Jonathan Farrington’s Blog

“Prince Rabadash’s army lay close behind them, Anvard ahead. If they did not reach Anvard before Rabadash and his horde, their journey, their entire lives, would have been wasted. The horses, Bree and Hwin (both of whom could, of course, talk) galloped. Certainly both horses were doing, if not all they could, all they thought they could do; which is not quite the same thing. But a lion appeared out of nowhere and with the spur of terror; Bree now discovered that he had not really been going as fast, not quite as fast, as he could”.

This extract is of course taken from “The Chronicles of Narnia”, that fount of a million, simple and usually overlooked truths and it illustrates perfectly what it takes for some of us to be steered out of our comfort zone.

Perhaps of all the temptations we meet in life, money, power, sex, alcohol, drugs and fame,(but not necessarily in that order), the subtlest of all is the comfort zone, that invitation to settle for less, to go for content when the stresses of over achievement beckon. The way that takes you out of the comfort zone is the route less travelled by. Most of us when we come to that place where the two paths divide prefer the one that leads to safety, to warmth and to comfort.

Both in sport and in business, I have witnessed countless companies, friends, colleagues and team-mates that underachieved, despite having far superior skills and talents when compared to others who have made it to the top. The reason has always been the same; fear of leaving the comfort zone and entering into the unknown, the land potentially of failure and rejection.

All successful people have at least two things in common: The first is their attitude and the second is that they all expect to be successful and because they want it badly enough, they bring about its happening, i.e. fulfilled expectation.

The drive has to come from within because no one else is going to make us successful, they are too busy minding their own stores: From Einstein, an overused but highly significant quote:”The definition of insanity is to continue to do the same things in the hope that those things will miraculously achieve a different result.” In other words, “Keep doing what you are doing and you will keep getting what you have been getting”If you don’t like it, you have the power to change it.

My experience is that you cannot have everything you want but you can have anything you really want – you just have to work out what it is.

This week on BlogTalkRadio, my guest was Clayton Shold of Salesopedia.com – who, as anticipated, provided some insightful and refreshing commentary on a host of “article community” topics and lots of other things as well – you can listen to the full interview here, or read a transcript here.

I promised to keep you fully updated with the progress we are making on “Top Ten Sales Articles” - well, the site design and layout has been agreed and the team have been burning the midnight oil to ensure we achieve our launch date, which is Sunday April 1st and no I am not fooling.

Our primary objective is to provide a single location where time strapped business captains, sales professionals and publishers can locate the very best business articles every week. For authors we offer a unique opportunity to showcase their work and benchmark the quality of their writing against that of their contempories.

So How Does It Work? – Each week we will research and evaluate sales articles submitted to all the main article communities: We will then effectively perform a cull until we arrive at the ten best pieces of work. Then a panel of globally recognised sales experts will make their decision. The winner will be announced here and on the blog every Sunday and a fresh set of reviews posted. From the four weekly winners we will choose a monthly winner and logically from the twelve monthly winners we will select the Article Of The Year. All overviews will remain on site in weekly and monthly archived sections, providing an ongoing reference point for visitors.

And finally: I have posted two new articles this week – on my personal site: www.jonathanfarrington.com “Negotiation – Planning For A Successful Outcome” highlights the fact that it is imperative to plan prior to entering into a negotiation - here is a brief extract:

“In any kind of negotiation the planning stage is probably the most important. Too often we go in badly prepared and end up giving concessions that reduce the overall profitability of the final deal. The importance of planning is in having a very clear idea before entering into the negotiation i.e……..”

On the group site: www.thejfagroup.com – you will find: “The Seven Essential Qualities Of Leadership” An opportunity to benchmark yourself? And yes, you are right of course, there are more than ten, but I wanted to highlight the most critical, based on my own experience:

– “Although there are many qualities necessary to be a genuine leader in a specific situation, these qualities should be common to all.”

Finally, I have been following the “debate” on ProBlogger: www.problogger.net where a number of excellent bloggers have been discussing how often is too often, when it comes to posting. As you know my preference is for just one entry every week and I aim for quality over quantity – that goes for every facet of my life. Apart from anything else, my decision is based around the time constraints that I am currently working within. However, if you have a view on this, I would be delighted if you posted a comment – do you think I should post more frequently? – or maybe you think less!!

As ever, wherever you are in the world, have a great week and thank you!

JF

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