Find yourself and fuck the others...
Find your own style if you want to succeed as an entrepreneur or leader. You can learn a lot from others, but you should not become a copy of them. Take what suits you, try it out and throw the rest away.
The video is from 29 March 2010. I am back in Florida after a week in Denmark, where we had lovely weather and a fantastic Aminotastic evening with 300 enthusiastic entrepreneurs. Here, it is bloody raining. But that is another matter. What I am still thinking about is how differently people can achieve success.
Find your own style among different role models
There were several excellent speakers at Aminotastic. I want to highlight two, not because they were necessarily better than the others, but because the difference between them gave me something to think about.
Stig Severinsen told stories about how he had become good at what he did and well known. He was a four-time world champion and also brought stories about the stuffed toy cat Bøf. He had taken more than 10,000 pictures of that cat. I tease him a little about whether he even realises the cat is not alive.
Stig showed a wheel model where you could divide up different areas, including training and diet, and assess where you stood yourself. He worked systematically on both his body and his mind to perform as well as possible.
It was enormously convincing. I think many entrepreneurs sat there thinking we bloody well need to be more structured. I did too: Perhaps I should get better at structuring my everyday life.
Then came a completely different approach to success
At the end, Mogens from Miracle came on. He is a lively character. He had brought a trophy, which he filled to the brim with porter.
He was really only supposed to speak for twenty minutes, but the talk was so fantastic that he was allowed to stay on for about an hour. And his way of talking about his business was completely different from the structured approach I had just heard.
When he and his business partners wanted to do something new, such as a microbrewery, they asked each other: What is the worst that can happen? Then came the answer: Your dick falls off. And the next person might add that the worst thing would probably be if you could not hear it happen.
That was the kind of decision-making process he described, and then they decided to do it. He also had a mantra about more or less saying yes to whatever he was asked.
As I experienced his story, he was very opportunistic and very unstructured. He said he had no middle managers and went around enjoying various things. He dived, made videos online because it was fun and tried things out.
You could sit there thinking: Sure, Mr Smart Guy, what the hell have you achieved? But in the video, I explain that he had 110 employees, had appeared in Den Hemmelige Millionær and was very successful. He had achieved something big in his own way, just as Stig had in his world.
There is no single formula for success
That is where my point lies. We are different people. There is no single formula for leadership or becoming a successful entrepreneur that you can simply copy and be sure will work for you. Also read Skab din egen succes about finding your own way.
I also tell a story about skier Alberto Tomba, whose name I stumble over a little in the video. The story goes that he could celebrate success before a race with partying, women and alcohol and still go out and win the next day. I use it as an anecdote about differences, not as training advice or a documented account of his routines.
Others train, focus, meditate, use coaches and do strength training. Some win and some lose. Looking at a winner’s habits and concluding everyone else should do exactly the same is not enough.
Treat the inspiration as a buffet
The reason you should listen to me, Mogens, Mikkel deMib, Stig and others who have achieved something is that you can get inspiration. You should not regard us as people who have a ready-made formula for your life.
See it as a buffet. Take the best of what you see around you and try it on yourself. If it works for you, keep it. If it does not, throw it away.
What you discard may well be something Mærsk Mc-Kinney Møller, Stig Severinsen or I have done successfully. That doesn’t make it wrong for them. It just means it isn’t necessarily right for you.
Get to know yourself and use your strengths
In my opinion, being successful requires being comfortable with yourself and getting to know yourself incredibly well. Meet people who have achieved something, and take away the little bits that feel right in your hands and come naturally out of your mouth.
If you try to be someone else, you come across as fake to the people around you. You’ll drift back towards who you are anyway, and then it’s hard to maintain a style that doesn’t suit you.
If you sleep until ten every day, you don’t necessarily have to turn yourself into a copy of someone who gets up very early. Perhaps you have other strengths you should put to work.
Find the strength in yourself. Accept that it may take three, five or ten years before you really know yourself. Finding what fits your way of leading, being an entrepreneur and making money takes work. But that’s the path I believe in. People who try to copy others don’t get far.
Best wishes, Martin
Location:Yamato Rd,Boca Raton,USA
Super-fed pointe: vær dig selv.
Der er ingen tvivl om at dette er guld værd for dem som lytter.
Jeg kan ej heller sige mig fri for måske at være lidt for midtsøgende engang imellem, og dette var absolut et pletskud. Vi kan ikke gøre alle glade, men ved at være os selv kan vi sikre, at dem som kan lide os passer til den person vi er. Det vil stensikkert øge ens brand.
Tak for dit indlæg. Håber vejret bliver bedre i Florida. 🙂