“Don’t envy the rich, be one!”
Think and Grow Rich
When it comes to accumulating massive wealth and growing rich, people stock up their shelves with countless personal finance books. They try to learn the lessons on optimizing the money, in other words, spend less than you earn, save more than you spend, invest carefully, retire earlier than planned, and eventually, get out of debt as soon as possible, and solve just about every financial conundrum in between. As much as truth resides in their recipe, they fail to compete with a 78-year-old book by Napoleon Hill.
“When riches take the place of poverty, the change is usually brought about through well conceived and carefully executed plans.” “Poverty needs no plan. It needs no one to aid it because it is bold and ruthless. Riches are shy and timid. They have to be ‘attracted.” -Napoleon Hill
Great Depression-era author and former advisor to President Franklin D. Roosevelt, Hill conducted a series of interviews with over half a thousand most successful men of the country. He claimed to have figured out the key to their good fortune. He gathered his notes and he synchronized all of his insights in a 200-page package and published “Think and Grow Rich,” which had sold over 20 million copies before Hill passed away.
Now that you have read more than half of this book you should know the willpower, perseverance, and the madness to achieve something. Wishing will not make you instantly rich. It is not a fairy tale, only if it were possible, nobody would value hard work, determination, and delegation.
If you desire to be a rich person and you have got the right state of mind for it, turn this desire into an obsession, for no one is as committed as obsessed people are. Once you have the passion to run with, get a pre-defined direction, and start planning definite ways and means to acquire your goals and objectives that you have set. If you are a rational one you would keep backing those plans with a persistence that does not recognize failure, and you will attain success.
To accumulate massive wealth and grow rich is no rocket science. I have been saying throughout that you do not need to be the best, most intelligent, or most powerful, you just have to be dedicated to the cause. Take a look at these six steps that will help you build a massive empire.
- To begin with, finalize the exact amount of money you desire, more or less but it has to be as precise as possible. Merely quoting a statement, “I want plenty of money,” “I want to be filthy rich”, etc. won’t be sufficient. You have to give it a definite amount.
- Once the figure is glued to your mind, evaluate the risks involved. Whatever business you choose to be in, any industry or venture, everything is prone to some risks. In addition to that, you will have to make some sacrifices; you will have to endure the pain, the sweat, and the suffering. If you have to achieve something that you never did before then you will have to do things you never did before. Determine what you can give in return for the wealth you desire, for there is no success without sacrifice.
- Now that you have evaluated the situations including the risks and opportunities, it is time to decide on a definite date as to when you intend to possess the desired wealth. Because unless you have a fixed point of time in the future you will keep on procrastinating or make unnecessary excuses, which will hamper your aim to achieve the goal.
- As soon as you decide on a date prepare a substantial plan and design it according to your strengths and weaknesses. Define your short-term objectives and simultaneously focus on long-term goals as well. At once put this plan into action.
- The fifth step involves writing your mission, vision, and the ire layout of a plan, hence making it simple and clear to comprehend. Include brief statements about the amount of wealth you intend to acquire, the time period for its acquisition, and the sacrifices you are willing to make. Describe clearly and completely the plan through which you intend to acquire it.
- The final step of the procedure will require the reading aloud of your written statements, reviewing them twice daily, once just before retiring at night, and once after arising in the morning. The more you read it, the more you will be inspired and motivated to attain success.
Now, you must be wondering what it seems pretty basic and plain. To let you in on a secret, pick up any personal finance guide you like, and you will find exactly the same simple steps. The only difference, if there would be one, will be of a few fancy words and some twisted statements.
The beauty of outsourcing is astonishing
You hear stories about successful business owners who have a ridiculously tight work schedule on paper at least. Their productive hours, on average, are at least 16 hours per day and that is pure, unadulterated work. But at the same time, you will see them having one of the most flexible and free schedules, like summer vacation perhaps. Owing to this to the nature of their business they have to travel for many reasons, also socializing is a very crucial part of their lifestyle.
How can someone manage something like that after all? Don’t they sleep? Are they machines or what? The only answer to this question is outsourcing.
Contradictory to popular belief, outsourcing is an amazingly productive way to generate quality. Also, it assures that both parties are being equally benefitted.
We all have heard the saying, “If only I had more hours in the day”. To your utter surprise, one can secure as many hours as he/she wants in a single day by the virtue of outsourcing. Confused a bit? Let’s suppose that you have to finish 11 projects and you alone have the resources to complete 5. What do you do?
This is where hiring a virtual worker comes into the picture. When you distribute the work among those people, you distribute the load and this practice gives you extra time to focus on other essentials. You can utilize your spare time to enjoy your favorite outdoor sport, spending time with family or friends or you can plan to spike-up your business.
Outsourcing most of your business activities to virtual workers will not only help you to reduce your working hours but you will increase your income too. You will build your empire faster than you would ever be able to do by yourself. Because when you work alone, regardless of the fact of how talented you are, your efficiency will be limited to a certain area. But when you outsourced the task, your workload decreases, you put more effort into new projects, you create quality, and quality creates an empire.
Also, outsourcing will reduce the tension of babysitting your employees at the office; it will give you freedom of location. Virtual workers are known for working with their own style and process, all you have to do is give them clear cut instructions and they are good to go.
Outsourcing is such an astonishing attribute a business owner can have to grow his/her business while they travel and pursue other interests. It is quite obvious that it is not a completely hands-off thing and will not have any of its cons. Over-optimization, exploitation of the virtual workers, and putting uncanny stress on them will be an act that will reflect your unprofessionalism. All good business owners are well aware of the fact that it would be foolhardy to make it extremely handy.
If you merge the process of delegation and outsourcing and you treat them like collaboration, not only will the quality of your output increase, but also you will have a chance to improve the relationship and trust with those you are working with.
Delegation is the key
The process of learning to be able to trust others so that they can assist you in the completion of tasks and projects can be termed as a delegation. While it can stretch the domain of its definition, delegation in some cases implies training, nurturing, and developing other people’s skillsets for the tasks that do not require your immediate attention. In some situations you handover the project or the particular task to someone you trust enough with their expertise more than your own.
Either way, a profound delegation will drive only successful results. Not only will it contribute to enhanced productivity, enhanced quality, and improved focus of the entire team but also it will give you extra time to spend on other things. In addition to improving quality by delegating to one who has a skilled, personal focus on tasks, and something they enjoy, and knows how to complete, you can now oversee and provide quality control.
Delegation develops effectiveness when it allows work to be relocated to people whose skills go right along with the task. Being a business owner, you are in charge of planning and strategizing steps for your team. When your employees, teammates that is, are able to carry out most of the routine activities required of your team, it will provide you with enough time and effort to plan for your team’s next move. This efficiency may also lessen your stress as your team will share your workload.
If you are rather selective about whom you delegate the tasks to, you will identify and then categorize the ventures and projects according to a particular individual’s expertise, skill sets, and interests. The science behind it is really simple. It is human nature that we are likely to produce better results, in less time when we work on tasks that drive our passion and we enjoy doing. We are familiar with their how’s, what’s when’s, and other kinds of questions. The most phenomenal and obvious result of delegating or outsourcing is a sudden spike in productivity, it is because there are now more people working on the same list of deliverables, thus improving turnaround time, and enhancing productivity.
As a business owner not only is it your moral duty but a professional responsibility to continuously seek growth and expansion of your company. Your mission, vision, and core values should be intact and your goals should be highly optimized and you must accomplish them in due time. Just to be clearer, I am not suggesting micro-management, I am seconding the theory that two heads are always better than one.
However, if you get yourself involved in petty things like we discussed in one of the former chapters you will make it less likely to seek success in the actual completion of operations. Again, you have to understand that there is a difference between an uninvolved leader and a person who is well aware of his responsibilities.
Once you have set your venture on the level where it is capable of running without your daily supervision and still produce enough profit, I suggest you start delegating. If you are bogged down in daily, weekly, or even monthly operational and administrative tasks, you will have no time, energy left that will be sufficient to devote to the vision needed to grow your company.
In addition to this – As the visionary, you will be rather more satisfied, productive, and creative when allowed to focus on your passion.