How to Build Your Business Through Building Yourself

By Joshua Odmark
Posted Monday, September 13, 2004

This article will help you in both mind and body. Your mind refers to the consciousness of making important decisions on a daily basis, whether it be cutting back expenses, or selecting the company budget for 2004. The body refers to your physical body with respect to its significance with your work. In retrospect, this is an innovative way to look at not only your business model, but to look within yourself for the person you need to be.

Let us take a look in the mirror. Shall we?

Lesson One:

Take 45 minutes each day to think.
Your mind is your pathway to success. Take time out of every day to think about business concepts, cutting costs, marketing, and anything else relevant to your personal business. This should be done in an atmosphere away from the TV, radio, or any other distracting noises. The 45 minutes of thinking is meant to be done alone for a continuous period. Avoid a pencil and paper, just let your creativity flow.

Lesson Two:

Create a Wisdom Journal.
Yeah OK, so wisdom journal is not the greatest name in the world, but you get the point. You can name your journal 1967 Shelby GT500 if you would like. The point is to create something that you can use to write down all of your thoughts. If you open up my journal, you will find discourses on religion, marketing techniques, drawings of mythological characters (I am not kidding), comic strips, and much more. Make an attempt to put your train of thought onto paper, you will be surprised with what you write down and you will be even more surprised at the doors it opens for ideas.

Lesson Three:

Separate your work area.
Have you ever spilt a drink or some kind of food on your keyboard/mouse? You should never have any type of food or drink near your work area. Not just because of the damage that can be done to important documents, but because of the simple fact that you need to separate your work area from your leisure area. Never have a TV, radio, or magazine near your work area. If you look into my office, you will find a bookcase, a desk with desk supplies on it, and a computer. I work in simplicity. The more distractions there are, the less work you will get done. Stop making excuses and get that TV out of your "office", NOW!

Lesson Four:

Always wear a suite and tie when you work.
Call me old fashioned, but I firmly believe that in any business atmosphere, in any location, one should always properly dress for the occasion. I proudly admit that I have dressed up to go to work in my basement at home. It sounds ridiculous I agree, but give it a try. I dare you…

Lesson Five:

All work and no play means disaster.
About a year ago I took a two-week vacation to Clearwater Beach, Florida. I left a software package midway through development, and I was coming back to two corporate clients waiting to place their orders. I returned home with innovative ideas for our software package, and I had interesting concepts to run by my new clients. A book, a chair, and a cold drink lead to plenty of self-discoveries, many of which still make my business a lot of money today. Your mind needs to be let out, it needs freedom, and it needs variety through experiences. Your mind is what makes you unique. It is what makes you the valuable person that you are. Think of a vacation as simply a treat for your mind. Now there is some food for thought… Get it?

Take these first new steps with diligence, and you will start to see a significant increase in your work efficiency.

Are we still looking in the mirror? Indeed we are. Let us take a look at our physical body.

It is very important to develop a routine that outlines your day of work. It is a well known fact that everything outside of your working environment, the type of car you drive, the woman in your life, and books you read, are a direct reflection of the type of person you are. Therefore everything has an indirect effect on your business.

Do you own a planner? You do not… do you…

A planner is the basis of everything that is routinely important. You should make it a habit to write everything down in a planner, relevant to your business. You can organize your important phone numbers, business meetings, calendar events, and much more with a planner. Why am I telling you this? You know what a planner is for. So why is this important? Because both you and I are human, we forget important things on a daily basis. I have so many daily repetitive tasks that when something is quickly added in I sometimes forget to complete the task. We all do, it is human nature, hence the significance of a planner to our "oh so important" lives.

The planner will now play an important role in our new, improved image of ourselves. You now have the ability to write things down, it is your mobile Wisdom Journal. Your planner is more of a memory tool used to keep your daily routine in tact. The ability to look at your actions, review your goal, process your ideas, organize personal information, and connect with colleagues allows you to consciously build upon all of them after you record them. Yesterday's idea will become today's building block.

If you do not own the following things, you need to take some time and acquire them.

t Necessity Number One:

Go buy a planner.
This is the building block of a business owner. It is like the composition book of a musician. You have got to incorporate a planner into your daily life. While it may not seem important to your current situation, it is imperative for the future. Are we not all working for a better tomorrow?

t Necessity Number Two:

Contact Organizer- separate from your planner organizer.
One of the single most important aspects of being a business owner is establishing connections. What a shame it would be to lose the contact of someone who would be extremely beneficial to you at a very critical point. Take thirty minutes out of your day and five bucks out of your pocket to purchase a contact organizer. The next Bill Gates could be on the 32nd index card in your neatly organized contact list.

We have gone over a lot together in this article, five lessons for your mind and two things that every small business owner should have. I think it is safe to say you have your work cutout for you. Take what you have read, and put it to use. Change does not occur all at once. It takes progression to get from point A, your current position, to point B, where you need to be. This article has pointed you in the right direction, and planted your first step. It is up to you to complete the next step by following through with the advice given in this article.

About the Author
Joshua Odmark is an entrepreneur in every sense of the word. He is the owner of Jeoworks Advanced Technologies, a website development firm based out of Michigan. Take a few minutes and say Hi over at (http://www.jeoworks.com).