Is That So?

I was recently listening to a CBC radio program in which a neurologist (David Perlmutter) was talking about the harmful effect of carbohydrates and sugars on the brain.  As I understood the discussion, the body’s defensive mechanism against carbs and gluten is inflammation.  It was this inflammation that had the neurologist concerned.  He attributed the onset in later life of brain degenerative issues such as Alzheimer’s and Parkinson’s disease to the inflammatory effects of carbohydrates and gluten.  He also indicated that excessive carb intake contributes to ADHD, heart disease, diabetes, depression and obesity.  His bottom line was that our dietary choices shall have a huge impact on our future quality of life.

Interestingly, a second scientist (Carol Greenwood) spoke to the benefits of carbohydrates and whole grains.  Her general take on dietary choice was one of balance.

Hmm.  What to believe?

I have started to count my daily carbohydrate intake and intentionally kept it under the suggested daily intake of about 260 grams.  Coincidentally or not, I have shed about 3.5 lb over the past five days, in combination with four exercise outings.

Part of my purpose in writing this blog is to point out a related (at least it is in my mind) but different subject and that is the idea of life long learning.  My interest in learning new ideas about diet is equally applicable to my overall interest in life long learning.  As a business coach, I find that most business subjects/concepts/ideas have relevance outside the workplace.  But the important point for me is having an attitude towards life long learning.

For a long time I’ve felt that I like the idea of being smarter tomorrow than I am today.  For this to happen, I have to be open to the possibility of learning.

I would encourage everyone to embrace the benefits that come with learning.

Grow or Wither?

Growing your business is something that most entrepreneurs strive to do. The reasons that they want to grow their businesses are many and varied and they include the following: increase profit; position it to sell at a higher value in the future; provide employment opportunities; contribute back to the community; build something for their family; satisfy their competitive nature; they never quit.  Regardless of the specific reason, most small business owners are looking for ways to grow.  Without growth, the business owner runs the risk of stagnation.  You should know that 95% of all new businesses in Canada fail within their first five years of operation.  So, we can ask ourselves this simple question.  Do we grow or do we run the risk of withering?

There are numerous resources that we can call upon in order to support our business planning and decision making.  One very comprehensive source for content is Small Business Solver.  This is a web based resource that is chock full of information that can be used to help guide the small business owner to a greater understanding of how to succeed in his/her business.  Small Business Solver provides subject matter content via over 200 learning modules, webinars, tutorials, and useful financial and planning templates.  There is also a significant discount offering from Staples that is provided as part of the low annual subscription price.

If you believe in life long learning and the enrichment that this attitude delivers, then I’d encourage you to consider a $250 (plus tax) subscription to Small Business Solver.  If you purchase this subscription from my website, you will also receive a full behaviour and motivator assessment complete with a one hour orientation session, at no additional cost.  This assessment alone is priced at $499.  The return on a Small Business Solver investment is significant.

Let Small Business Solver assist you in positioning your business for a future that is bigger than your present.

BIZBUZZ – Barry Nalebuff and Ian Ayres; Why Not

This is episode 3 of BIZBUZZ.

I stimulate conversations that challenge business owners to consider new possibilities and to act boldly.  This video highlights those takeaways from Barry Nalebuff and Ian Ayres that made the greatest impact on me in their book Why Not.

Hi, I’m Gary Brown a FocalPoint business coach.

Welcome to BIZBUZZ.

I’ve chosen to comment on Why Not, a book co-written by Barry Nalebuff and Ian Ayres that deals with the subject of problem solving.

The three suggestions that interest me in this book are:

Principled problem solving.  The authors suggest that you identify the constraints that your solution must satisfy.  These constraints are then used to generate ideas.  You then re-evaluate the constraints to determine if any of them are artificial and cause you to limit your vision.  Interesting.

My second take-away is described as ‘flipping it’.  You write a declarative statement that describes the current practice that needs improvement.  You then stress various nouns and verbs in the statement and then try ‘flipping’ them by inserting the opposite meaning into your statement.  Does flipping things around suggest a solution to your current problem or perhaps to a different problem?  This doesn’t sound like something most of us would normally do.  But, why not?

The third notion is that self-interest will sometimes lead us to do the wrong thing.  Sellers will sometimes take actions that in fact provide less benefit for themselves than the harm these actions cause their customers.  You need to think about this one.

That’s it for Why Not.

Thanks for watching.

Your comments are always welcome.

Stay tuned for more BIZBUZZ.

Goal Setting

My wife and I were recently on a cycling vacation in Tucson, Arizona with friends.  One of the suggested rides at the local bike store was tackling the ascent of Mount Lemmon.  This sounded like a challenge but one worthy of pursuit.  We decided that our goal would be to ride halfway to the summit.  This represented an elevation change of about 3000 feet over a distance of approximately 12 miles (20 km).

I couldn’t help but think that this cycling goal was no different than any goal that we would set for ourselves in our respective business lives.  Goals need to follow the SMART acronym in order to pass muster.  That is they need to be: Specific; Measureable; Aligned with one’s values; Realistic; and Time based.  A twelve mile ride up a constant 5-6% grade met these requirements.

The higher we climbed, the more I realized the value of setting sub-goals.  In other words, some goals should be pursued by completing discrete steps along the way.  You’ve probably heard the description of eating an elephant – one bite at a time.  One of the benefits of this approach is that it allows us to focus on the steps that are immediately ahead of us.  We are able to see progress towards the ultimate goal as we achieve the milestones along the way.  During our ride, I found that many of my sub-goals were simply reaching the next road marker, bush or outcrop of rock.

The ride objective was achieved and the ride downhill was our reward for the uphill journey.  Goal achievement is an extremely satisfying result that accrues from the goal setting process.