“We choose to go to the moon. We choose to go to the moon in this decade and do the other things, not because they are easy, but because they are hard, because that goal will serve to organize and measure the best of our energies and skills, because that challenge is one that we are willing to accept, one we are unwilling to postpone, and one which we intend to win, and the others, too. “

- President John F. Kennedy Space Challenge

Problem.

Challenge.

When President Kennedy gave that speech in 1962, he made a clear choice to look forward and to view the Space Race as a challenge and an opportunity – and it set the tone for the US Space Program and innovation in the US for the next 10 to 20 years.

The ability to choose to see the challenge and the opportunity rather than the problem is key to a business owner’s long term potential for success.

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photo by wili hybrid 

There are times when we make things harder than they have to be.

It can be really hard to grow your business – when you’re still in the first couple of years, not only are you doing all the work but you’re still going through a major learning curve.  When you’re more established you’re even busier doing the work and it’s likely that you’ve picked up some bad habits or you’re just exhausted from stress and working long hours.

Either way there are a lot of challenges, but at least a few of those challenges end up being self imposed.

Let me give you an example that came up during this morning’s peer group advisory board meeting.  The group is in the process of doing planning for 2009 and today one of my clients was presenting his marketing plan to the group.

Overall he did a great job pulling the plan together and he got a lot of good feedback and few ideas that he hadn’t previously considered but the most interesting part of the conversation was on 2 points in the plan that he was clearly conflicted on.

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photo by Ben Alford 

I was at a networking event the other day and one of the people that I was meeting with remarked “You’re a Connector, aren’t you?”.

Malcolm Gladwell popularized the term Connector in his best selling book The Tipping Point a few years ago.  Simplistically Connectors are people that know a lot of other people, although a more complete explanation would be people that actively build connections with an intention to find win-win situations.

On a more generic level, I look at connecting as the evolution of networking – the goal for connecting is to actively listen to the people you meet and do your best to help them out – often by introducing them to someone that can potentially help them, either a prospect, a collaboration partner of some sort or a solutions provider.

My approach to networking for the last year or so has been to work hard at becoming a connector, so it was nice to be recognized (although that’s not why I’m doing it).

Why do I want to be a connector (and why do I think you should be a connector?  Read on!

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