152. 9 Principles for Unstoppable Success
(Episode 2 of 2 with Kelly Roach)
Welcome back to another episode of Monetization Nation. In our last episode with Kelly Roach, we discussed strategies to successfully run live product launches, Kelly’s entrepreneurial journey, and the power of collaboration. In today’s episode, we’ll be discussing nine principles for success from Kelly’s book Unstoppable.
It’s Never Too Late
Before we dive into these principles, Kelly talked about another topic in her book that really resonated with me: it’s never too late to start to dream big and achieve amazing success. Kelly shares several examples of people who didn’t achieve success until a little later in their lives.
Julia Child was 39 before she published her first cookbook. After working in advertising and media, her TV debut came at the age of 51. Ray Kroc bought McDonald’s in 1954 at the age of 52. Laura Ingalls Wilder was 65 before she published the first of the Little House books. Colonel Sanders franchised Kentucky Fried Chicken when he was 62 and sold it for $2 million 12 years later. The first true Walmart opened when Sam Walton was 44. Henry Ford didn’t launch the Ford Motor Company until he was 40.
We often think if we aren’t successful by a certain age then we never will be. For most of us, our greatest success is going to come in our 40s and 50s. When we are that age, we’re actually in a better position to find success because we’re more mature and we have more life experience.
“Wherever you are, do not let your life be wasted. It’s never too late. It’s not about how old or young you are, it’s about the amount of tenacity, determination, and perseverance that you have.”
– Kelly Roach
1. Stop Resenting the 1% and Join Them
Kelly has seen many people who have a negative attitude toward people who are wealthy, yet in the next breath, they’re saying they wish they were that wealthy. If we have a goal to become wealthy we can’t resent people who have achieved that goal. Kelly said, “You’re not going to achieve something that you resent, you’re going to repel that. You’re telling the universe ‘I don’t want that. I don’t like that.’”
While some of the 1% had previous advantages in their lives, many of them are self-made. They worked hard to get to where they are today. Instead of resenting them, we can learn from them. They have given us an example as they’ve carved their paths to success, and if we learn from their experiences we may find success too.
2. Cultivate the Entrepreneurial Spirit
Most of us have had 18 years of programming telling us that failure is bad. In our culture, it is very important to get good grades or do well in athletics or music, or other extracurricular activities. This can set us up for success in many ways, but it can also make us afraid of failure.
When Kelly was first starting as an entrepreneur, she was so afraid of failure. She was used to being in the corporate world where if you make a mistake, you can get fired. In entrepreneurship, however, we have to make mistakes in order to learn how to execute. Mistakes and risks are part of the job, and it can be hard to shift our mindset to realize that mistakes are okay.
“If you only play it safe and you stay in the box of what you already know how to do, you’re not going anywhere,” Kelly said.
3. Act Like a CEO if You Want to Earn Like a CEO
Everybody wants success. Everybody wants a big house, expensive vacations, and their dream car. People who have those things live their lives in a specific way. They have discipline and perseverance, they’ve made sacrifices, they make investments in themselves, and they hold themselves to a certain standard all because they see themselves as a CEO.
Kelly has seen many people who think, “Once I’m successful, I’ll do the work.” They’re trying to put the cart before the horse. We can’t start working hard after we get the promotion. We have to work hard to get the promotion in the first place. We can’t say, “I’ll build a team once I hit six figures,” because we’re not going to get there without a team. And we can’t wait to take risks until we see the payoffs.
Entrepreneurship requires us to dive in and give it everything we’ve got. It’s not something we can just dip our toes in and find success. Success is much more likely when we start acting like a CEO, putting in the hard work, and making the hard decisions.
4. Act like a Leader
Along with acting like CEOs, we also need to act as leaders. Kelly said. “You have to see yourself as a leader. You have to conduct yourself as a leader. You have to be a leader in all things: word and deed. If you want to go far and go high in life — and it doesn’t matter what that is; that could be at home with your children, in your relationship with your spouse, in your community, in your church, in your business and your career — you have to conduct yourself at that level if you want the rewards of life that come at that level.”
We are always at the podium as entrepreneurs. Everything we say and do is on display. So we must be ready to act as leaders at all times.
5. Develop Business Mastery
Growing a business has a lot of moving pieces: sales, marketing, infrastructure, systems, team building, leadership, HR, legal, etc. There are a lot of moving pieces to build a company, but often entrepreneurship is simplified down to acquiring clients.
Someone can secure the huge investor and still lose everything, going right back to where they started. Someone can get the big win on the front end with clients, but they don’t have the backend systems to support it so they lose them all.
“Business mastery,” Kelly said, “is really about investing in committing to learning the components of building and running a successful business and creating mastery of your own skillset in being the leader. . . . Really think about the energy and effort that you’re putting into developing your own skills as a CEO and as a business owner and [make] sure that the way you’re investing in mastering these different fundamentals of business aligns with how high and how far you want to go. Your business can’t grow beyond your growth.”
6. Invest in Ourselves
Let’s face it, none of us know it all. None of us have achieved what we’re trying to achieve before. But there are people who have achieved our goals before or have experience in the things we’re trying to do.
In order to reach our goals, we need to be investing in ourselves. “Get the mentorship, the information, education, support, the resources that you need in order to achieve the outcomes that you want.,” Kelly said. “Your best investment is always going to be in your worth because you touch on everything else that you come in contact with.”
We should be investing in ourselves every day, even if we only have time for something small like listening to an informational podcast. We can’t fill up the gas tank in our car once a year. It’s something we’ve constantly got to keep up.
7. Don’t Avoid Sales
Many entrepreneurs and small business owners almost have this phobia of sales. They don’t want to spend time on it, they don’t have a sales system, strategy, or salesperson in their company or on their team.
The problem with this is that everything in life from landing clients to getting kids to do their chores is sales. Everything is sales; everything involves a negotiation. “This is something that the vast majority of people really avoid. They have this negative perception, but it’s really helping someone to do what’s in their own best interest by showing them what’s in it for them,” Kelly said. One of the most important skills that an entrepreneur can learn is how to be a great salesperson because everything is sales.
8. Be Disciplined
We often look at successful people and say, “Wow. They’re so talented.” Talent does play a role in success, but it isn’t the most important thing. What is the most important thing? Discipline.
Discipline is available to anyone. We choose to be persistent. We choose to be disciplined enough to work through challenges, to do what we don’t feel like doing because it’s the right thing to do, and to be a good leader even when we’re exhausted and don’t want to get back on the phone with someone one more time for the day.
“Discipline is the price that you pay to achieve greatness in every area of life, and almost always the answer to why you don’t have what you want in your life is discipline,” Kelly said.
When I went to college, I received the largest private scholarship the university offered, but I was nowhere near the smartest kid there. What I had in my favor is I could outwork anybody. A lot of the time the biggest scholarships, best grades and GPAs, and the best business opportunities don’t go to the smartest person, but they go to the person who’s willing to discipline themselves and outwork everybody.
9. Focus on Something Bigger
If our goal is just to pay the bills, we’re only going to get so far. Paying the bills, making money, and buying a house are all great goals but they are only going to bring us so much fulfillment. Focusing on something bigger than ourselves is the thing that is going to propel us to achieve our goals and dreams and bring fulfillment, joy, and a spark to our lives.
It will also help us during hard times. We’ll be able to put things in perspective, deal with challenges, and work through hardships. Kelly said, “When I’m having a really big challenge when I’m struggling, I really try to put things in perspective and remember the why and remember that picture because I know that will help me recharge and refocus and get my mindset back on track to keep moving forward.”
Life is really about something bigger than us. The whole purpose and meaning are about doing good and making the world a better place. That’s where we’ll find true fulfillment.
Thinking about the big picture can be easier than thinking about the small. When we think small, not only do we think small in our solutions, but it’s also hard to get people excited and motivated. It takes just as much effort to do things small. Kelly said, “When you’re solving small problems, you box yourself into small solutions. When you are solving the 10x problem, you’re opening up your whole world, and you’re paving a path for yourself to succeed at that next level.”
Key Takeaways
Thank you so much Kelly for sharing your stories and insights with us today. Here are some of my key takeaways from this episode:
1. It’s never too late to find success. Success doesn’t have to happen at a certain age.
2. If we resent what we want to become, we will never become it.
3. Don’t be afraid of failure. As an entrepreneur, it is part of the job.
4. We have to put in the hard work if we want success.
5. We must see and conduct ourselves as leaders.
6. We should be striving to learn about every aspect of our business, not just getting clients.
7. We should invest in ourselves daily to help our business grow with us.
8. Everything involves sales. We shouldn’t try to avoid it.
9. Discipline will get us to where we want to be in life.
10. Focusing on something bigger will give us fulfillment and allow us to think of big solutions.
Connect with Kelly
If you want to learn more about Kelly or connect with her, you can find her on LinkedIn or visit her website at UnstoppableEntrepreneur.com.
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