truth or our own perceived truth….are they received as such?

Do we accept when others in their transparency tell us who they are even when we would prefer them not to be what they have revealed?

Are we willing to accept that the sharing of our perceived transparency of the given situation may be tainted without our knowledge by our own perceptions of what we believe to be true, but in fact may be only our perception of that truth?

I believe that our own journey is to ask ourselves and listen to our internal and external dialogues to be very aware of who we believe we are. To compare and contrast that with our actions, values, behaviors and beliefs.  To line those actions, values, behaviors, and beliefs to our daily life and to how we interact with others….

Transparency, for me, is defined as the desire and effort to be who you are, without cover, without intentional duality. In my case, with the deepest desire to fulfill the command to love others as I do myself, as an ongoing goal. I also believe that our very humanness, the fantastic way we were created, will always mean that transparency is a process, not a destination.

Often a new business has limited budget and time to interact through advertising. Social media is my favorite go to at that point. I work with clients that have 100,000+ followers that spent literally fifteen minutes a day to achieve their market share of communication of appropriate audience for their service or offerings.  Let me assure you that the number of Twitter followers won’t get you to the bank until you realize that your job at Twitter is to find out where the conversations are on your topic.  Take time, listen, watch, and observe, then see if you can add to the conversation.  When are your conversations held? Who is hosting them? What are they seeking? Why are they liking and buying from the providers they do?  The level of engagement from your business at that point should be completely learning and friendly focused.  After all, if they followed you home that moment and came to your Like page or Website, are you ready for them? What would they find?

Last night Guy Kawasaki was Melinda Emerson, @SmallBizLady’s guest on SmallBizChat.  Guy’s new book, Enchantment, was being discussed and Guy answered many questions on what was important in business.  The answers aligned with my beliefs.  Keep it simple. Use positive, helpful language.  Say yes as often as you can. Build for the long term relationship with customers and clients, be willing to check yourself on price and offerings regularly. Learn to create enchantment opportunities….set yourself a part.   There’s that word again, make each part of your business different and special….perhaps its making sure every single client thank you is answered with “It’s my pleasure to serve you” or requests are answered personally consistently from the same rep or customer service personnel, not a random person.  These kind of parts matter.

Be who you are in business.  If you are a small firm serving business and a big boy business comes courting, think carefully. Is your staff ready for a different alignment of time, schedule, demands? Likewise if a client needs x, y, and z to succeed in their endeavor and are not willing to align their situation to succeed, are you doing them any favors by only dealing with part of what it takes for them to succeed. Qualifiers aren’t just financial you know! Many of the projects that are brought to me are brilliant in concept, however, they lacked the parts of structure and follow through to allow them to succeed.  Parts is not parts, in deed as the silly commercial implied.  Successful systems require all parts: web media, personnel, software, HR, customer service, budget, and overhead to all be in sync so that service can be consistently provided and supported for their clients.

Parts matter.  Whether its making sure your website reflects aesthetically and in content who and what you do appropriately. Whether its monitoring and responding to social media tweets, comments, or emails in time and content appropriate ways. Whether its knowing who does what in your organization and why.  There are many many moving parts in a successful business. Each part essential to the environment and success of your business.  Is someone looking out for how you’re actually running now? Are you gathering the data you have? How are your financial, social, environment, and personnel indicators reflect of your success? Have you asked your team lately what makes them struggle, is software hindering or aiding you? Do you have too much going on with too many medias or are you focusing on solid presence where your customers are?  Are your ads bringing more people to your newsletter, website traffic, or stream? Have you linked your offerings to your sales and made sure your copy and aesthetic copy is making  impacts with your audience? Did you start on Facebook or like medias only to leave those who find you with nothing new on your page, blog, or stream?  Parts matter. If you’re going to engage in business, there needs to be a plan for your parts, those parts are measurable, monetizable, and meaningful.  Read, listen to videos, or hire a consultant. If you can’t afford a consultant for consistent help, hire someone to help you evaluate for a couple of hours of consulting, it will save you money and energy in the long run to have a workable plan.

Each part of success in business  involves planning, implementing, and evaluating why you do what you do and what its value is to your business. Are you ready to stop looking at your return on investment as one number? Are you ready to look at each part of your business activities return on investment. Remember, activities that matter bring you audience, interaction, engagement, and enchantment by your clients and customers, the end goal is the purchase, repeat purchase, and referral of your business offering or service….and those parts together will affirm you as a successful business.

What do you perceive to be true?

An experience yesterday in Huntsville again reminded me how often we assume and rely on what we see to give us the information others believe about us as well as what we believe about them.  A young gentleman was assisting me in the Apple store. I could articulate the issues at hand, showed him the device having the trouble, talk him through the process of what was happening and what he would see as he went through the exercise.  The young gent’s perceptive as he explained to his tech that I had shown him this and that, that we had seen the problem and it was past what he could explain.  The advanced tech then wanted to go through the screen processes again to see for himself. At this point I articulated that to do so I would need him to begin the sequence from the beginning again so that I could tell him step by step what the misfortune of the dysfunction was.  The young man paused and tried to comprehend why I would ask such a thing. His experience was that I was able, articulate, and intelligent enough to start it myself.  I bore no outwardly visible signs that I was impaired.  Was this some sort of power play? Was I suddenly becoming “upper crust” and insinuating that I was the master and he the servant?  At that moment I realized they were missing a truth that was pertinent to their perception of my behavior….

because I had just left a physician’s office after a procedure on my eyes…..I was unable to focus…. at all.

The perception the two techs had though was a relatively normal looking female who had articulated and described a technical issue, screen by screen, (because of experience the day before when I could myself focus with one eye what they were seeing) and because I had carefully memorized each error message, they assumed that I was visually seeing what they were seeing on the screen as we talked.

In fact, while we were going through the process with the computer, I had been able to focus on nothing, including their faces while we went through the diagnostics. My husband and daughter had walked me to the station and then had exited to look around the store, the gentlemen had not been privvy to my entrance as Les lead me to the stool.

I let them off the hook.  I explained that currently I could see light but have no ability to focus, but an hour or more a day I had limited focus in one eye in a 2″ field.  but in fact that morning after a procedure, I had absolutely no ability to focus either eye during that time.

Their tones and level of involvement immediately changed, their speed of speech did too (I wanted to say, I’m blind not deaf) as did their empathy level and I felt very sorry for them. You see, they had judged, assumed, perceived I was somehow being “above station”, lazy, or perhaps mental by not resetting the situation by myself. They were fooled by their visual perceptions, their mind’s call on previous experience with me, which led to assumptions about my unwillingness to reset the test. With a little more information, they were able to more adequately access the situation of my behavior and in short order we solved the dilemma of the imac and they then were asking more questions since they had both seen me in the store on multiple occasions when I’ve had trained their clients or been involved in training others on Apple products.

Last night #LeadFromWithin with Ted Coine’ and Lolly Daskal discussed transparency. It was especially entertaining when you’re the girl who can’t see the broad side of a barn clearly right now…  The conversations on Twitter were lively and full. (wildly fast when you’re counting on software to keep up in reading it to you, or in my case, turning it off so my fabulous husband could read the tweets so I could interact) My interest was focused on how the word transparency somehow transformed the conversation to imply that transparency in personal and business settings equated honesty, openness and in many tweets had a connotation of “goodness” ‘light” and other positive experiences.  I am a fan and admirer of the journey of personal transparency in the unity of how we behavior and interact with one another.  Like the experience in the store yesterday however, transparency, at least the experience of its presence is supported or not supported by the experience or perceptions as well as the beliefs of its audience.  The perception of believing complete disclosure (transparency) is acceptable is gained only if one hasn’t been taught in business, in childhood, or in life that it is not dangerous, painful, safe, <insert your emotion word> to do so.  Society and families have not always taught that transparency is safe. Too often we reward conformity, the keeping of status quo, or acceptable public personas. We reward and even support duality, especially if it means we are allowed to remain in our own comfort zone. Entire campaigns, product marketing, and product pushes each day are based entirely on keeping te public perception of their offering being viewed in a certain perspective…..often without any relationship of that perspective to their truth if tested.

What perceptions do you without questioning employ in your daily life? What rules of operation have you readily employed a perception that if you spent ten minutes asking why, you would realize your perception is based on someone else’s truth, not your own?  How many of your own accepted norms are based on limited experience or maybe not even your own experience? It’s a topic that has had my mind considering new perceptions for the last six weeks. (of course having lost the ability to focus my eyes has brought the experience home in ways I could have never predicted!)

I believe that as we grow and seek truth in our own lives, we must continually question our perceptions and evaluate our deepest daily internal dialogues as well as external ones to truly check what we are saying, hearing, and choosing to accept as truth….and compare it to why we believe that….What we see, or hear may very often be the product of what someone else has planned for us to experience, or our experience may be limited in exposure to information that would completely change our perception if we took time to look past the moment of experience.

What do you think?

Note:  For those of you who have so kindly asked. My eyes began to see less about six weeks ago, I assumed overuse at the computer after a many months project.  I had an eye injury two years ago involving my corneas that had healed, but they have been sensitive sense. After three weeks of resting, lessened use, we found it was not overuse, but degeneration of the corneas, specifically the left one in a much more severe level. Currently we are working with cornea specialists to try to solve the puzzle of why this is happening as well as treat it. Meanwhile, as one experienced with visual impairment, having grown up with correctable low vision, I am working with software, gadgets, and our teenagers when I can snag them to  overcome the issues having no ability to focus brings. They are telling us we’re in for a long haul on healing, but you know me, I’m not one to give in without a good fight…finally a doctor’s note to not be involved with laundry!

I am fortunate. We think this will be over in 6 to 18 months as the cornea regenerates and we figure out what is causing the damage.  It’s inconvenient, but event at the worst case scenario, its sight, not life. I cannot begin to breathe that this would be it, that the level of vision I have is what I will have, but thankfully that’s not the sentence yet….and so I work on listening to books, using the large screen differently so I can stand in front of it to get that 3″ vision field from my eyes, and I do what I am told on taking care of treatments and rotate through the specialist office like its our favorite ice cream drive through…

We are blessed….

there is care, there are doctors, I have Les and children who help….I think of Thursday night’s pain and the people in the world who walk miles to get to a clinic that has no medication, or cannot walk at all…and I know I am blessed, what I am facing has help available.

It’s a time of learning, of appreciating what is, of realizing there are many ways to live life and though I am unfamiliar with one in which eyes don’t play the central role in your day, I am learning the day still comes…and life still goes on, with or without the ability to focus.

I’m working on seeing more clearly with my perspective….albeit a new one.