THINK BUSINESS — Time to Get Your Mojo Back
A couple of years ago I was asked to give a keynote speech to a group on the state of the building industry. The primary interest on the part of the group was to have me make sense out of what was happening out there and hopefully give some insights to what the future might hold.
______________________As with many speeches, I arrived the morning of the talk and checked in with the event director. I asked if they had an event program and how the intro- duction was planned. As I reviewed the program, I noticed the title of my speech had been changed to “Getting Your Mojo Back.”
Needless to say this required a little last minute adjustment to my slides and my presentation thoughts.
After I got beyond the initial shock, I realized that while the basic title had changed, the fundamental message had not.
When I began the talk, I asked the audience to raise their hands if they knew what “mojo” was. As you can imagine most of the hands went up. Then, when I asked them to define mojo a couple of volunteers’ hands went up. One said mojo is “positive energy,” another said it is “enthusiasm, confidence and conviction.” Another went on to articulate that mojo was the reason his clients bought from him instead of his competition. While only a few spoke up, the others did not need to take notes because they knew what mojo was all about.
Then I asked them how many felt their mojo levels had dropped in recent years. Again, as predicted, most of the hands went up. While this may appear to be just a clever or interesting topic, it is really important, not only for you but also for your entire team.
FINDING YOUR MOJO
Mojo may be the difference between winning and losing … between happiness and sadness … between success and failure. It may be the secret ingredient that is missing from your business today. The following are a few tips if you want to get your mojo back or at least improve it.
1. Stay away from negative influences: You have heard the adage, “Misery loves company.” Well, this is more true today than ever. The best example of this is the media. Many media outlets feed off of bad news and love to bombard us with it. Thankfully you have a choice. You can watch the news or not. You can read the newspaper or not. Many who want to get their mojo back are boycotting these negative media outlets. This is also true with the coffee machine talk or chats across the fence with your neighbor. Choose not to participate with the negative ones and you will be happier and may see your mojo level improve.
2. Seek the little wins: Little wins create bigger wins and bigger wins will help get the mojo back. By lowering the bar to the little wins, you will increase the likelihood of winning. These wins can be by selling a small project or a change order. They can also be with helping a team member be more successful. If you believe in this dynamic, then you just need to find a few little wins then see what a difference it makes in refilling your mojo tanks.
3. Take inventory of what is happening (and write it down): At the risk of sounding like your parents, you probably have many more positives in your life than negatives. A simple exercise is to create two columns. In one column, list all the negatives in your professional and personal life then in the other column list all the positives. These could include your health or your financial well-being. I like to do this about once a month for myself. I find for myself (as well as most others) the list of positives is always much longer than the negatives. Within just a few min- utes of reflection with this graphic in front of me, my positive attitude moves up a notch.
A FRUITFUL EXPERIENCE
In closing, while mojo is not something that we can see or feel, it is something we know and understand. In years past it may have existed naturally but today in this environment we have to work at creating it. If you can be proactive with it, you will not only regain your mojo but also all the other fruits it brings.
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