cartoon by @gapingvoid
Here is something I am taking action on as I launch some new projects in 2010. Not by any real design, but turns out I am starting the year with three new clients – just this week alone. And I am chatting soon with a former client, and we are about to engage on a brand new project.
So, while it is a fluke that all this new activity is happening in January 2010, I am using the new year to take a new approach with these new client projects.
What am I doing differently? I am making a bigger push than ever before on my vendor engagement. In fact, I have released a few past vendors, and have engaged some fresh faces.
This is really exciting to me, as this will give me some new souls to bounce ideas off, and a fresh perspective on some things. This has done a lot to recharge my batteries.
And in the end, I think it will serve my clients very well. I am NOT suggesting that my work prior to this point was mediocre, but I am looking at these refreshing new partners as if I was striving to up my game. And make it better. As if I was telling “mediocrity” to kiss my fanny.
And you can’t imagine how this is firing up my creativity!
So, the simple point of this post is to remind you to think about doing something like this in your business. Take things you have been doing, whether they are standard protocol, routine, comfortable – and shake things up a bit. Be like John Keating in Dead Poets Society, and stand on a desk and look at your world a little differently.
Pick something that needs a little shaking up, such as how you interact on social media, how you present your company while networking, how you shape your customer experience, or how you deal with your vendors – and make it a point to seriously question how you can do those things better.
Don’t settle for anything mediocre – make your business lives extraordinary!
