Entrepreneurs often need to be creative to have a profitable business. What do you do when you aren’t a creative person? In this episode, business coaches Dan Sullivan and Shannon Waller talk about the “why” and “how” of imitating other people in order to achieve business success.Here's some of what you'll learn in this episode:Why we imitate other people’s performance.The reason Dan never attends workshops by other coaches.How real creativity involves grafting.How uses of technology can be a step back instead of a step forward.Show Notes:There are two timeless ways of learning and improving yourself: imitating other people's performance, and repetition.Humans are the only species that can use their brains to access the uniqueness of other people's brains.We all imitate other people, whether we like to admit it or not.If you're creative, and you come across someone who's more creative, you imitate, but at a certain point, you make it your own.What an imitating person does, and for how long they do it, tells you whether they're just an imitator or whether they're creative.If you appreciate someone else’s skills, you can translate them into your own world.Creative people can be polarizing.You create a new capability using vision and obstacles.The combination of two people’s uniqueness creates something brand new.People who imitate but aren’t creative are stealing.In a world of AI imitation, creative people are going to get wildly more creative to differentiate themselves from robots.Resources:Unique Ability®Your Life As A Strategy Circle by Dan Sullivan

Discover why being busy is not a measure of success for entrepreneurs and how it can actually hinder results. Learn about the mindset differences between corporations and entrepreneurial companies, and the importance of focusing on achieving productive results rather than being busy. Explore strategies for setting measurable goals, promoting teamwork, and leveraging unique skills for success.

Learn what it takes to be a 10x entrepreneur, including having measurable goals and a growth mindset. Explore the significance of finding the right fit and striving for greater capability. Discover how Strategic Coach helps individuals become 10x entrepreneurs. Emphasize the importance of social relationships and finding a growth-oriented community. Unlock ambition and set tangible goals with a specific exercise.

Every entrepreneur should expect surprises because surprises are a part of reality. How you respond to them is key to whether you’re a happy, successful entrepreneur. In this episode, business coaches Dan Sullivan and Shannon Waller discuss how entrepreneurs can use both good and bad surprises for business success and business growth.Here's some of what you'll learn in this episode:Why really successful entrepreneurs don’t care if a surprise is good or bad.How bad surprises can turn into good surprises.What happens to people who try to make the future free of surprises.The best way to respond to good surprises.The best mindset to have when it comes to bad surprises.Show Notes:Being taken by surprise means nothing you were preparing for, or nothing you expected to happen, actually happened.You can do different things with a good surprise than you can with a bad surprise, and vice versa.More clearly than almost anything else, surprises tell you what kind of person you are.With bad surprises, you have no choice about how you have to respond because your survival may be at stake.You can decide that whenever you’re inconvenienced, you’ll get a much bigger result instead of just getting back to where you were.People who are entrepreneurial take greater advantage of bad surprises than good surprises.Good surprises can help you up your level of ambition.You have very, very little control over events outside of yourself.Resources:The Front Stage/Back Stage Model® articleWho Not How by Dan Sullivan and Dr. Benjamin HardyThe Gap And The Gain by Dan Sullivan and Dr. Benjamin Hardy10x Is Easier Than 2x by Dan Sullivan and Dr. Benjamin HardyThe Experience Transformer® toolScary Times Success Manual by Dan Sullivan

The world has become more competitive, and many people are focused on the concept of fairness. In this episode, business coaches Dan Sullivan and Shannon Waller explain what fairness really means and what every entrepreneur needs to understand to avoid certain dangers.Here's some of what you'll learn in this episode:The different definitions of “fairness.”Why you shouldn’t compare yourself to others.How there’s a touch of envy in talking about fairness.How to recognize your uniqueness and avoid false comparisons.Show Notes:No one knows what it’s like to be someone else.Who you are can be modified by who other people are.Reactive and creative are opposites.The word “fairness” is a fairly recent creation.The present understanding of fairness touches on equality.Fairness is a social term, not a descriptive term.A lot in our world supports the fact that things should be fair.Uniqueness means looking inside and knowing who you are.If you’re looking for fairness, you can’t find out who you are.Resources:“Geometry” For Staying Cool & Calm by Dan SullivanCliftonStrengths®ENVY: A Theory of Social Behaviour by Helmut SchoeckWho Not How by Dan Sullivan and Dr. Benjamin HardyThe Gap And The Gain by Dan Sullivan and Dr. Benjamin Hardy10x Is Easier Than 2x by Dan Sullivan and Dr. Benjamin HardyUnique Ability®Unique Ability® 2.0: Discovery by Catherine Nomura, Julia Waller, and Shannon WallerThe Kolbe A™ Index

Entrepreneurs should choose role models carefully; Dan Sullivan discusses his five role models and their influence. The significance of Euclid's principles in modern construction. Exploring congruency, consistency, and the US Constitution. Visiting historical sites and Thomas Edison's contributions. The impact of role models on entrepreneurs and levels of success.

Business coaches discuss the importance of hospitality and treating customers like human beings. They emphasize the value of personal connection, being interested rather than just interesting, and showing genuine appreciation for clients. They highlight how technology can diminish the sense of connection and the need to up one's hospitality game to stand out from the competition. The speakers also stress the significance of making personal connections, showing interest, and forming genuine connections with others in a technology-driven world.

How do you stand firm in a world that seems to be in flux? It’s easier than you might think. In this episode, business coaches Dan Sullivan and Shannon Waller explain the three rules for staying cool and calm so you can achieve business success and business growth no matter what’s happening in the world.Here's some of what you'll learn in this episode:Why entrepreneurs don’t need to ask permission to create.The importance of company ground rules.Why it’s helpful for entrepreneurs to recognize that life isn’t fair.Why some people need to be controlled by other people’s lawsThe real definition of creativity.The five “credibility rules.”Show Notes:If you want somebody to be in charge, you have to be the one in charge.If we aren’t enforcing the rules, the rules don’t matter.All the knowledge that we have was made up by someone.After you make something up, you have to communicate it in such a way that other people will find it useful.Entrepreneurs are the masters of making up new things.Political leaders aren’t in charge; they’re fulfilling a role according to a set of rules.Your new ideas will advantage some people and disadvantage others.There used to be so much scarcity in the world that you couldn’t think about things like fairness and equality.Freedom is maximizing being inside of restrictions.Nothing you come up with has any value until somebody is willing to write you a check for it.Economic breakdown usually comes from government mismanagement.Rules allow you to have your attention on the main thing rather than on the small things.Resources:“Geometry” For Staying Cool & Calm by Dan SullivanThe Impact Filter™

Every so often, there are major world events that affect things economically and can lead to people feeling a lot of uncertainty. In this episode, business coaches Dan Sullivan and Shannon Waller talk about the best business strategy an entrepreneur can take to make sure their business not only survives, but thrives while other people are feeling uncertain about the future.Here's some of what you'll learn in this episode:How Strategic Coach® acquired a whole new capability during COVID lockdowns.The advice Dan gave clients after 9/11.What a lot of people’s futures depend on.The single question that will renew clients’ sense of their future.Things clients can work on while cash flow is an issue.Why it’s really easy to compete during an economic downturns.Why Dan predicts scary times for most of the world over the coming decades.Show Notes:Big companies and corporations make all their gains and market share during bad times. Economic downturns are always going to happen, so it makes sense to develop a skill around them. Instead of worrying about yourself, you have to give other people a chance to be clear about their future. As the leader of the company, your number one daily job during uncertain times is to keep everybody's confidence high. Everybody is coming from different worlds when they come into work. You should come out of a period of uncertainty with the same team you went into it with in terms of numbers and in terms of the power of your team. When uncertainty happens, most people lose their ability to take action. You haven’t solved a problem until you can laugh about it. Your job during uncertain times is to go out and create new futures for all of your clients and prospects. A client’s money is frozen when their brain is frozen. Resistance and uncertainty are normal for entrepreneurs. If you allow external forces to control your future, you’re not being an entrepreneur.Resources:The Positive Focus® toolScary Times Success Manual by Dan SullivanThe Dan Sullivan Question by Dan SullivanPeter Zeihan’s YouTube channel

Entrepreneurs innovate by drawing connections between things that haven’t been linked before. But how can you go about making such connections? In this episode, business coaches Dan Sullivan and Shannon Waller explain Dan’s latest breakthrough thinking tool, The Triple Play.Here's some of what you'll learn in this episode:How creativity is a method you can master.How you can tell whether an activity is creative.What types of connections get people excited.Why Dan preferred to make his own toys as a child.Show Notes:We don’t discover connections; we make connections.Creativity is connecting things where you didn’t see the connection before.Not many people are creative enough to build an independent career in the marketplace.You’re not really creative if you’re not surprising yourself.Your brain can’t ignore a question.Children play according to a method of connecting things that don’t belong together.People's directed usefulness is achieved at the cost of creativity.Imaginative thinkers make more money than people who are uniform and predictable.Creating connections is how our brains get used to the world.Resources:Capitalism—And Everything Else by Dan SullivanYour Life As A Strategy Circle by Dan SullivanUnique Ability®Visual Thinking by Dr. Temple Grandin