THE OPPORTUNITY SEARCH

In the last piece we talked about positioning for opportunity. In this section we move to the next phase; searching for opportunity. Whilst there is a need to be ready for opportunity when it arrives; there is also a need to be able to know an opportunity when you see one.

There is an old Chinese wisdom that tells us that the Chinese word ‘crisis’ is made up of two words; one stand for danger and the other stand for opportunity. The idea here is that you can find opportunity in a crisis. Peter Drucker, the management guru says “The entrepreneur always searches for change, responds to it, and exploits it as an opportunity”. A crisis is a huge negative change and there is congruence in both wisdom. The question is do you see change as a danger or do you see it as an opportunity? The smart entrepreneur thrives on changes and explores it for opportunities whilst the rest avoid changes and stay in their comfort zone; perhaps waiting for money to fall down from the sky.

Drucker went on to indentify seven areas of changes to look for opportunities. Decision Processes International, (DPI) an international management consulting firm which specializes in providing clients with processes to help them improve the quality of their strategic or operational decisions, extend that to ten areas of systematic search. The ten area are;

1. Unexpected Success, such as Ray Kroc’s pursuit of why he was selling so many milk shake machines to a place called McDonalds.
2. Unexpected Failure, such as Ford’s miss with the Edsel which should have alerted them to new objectives of the auto buyer, a change eventually exploited by the hugely successful Ford Mustang.
3. Unexpected External Events, such as the advent of AIDS which led to a boom in the rubber industry.
4. Process Weakness, such as the unacceptable speed of delivery in the traditional system of the post office give rise to the guaranteed system of next-day delivery, creating the phenomenal success story of Federal Express.
5. Industry/Market Structure Changes, such as those undergone by the telephone industry, leading to the advent of numerous private mobile telecommunication companies.
6. High Growth Areas, areas of the business growing faster than the population or user groups would otherwise justify, such as the high growth of mobile phones usage giving rise to a whole range of possibilities from ring tones to mobile payments. Mobile computing and marketing become the next big thing.

7. Converging Technologies, such as the increasing sophistication and growth of computing technologies converging with the change sin the learning field spawn the growth of the ‘e-learning’ industry

8. Demographic Change, in areas such as age, education, income, geography and buying mix, which has led to an entire industry such as the recent phenomenon of restaurants, entertainment and ‘toys’ catering for the free-spending life style of the Gen X and Gen Y.
9. Changes in Perception, which aren’t based on changing facts but rather changing interpretation of the facts, such as increasing society acceptance of the gay culture leads to a growing industry catering for the needs and lifestyle of the gays.

10. New Knowledge; the whole area of new innovations and scientific discovery leads to various opportunities from high growth hormones to stem cell research giving rise to new drugs and new medical possibilities

THE SEARCH PROCESS
To put this to applications I developed the following process;
1. Event (The Change)
Identifying the ‘change’ that is relevant and would be significant to the ‘searcher”. For instance a relevant change for me was the change in perceptions; in this case, the increasingly concern that having a single income source is not safe and is not a wise choice in today’s fast changing and economically fragile environment. The perception is that no job is entirely safe.
2. The Effects
What then are the effects of the change?
In my example; this gives rise to the increasing need for people to look for Multiple Sources of income
3. The Situation
What is the present situation with regards to the effects of the Change?
This situation gives rise to a whole range of seminars offerings from stock options programs to internet marketing training to property investment training
4. The Problems or Challenges
Is there a problem that gives rise to an opportunity?
The challenge that exist right now is that most people who attended all these two or three days program finds it difficult to actually put these opportunities into real world applications.
5. The Possible Product or Services
What new idea, innovation, product or service that can be provided?
Our organization MasteryAsia provides a two years coaching program that helps our members create real world multiple sources of Income.

PROCEES QUESTIONS

DPI also suggests that to seek opportunities in the various areas, we need to ask some process questions that will lead us to revealing the “hidden” opportunities. For example, some questions to ask in the area of Unexpected Success are:
* What unexpected product success have you had recently?
* In what geographic areas have you had unexpected success recently?
* In what market/industry segments have you experienced unexpected success recently?
* Which customer segments have provided unexpected success recently/
* What unexpected successes have your suppliers/competitors had recently?
* Which of your technologies have had unexpected success recently?
* Which unexpected customer/user groups have brought from you recently?
• Which unexpected sources have asked to sample/distribute/represent your product recently?

Then we can go on to ask the following questions:
* What opportunities and ideas can you develop from these unexpected successes?
* What specific new product/service idea can you think of to satisfy this opportunity?
* What specific new customer/market segment could we serve?
* What specific new geographic markets could we seek?
* What specific new improvement programme could we develop?

There is an organized way to look for business opportunities and it is not necessarily something that need to be a hit or miss high risk exercise. You can increase your chances of successes by using a logical and systematic way to either identify an opportunity or simply to confirm your ’gut feelings’ about a certain opportunity.

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STARTING AND MANAGING A BUSINESS FOR PROFITS AND WEALTH

Part 1: POSITIONING FOR OPPORTUNITY

ENTREPRENEURS ARE A SPECIAL BREED – they are a brave lot who are willing to take risks and face an uncertain future, to start and manage their own companies. Perhaps they just want out from the organizations they worked for, perhaps they have ideals on how a company should be run and want to try their hands at it, or maybe they have a great business idea which they are confident will reap them success. In Part One of this series, we touched on the how to position for business opportunities.

Opportunities are always knocking. The question is: “How does one recognize it, when it comes?” Benjamin Disraeli said “ The secret of success in life is to be ready for the opportunity when it arrives ”.
So the first issue in entrepreneurship is recognizing an opportunity and if you are NOT ready; you can walk pass a million-dollar opportunity and not realize it. That happens to be a matter of your mindset, not a skill. As the saying goes, half a glass of water can either be seen as half empty or can be seen as half a glass full. It is obvious that it is NOT the eyes the sees the opportunity; it is your mindset and how you choose to interpret what you see.

Some entrepreneurs start a business when they are struck by a sudden bright idea – the miracle cure, the conceptual breakthrough. But these types of inspiration aren’t the source that entrepreneurs or aspiring entrepreneurs can generally rely on. Imagine having to sit around and wait for this to happen! They are not repeatable on demand, cannot be taught and learned, and are seldom immediately applicable or even feasible. Leonard Da Vinci’s greatest works were mostly useless to him and his contemporaries because the technology wasn’t available to implement them and the society and economy weren’t prepared to accept them. So you need more than blinding flash of creativity and inspiration; looking for opportunity is an organized learnable process. The first process is positioning…

HOW TO POSITION YOURSELF FOR OPPORTUNIES

If an opportunity does not drop on your lap, don’t fret. You can position your self to be more susceptible to opportunities you are seeking. The following eight steps will put you where you want to be.

1. Decide what business area you want to be in.
While some people would make that decision straight from their heart, this can also be a restructured rational decision and it be consciously worked out. You can decide based on areas of interest and things you want to do and things you do not want to do. For instance you can decide you may want to be in the food and beverage business or may be you want to start a coaching business or may be do something on the Internet.
This is an important decision and therefore requires proper guidance and support form experienced people. But it is critical that you separate people who teach you how to fish versus people who give you fishes. Be VERY careful with the person who ask you to do what they do. They give you a fish but it may work well for them but may not for you. On the hand they are those who will guide you through questions and exploration with you. They teach you how to fish…for the right decision. Ultimately, YOU make you own decision.
2. Analyze the skills and knowledge required by that business.
Once you decide your area of interest; do your own research to find out what skills and knowledge is required in order to do well in that area. They may be skills areas that does not interest you in which case, you need to consider leveraging on someone who has that area of skills or knowledge. The question is, should you bring the person in as a potential partner or just find ways to work with that person and be able to have access to that skill set.
3. Acquire some of these skills and knowledge. LEARN at every opportunity.
For those areas of skills and knowledge that you want to have for yourself, start learning. Position yourself to learn. And ONLY learn from the BEST, at least in the geographic location you are in. Be willing to invest in your own learning. The knowledge and skill would be immensely useful in due time.
4. Find good examples of successful people in similar fields. Find out what makes them successful. Read every book and articles you can find about how they do it. Analyze their attitudes, their abilities, your shortcomings and plan to close the gap
5. Start associating and getting to know people who are in the area of business that you are or want to be in. When I wanted to be a trainer; I traveled to Singapore, the U.S. and other countries just to hang around with successful trainers. However you must be willing to ask for help, guidance and the only thing you need is to be humble. You would be very surprised by how many people willing to help as long as you are humble enough to ask and to learn. And by the way it does not only have to be successful people you can learn from; you can also learn from people who did not succeed and know why they did not.
6. Become whatever it is you want to be and need to be.
If you want to be in a business area that require you to make personal transformation then you have to be willing to make those changes. Be the person you want to be BEFORE you become. So if you want to be a successful business coach, behave, talk, listen, dress like a coach.
7. Be around people in the business. Join networks.
Spend more time with the community where the people in that business are in. You may have to spend less time with your old buddies but as Robert Kiyosaki say to me; Before you learn how to make money you must first learn how to make friends. I would just add; the right kind of friends.
8. At the appropriate time, when you spot or sense the opportunity, go after it…
This will come; it is just a matter of time

Opportunity search lies in looking for changes. Change is all around. More than that, we now living in a world with tremendous changes and it only goes faster and further. I am constantly amazed and excited by the speed of changes in the mobile marketing and the social media marketing world. And in this era of changes; some individuals and companies will capitalize on it and prosper while those who could not change, would not, choose not to or simply just don’t see it, will deteriorate and decline.

Why? Because successful individuals and companies recognize that things must change, and they position themselves to exploit these changes while others see change as only a threat and choose to avoid it or just be oblivious to it

THE PROCESS

Great ideas shouldn’t be ignored when encountered, but we can’t sit and wait around for it to happen as I have said earlier. My friend told me that it is like finding money in the street. You’re glad it was there and can certainly use it, but you wouldn’t walk around in the streets looking for money to be found on the ground in order to pay for your lunch that day!

There is an organized process to opportunity search. This removes the “hit or miss” danger, and reliance on that rare “flash of insight” or “breakthrough idea.” We will cover that in the next part on SEARCHING FOR OPPORTUNITY.

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There is a deluge of seminars on creation of wealth and how to create more income source. In a recent financial survey among working adults in Malaysia and Singapore carried out by MasteryAsia, a mentorship organization that has been coaching individuals in wealth and income creation over the last 14 years; came out with some interesting results:

Fact 1:70.22% of all the respondents will not have sufficient financial resources if they do not go to work tomorrow
Fact 2: 72.57% of them does not have any other additional sources of income.
Fact 3: 59.72 % admits that they don’t know how to create multiple sources of income
Fact 4: Only 29.31% say that they are up to date with the latest income opportunities in the market place
Fact 5: 73.98% agrees that financial re-education is a priority
Fact 6: Most interesting is as much as 31.36% confess that they do not know what their passion is.

Results from this survey shows that when it comes to making money or wealth; Malaysians and Singaporeans wants it but unfortunately most has not achieved one of the first step in wealth creation; creating multiple sources of income. This is in spite of the fact that most will face real financial challenges should the worst case scenario happen to them; losing their job or their business. It will also happen if their sole income source for whatever reasons it might be; simply disappear.
In today’s tumultuous economic environment that is not unthinkable. Unemployment rate is higher than ever in some countries. Business owners are facing increasingly challenging market situations and close downs are happening. And losing your income source need not necessary be because of economic reasons. A natural catastrophe like the disaster in Japan wipes out not only homes but also livelihoods of people.
A major part of the problem lies in that most of them actually do not have sufficient knowledge on how to go about creating additional income sources. That admission could either because that they actually don’t have any idea how to start or that they could have attempted to start something and then discover that it is not a piece of cake as they might have expected it to be. Or simply they carry too much mental blocks and they some how conclude that it is too difficult and thus they give up.
From the survey we also found out that majority does not have up to date information or knowledge of income opportunities in the market place. Either they don’t know it or perhaps they just don’t see it. These seems surprising given the fact that they been a lot of so-called ‘money-making opportunities’ been marketed out there. These ranges from network marketing, to low-cost franchise to ‘ready-made business in a box”. Nothing wrong with any of them although some are actually jobs–in–disguise.
Another interesting revelation is that most of the respondents realize that they need financial re-education. This could be because of the great abundance of training programs teaching people how to make money. MasteryAsia in their research found that as much as that 70% of people who invested in these two or three days training program end up doing nothing. MasteryAsia also believes that financial re-education cannot be done in two or three days and it must start with first re-examining their money beliefs. If their money beliefs do not change, the money results will not change. And that for most people is unlikely to happen in a short seminar.
However the saddest piece of data we got is that a significant portion of the respondent people doesn’t know what they really want…they don’t know what their passion is. The question posed by MasteryAsia to people is why they want to make a lot of money of they don’t know what they really want to do. MasteryAsia believes that the ultimate purpose of wealth is so that you can have all the time and the money in the world to do what you really want to do. So what do you really want to do?
To help the public understands the concept of Multiple Sources of Income better; MasteryAsia is running the Multiple Sources of Income Summits in a few locations in Malaysia in the next few months, Proceeds of the tickets goes to the National Kidney Foundation.

* Money Mastery carried out the survey in 2010 and we have 683 respondents. If you like to have a copy of the report, please write in to kcsee@masteryasia.com. This report was first published in ‘SME and Entrepreneurship’ magazine.

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I stood in front of over 200 Australians in October 1999. I have a 12 slides PowerPoint presentation of an idea that I have. It was in Perth a relatively laid back city and it was at the tail end of a seminar that Gerry R, my partner did. I was supposed to speak for 20 minutes but with the onrush of questions; I took 40 minutes instead. When I finished my presentation; close to 100 Australians lined up to pay USD250 each to be involved with the Idea. It was simply magical and all the concepts that I learnt from my mentor Robert Kiyosaki, just came alive.
This is the beginning of “a new new thing’ that went into 22 countries and make RM6 million in the first year. This new business that I started with Richard T just exploded and close to 50, 000 people got involved in this new exciting venture. It won us a second prize for the best ICT business in a competition in Singapore in 2001. And our capital …….zero.
Looking back on how we started a RM6 million company with NO Money Down and from the experience I gain since; I am able to boil it down to my 6 learning points.
To get to very beginning, I have to go back to the day when Raymond called me and ask me if I have seen a new technology where by someone speaking in front of a computer miles away, can talk to you and been seen by each other .(No. There was no Skype then) This is 1999 not 2010 and in 1999 that is a WOW! He went on to demonstrate the technology to me and it just knocks me off my feet. I know nothing about internet technology but I immediately recognise the opportunity and the potentials.
Learning No 1: Opportunity comes from Change
In mid 90’s I had an opportunity to be trained by another mentor of mine, Alan Weiss. He taught me that opportunity comes from Change; echoing what Peter Drucker wrote earlier in his book,”Innovation and Entrepreneurship.” Alan mapped out 10 major change areas and one of them is “convergence of technology”. What I saw in 1999 is the convergence of learning technology and computer technology; giving rise to the new BUZZ; E-learning. The potential for people to learn from a distance and the ability to upscale numbers from the traditional classroom of 20 to a virtual class of thousands simply becomes mind blogging. The idea was born.
Learning No. 2: Everything starts with an idea
The idea is to start an e-learning portal that delivers valuable learning content worldwide. Sounds simple since I now have access to the technology but I need a business model and I need content. I realised that if I am going to do this really well, I can’t do everything by myself. I need to do what Robert Kiyosaki taught me; I need to leverage.
Learning No 3: Leverage, you can’t do everything by yourself
I told Richard T about this idea and got him to see a demonstration. Richard runs a very successful training business which organise huge events and he brings world class speakers into Asia. He caught onto the idea immediately and we begin to jointly see a vision of what is possible. We want to broadcast live presentations’ of top gurus over the internet worldwide. We are going to create a global organization.
Learning No 4: Think Big but start small.
We have no idea how to do this. We only know that the technology is available. We believe we can get some gurus to do this with us. We have not built any business beyond Asia. But there is one thing common with both of us; we are die-hards positive thinkers. We decided to do that presentation in Perth just to test out whether people will buy our idea. Up to that point we don’t have any sales channel and we don’t have a single content. Amazingly we DON’T even have the domain name registered; let alone the website. Just the idea. What happened in Perth and the positive response is like injecting ourselves with huge shots of adrenaline. We started running………really fast. We immediately did a similar presentation in Singapore and then Malaysia. We had earlier explored the possibility of putting the business on a network business model. We decided to go ahead with it. That decision is a brave and unprecedented one. Nobody in the world has put a virtual internet-based product on that kind of business model in 1999.
Learning No 5: Choose the right business model
Had we done it any other way we would not have achieved the kind of success we got. The momentum that was built in the subsequent months after the launch was the reason for its success. But the six months before the launch ion March 2000 was the most intense six months of my business life. We travelled thousands of miles to seek out all the pieces required to make it work. The most interesting experience for me was flying to Florida to work with the software developer to do up the back engine and flying back with the server (which I hand carried)……..plug it on and the engine started running.
Learning No. 6; Make a lot of friends
More phenomenal was what happened after the launch. It was an amazing journey made possible by friends, friends of friends and friends of friends of friends (you get the picture?).We went to Korea to find enhancement to that technology, to the United States to meet with a large entrepreneur group to discuss strategic alliances, to Japan to speak to hundreds of Japanese who does not really understand what I am talking about but still buy the idea. And to Taiwan (I speak no Mandarin), to New Zealand to be greeted by a group of friendly Kiwis stranger in the airport who thought that I am some kind of an Asian Steve Jobs. Not forgetting the Indonesians, the Hongkies and the Thais. Oh yes and speaking in London is a blast.

Note: All mention of time, place and people is based on my memory and as you get older they get blurred.

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Masterminding is an effective tool used throughout the centuries to bring about solutions to challenges, problems, goal-achieving and creative brainstorming. On top of these, Masterminding has also helped many people to create wealth and start new income or business opportunities that on their own seem impossible. In the Money Mastery Community, masterminding is one of the 5 pillars of success and all members are required to be part of at least one mastermind group. So the question you might ask is how Masterminding can help you with your own business and your quest for creating more wealth.

History of Masterminding
Andrew Carnegie had a team around him and built the world’s biggest steel manufacturing company. Carnegie went on to become the first great philanthropist – funding over three thousand public libraries throughout the world. Likewise, Bill Gates masterminds regularly with Warren Buffet and others. They have also done the same with their businesses and other ventures…all with help of forming mastermind teams although they may not call it by that name..
Thomas Edison, the world’s greatest inventor, had many mastermind partners. In fact his most famous mastermind partner was Henry Ford. When Mr. Edison’s New Jersey laboratory burnt to the ground, Mr. Ford arrived the next morning and handed Edison a check for $750,000 and encouraged him to “Start building again.” Ford would not accept interest on his loan; he just wanted his best friend to get back to work. Such relationship does not come overnight but takes efforts and maybe years of masterminding.
Great success is only achieved as the result of great teamwork that comes with good masterminding practice. Walt Disney and his brother, Roy. Steven Spielberg and George Lucas. Jack Canfield and Mark Victor Hansen combined, activated and accentuated each others’ talent to create the phenomenally successful Chicken Soup for the Soul series which has sold more than eighty million books worldwide with 29 best selling licensed products including calendars, greeting cards and games.
In my opinion the self-made millionaire simply does not exist….
So what exactly is masterminding?

Masterminding is what happens when several people, in a spirit of harmony, tap into a creative source far more than the collective power of the ones present. Masterminding is the process of individuals connecting with each other in a structured way, united by a common platform and then allowing the interactions to create more solutions than they ever could on their own.
Napoleon Hill coined the concept of the mastermind alliance in his classic book “Think and Grow Rich”. He believed that a group of like-minded, achievement-oriented individuals could dramatically leverage each other’s success.
It is said that “the sum of the whole is greater than its parts” or “two heads are better than one”. You will find that more and more people, in corporations or independent businesses are leveraging and harnessing the power of the mastermind groups to think and achieve bigger.
“One plus one, doesn’t equal two. It becomes the power of eleven.” Mark Victor Hansen
Your greatness lies in your ability to attract to yourself a great team. Unfortunatel;y not every one is capable of starting or sustaining a mastermind team. It needs learning.
With masterminding in practice, you will find yourself on the way to creating more and more streams of income. Remember we need to have MSIs (Multiple Streams/Sources of Income) and not just depend on our PSI (Primary Source of Income).The reason is obvious…in a fast moving market environment you cannot possibly do everything by yourself.

Benefits of Participating in Mastermind

When you mastermind with your team of like-minded people, you are in a safe and non-judgemental environment. Thus you can talk and be listened to safely without worrying about being judged or being exposed. You will have the support and encouragement of a network of successful people to move your business or project forward. This dramatically helps to increase your chances of reaching your financial goals, as this group of people will assist you in the brainstorming process and in finding good solutions and in taking relevant action steps to make it work.

Also when you share your goals and results, you are motivated by accountability. On your own, at times you may let go or slack in the process but when you are with a team, you will take more effort to be responsible for what you have planned to do because if you don’t, the team will make sure you do.

Of course, working in a team will be more fun and when you do get results…there will be more cheers and positive reinforcement towards even greater achievements.

One key benefit of masterminding includes getting helpful feedback & the ability to bounce ideas off the group before you implement action, saving yourself time energy and money. Being in a group with similar objective to succeed, everyone will want the best for the team and you will find solutions to problems from proactive and objective-minded people who want you to succeed at the same time. Synergy of mastermind group lies not in individual success or failures but in the team’s success which means every team member will be successful.

You can then gain increased self-mastery and leadership skills as you support and coach other group members. All these lead you to being a part of something special, a part of something that has continuous growth and long term success. In the long run you will be able to develop meaningful relationships with others. And at times, these relationships may have more impact on your life than any materialistic success.

Getting started
The Mastermind can be directed toward any objective, with one single purpose or each member having different goals. You can start a Mastermind group by having each one discussing their objectives for their business with the group.

Masterminding is how you make more happen in one day than is “realistically possible,” because you’ve got people who have agreed, in the spirit of harmony and good will, to putting focus and energy into the cause.
Have Mastermind groups hold the promise of helping you to deliver on your own commitments to yourself. When everyone puts positive charge in the team, it harnesses an unlimited source of energy and group synergism. You will be building supportive and competent relationships. Masterminding helps you go beyond goal setting to goal GETTING and turns turn stumbling blocks into stepping-stones for success.

In the group, you are tapping the true source of Group Mind Power. With that you are creating strong, healthy self-image that never lets you down, thus helping you to develop an unflappable belief in yourself and your abilities.
Suggested Guidelines
1. Invite ‘givers’ ONLY. In other words, find people who understands the need to give in order to receive. If they don’t have the ‘giving’ nature they will end up destroying the harmony of the group.
2. Coordinate in the spirit of harmony. Complaining or whining, arguing with or negating anyone else’s ideas is not productive. Gently remind people to express positive solutions.
3. Plan a mastermind session bi-weekly or once per month, and make them fun. Try lunches, dinners before or after the weekly conference calls when the energy of the group is naturally high.
4. Start each session with a time “Good News”, Success Stories, or Joke of the day, from the group or even Chicken Soup Books. This generates incredible synergy for the group.
5. Encourage team members to determine their “Top Challenges.” One person can facilitate and lists the challenges out on a board, overhead, or shared electronic media.
6. Keep asking the person ‘what do you need to overcome the challenge?”. Have others contribute ideas as to what he might need.
7. The facilitator can then ask the group, “Who can help him with what he needs?” Then, brainstorm all of the solutions on the overhead/board/media.

One very important fundamental that must be in place in order for mastermind to work is the adoption of the practice of ‘Giving in order to Receive”. The mastermind members must go into every meeting ready and willing to ‘give’ and not focus on their own agenda. The power of this concept is easy to understand when you realise that when everyone gives….every one receives.

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Most people went into the network marketing opportunity because it promises the dream of a wonderful life and great wealth. Indeed it does. However this dream remains unfulfilled for many. Some might and will end up making good income but find that they have to work very hard and in some cases having to make sacrifices that they would rather not make; such as time away from the people they love.
There is nothing wrong with network marketing. It is amazing business model. What might have gone wrong is the way you go about doing it. I tell people that if you are going to enjoy this business which will give you financial success and a dream lifestyle, you have to make it works as easy as you breathe.
Do you have to wake up in the morning and remember to breathe? Obviously not.
The reason why net work marketing is challenging for many is because they ended up doing things that they have to push themselves to do. When net work marketing feels like work and what more, work that you don’t like to do; then it’s going to be a real drag.
So how do we make net work marketing as easy as you breathe? By doing the things you do naturally. Consider one of the most powerful form of “network marketing “which unfortunately nobody gets paid. This happens when you go to a movie and tell someone about it. We do that all the time. And the movie people laugh their way to the bank.But what will make you do that willingly even when you don’t get paid? First; you must like the ‘product’. Secondly you must really want to tell a FRIEND about something you like.
So the first part is to develop a passion for the products of the company. If you have it …talking about it is an easy as you…….
Secondly you need to tell friends about it. Well that is fine if you have a lot of friends to talk to about your products. What if you have limited number of friends? Well I would ask you to make more friends or treat everyone you talk to as a friend you have not yet made and make them into friends
But breathing must become so easy that it become s a habit. Likewise net work marketing MUST BE a habit in order to make it work easily for you.
‘So the first habit we must develop, if you want to succeed in this business is to ”make a new friend a day.” Yes, make a new friend EVERY DAY, and I tell the people that I coach in Tupperware, not to go home until you make that new friend.
I say “make a friend” not “make a sale” (which would be great but would change your approach entirely) and I am not asking to say hi to someone and then immediately start talking about Tupperware or ask if “You want to join Tupperware, ah?”. You will only end up frightening them away.
So if you make new friend a day how many will you have in a month? 25? 30?> Well how many of them do you need to recruit? All of them ……great but you really only need two. How you possibly not succeed when you have acquired the habit of “making a new friend a day?
So when will you start………….make it as easy as you breathe.

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I have been sharing the idea of Multiple Sources of Income( M.S.I.) since I started running Financial Intelligence seminar in 1997. I seldom have anyone disagree with me about the importance of having MSI. Most agree that it is no longer a wish or a nice-to-have. It is the rule of today. However while I can get a 95% agreement I estimate that fewer than 30 % of people out there really have any significant income sources beyond their main job or business. Why? Simple…we are all educated and brought up on a single income source idea. Whilst having more than one source of income is desirable it takes more than just a wish. It requires a change….a change within us. A change in Money Beliefs.

Why you need to have Multiple sources of Income?
In today’s society we need Multiple Sources of Income. Why? Knowing that change is inevitable and things are no longer the way they used to be, if you have only one source of income, that source can disappear overnight. The worst scenario is if you have only one source of income, and the number of days you can survive forward if you stopped working today is very small. You can’t afford to lose that source of income and that puts you in a financial corner.

If you are in a job …look at it today. If a machine or someone willing to take a lower salary than you can replace what you are doing today, you should be really concerned.

For example, just look back 15 years ago. If we needed to deposit cash into the bank, what did we do? We brought our money to a bank teller who counted it and updated our bankbook for us. Now what do we do? We go to a machine that helps us do the same thing.

So what happened to the bank tellers sitting there 15 years ago? Some of them will be promoted to managers, but as we know, promotion only happens to a small group of people. Let’s say out of 20 people, maybe one will move up the ranks. A few more will be able to stay in their positions. But what about the rest? Chances are, they are likely to get the golden handshake.

So you cannot count on having your job for your entire lifetime. You must change to be the one who gets promoted or better yet, you do not want to rely on that job solely as you would have Multiple Sources of Income.
Having Multiple Sources of Income not only helps insulate you in case of job loss but is a step towards creating more wealth so that you can do what you want to do. If your current job is not a passion job, then losing the job is a matter of time or choice, while you build your Multiple Sources of Income.

It’s no different from people who eat unhealthily and never exercise – until something happens to them. By then it may be too late. That’s why doctors always advised that prevention is better than cure.

The same applies here. Why wait to look around for opportunities until after something happens to your one and only paycheck? Start doing it today!

If you are in a business and it gives you the only income you have then you need to realize that we are living in a fast changing world today. Technology changes, government policies changes, market and economic changes are common happenings and will continue to be the case. Especially we are impacted by the fact that we are living in a globalised world. That means unlike twenty years ago whereby changes happening thousands of miles away does not affect us much or it takes a long time before it affects us but we are living in a different world today. Something happening in one country can affects the whole world; from terrorism and conflicts (such as a bomb in Bali) to economic downturns (such as housing loan problems in the United States) to diseases we never heard before (the Sars outbreak) to global warming and natural disasters (the Tsunami in Acheh and the never-before flood in Singapore). All these affects economy, and can affect you and your business.You never really will know.
So while you have a business you should still look at creating other sources of income especially passive income.

A second benefit from Multiple Sources of Income besides independence is choice. When we ask people why they don’t quit their job or the business that they don’t really find any passion in and pursue their dreams, many will say, “You don’t understand! I’ve no choice!”

But if you have only one source of income, isn’t that your own choice? Some of us are still going to say, “You still don’t understand! I’ve no choice because I need to pay all my bills at the end of the month!”

But we do have a choice! What stops us from creating Multiple Sources of Income? If we really want to, we can all find the initial time and energy it takes to create a Money Making Machine.

So it’s not that we don’t have a choice; it may be because we are afraid to take that new step! We are afraid to get out of our comfort zone and take action! We are afraid we could fail!

Yet it is paramount that we overcome our fears. Choice is the human person’s most valuable attribute. We are neither stronger nor faster than animals but we are superior. Why? Because we, unlike animals have a clear conscious mind to make choices. The ability to think, analyze, draw conclusions and choose is perhaps the greatest gift we have as human beings.

And choosing to set up multiple sources of income will give us even more choices after that. Let’s look at this again.

If you have only one paycheck, you have very little choice. You cannot just quit once you don’t like your job anymore. Why? Because yes, you do depend on that one monthly paycheck. However, if you have more than one paycheck, wouldn’t you have more choice?

The same goes with a business owner. Smart business owners make sure the spread their risk and would not put all their eggs in one basket.
The roadmap to being financially free and doing what you love is not rocket science. It’s quite simple and logical. If you start to create multiple sources of income, you position yourself to have more choices.

We can summarize it like that:

Multiple Sources of Income

More Choices

Freedom

Why most people will not have Multiple sources of income?

Many will not be able to actually create real and significant multiple sources of income. Why? Because most mind just does not entertain it. Some people think that income source corresponds directly to job so to get an additional income; we must find an additional job. This resides in the mind of many and that thought of having to do a second ‘job’ would defeat most people. Some would just say .they have no time. Or no money. Or no experience. And a whole list of barriers. Mental barriers.

Well at the end of the day one thing is clear if you really want to migrate from a single income source mentality to multiple source of income you need to be willing to change your mind set. Otherwise it just would not happen. The best and in some cases the only way to do that is to RE-EDUCATE yourself.

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In my previous entry we talked about negative money beliefs that many have in their head and thus limits their thinking and therefore their ability to go the next level financially. Negative money beliefs are like the ceilings over our head; we have to break through ceilings to go further; we have to break these money beliefs.

Another common negative belief is “if we don’t have money we cannot make money.” People keep saying that if you have to have money in order to make money. Many believe that money creates money and would readily use this as an excuse if they are not making any headway in terms of financial success.
Some will use the fact that they don’t have money or capital or that they are not born rich as their excuse, their justification and even to blame. Some even go to the extent of blaming their family background (i.e. lack of money) for hindering their own success. They may make comments such as “I don’t have a rich father” or “I was not fortunate to inherit money.” And the perpetual justification; “if only I have money……..”

All these are just our limiting beliefs. Of course, having inherited money does give you an advantage but not having money should not be a factor that is stopping anyone from improving their financial well-being.
It is an challenge to get others to discard this limiting belief. I often say that “ No Money cannot make Money “ is what rich people tell poor people so that they can remain poor. The only way to people to shift his paradigm is to show them how to do it and in the Money Mastery Community, every member go through the experience of having to make money with no money. Once this is achieved they never look back and never doubt the possibility.

So how is this done? The formula for making money out of no money is actually very simple – use OPM. Other People’s Money.

Many of us cannot accept this. Some of us even think that this is unethical. But this isn’t true at all. Making money with other people’s money is actually a common practice in business! It is done every day! It is all about leverage. We all know that know that banks and listed companies are making lots of money out of your money saved with them! They are using O.P.M. ….your money. One other thing that we all need to realize I sa little secret; rich people make money using as little of their money as possible. They leverage; using institution’s money, government’s money, suppliers money and investor’s money

But to make money out of other people’s money, you will probably need one or more of these three ingredients:

1) A great idea. Not just good but a great idea that gets people excited. A great idea is an idea that no one can resist supporting and putting their money on.
2) Personal credibility. Credibility is the combination of trust plus expertise. For people to trust you, you need to have integrity or be trustworthy. In other words, your reputation needs to be impeccably clean. You also need to have expertise. Expertise refers to the sum of knowledge, experience and ability that produces a certain level of achievement in a particular field.
3) Friends. This is the most important. Before you start to learn to make money, you must first learn to make a lot of friends. You need a lot of good friends. Rich people are good at making friends.

Belonging to a community of people who are credible and have great ideas is a good starting point.

As Robert Kiyosaki said, “Your network determines your net worth”, it would be worthwhile to note that who we are and what we will become is often determined by first the friends and the people we mix with. Surrounding yourself with the right kind of people is essential. It would be easier for you to approach the right people to support or finance your idea and most people will be happy to do so if you have an awesome idea and they believe in you because of your personal credibility. That is one of the reasons why I created the Money Mastery Community.

So once you have these three ingredients in place, start strategizing how you can use OPM to finance your ideas and turn them into Money Making Machines. When you start to create wealth, you are also benefiting the people whom you borrowed the money from, because you will be paying them interest for their investments.

If you look closely at these three ingredients, you’d noticed they are what any employer or business partner will ask you. Typically they’d ask for proof of concept, a good track record and a good network of suppliers, customers and partners.

Accepting Total Responsibility

If you plan to be financially successful, then you might want to start taking total responsibility for what you are and who you will become. We need to stop blaming our lack of financial success on the government, on the economy, our parents or our spouse, our lack of education or money or anything else under the sky

Human beings have a natural instinct to defend themselves because they feel the need to be right. People blame, justify and find excuses because they want to say, “Not my fault.” The fear of failure is in every one of us although none of us like to admit it. When we blame, justify or find excuses, we are indirectly saying someone else failed and not us!

This is further reinforced when we leave school and join the working world. The culture in some traditional companies is for employees to accept as few responsibilities as possible, at the same time always looking for someone to point their fingers to when a challenge arises.

The fear of failure is one of the main reasons why most people don’t do anything, even if presented with a fantastic opportunity! And if they don’t get the financial success they want they very easily come out with all the ‘reasons”. Learning not to blame . justify or to make excuses is a first step towards taking total responsibility for what happened, learning from it and moving on. Then the world of great financial abundance will be all around you.

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