It doesn’t matter if you’re a solo entrepreneur, a solo blogger, a solo musician or artist.

To truly build an empire takes more than the soloist you may be – it takes a team.

From a solo point of view, that can mean a variety of things.

For solo entrepreneurs, it’s your partner that encourages you when no-one else will. Or the bank manage who approves your loan when you first start. Or the contractor who gives you the part-time skills for that job you couldn’t do otherwise.

For solo bloggers, it’s your readers who give you strength to keep writing when you want to give up. Or commenters that validate your thoughts. Or the social community who share your blog with new eyes.

For the musician or artist, it’s the fans who buy your work when everyone else says it’s worthless. It’s the manager or agent who never gives up on you. It’s the supplier that provides your tools of the trade to make the magic happen.

For the business owner or leader that has employees, your team is easier to define – as is the fact that, just like the soloist, your team is everything. Without them, you have nothing.

Recognize that. Nurture them. Encourage them. Give them permission to err and give them the stepping stones to the right path the next time. But most of all, make sure they feel appreciated.

We can do a lot on our own – but with our teams beside us we can conquer the world.

Want success? Make it about the team. Always.

image: Carol VanHook

It’s Always About the Team – Always originally appeared on Danny Brown - under a Creative Commons license.

Towards the end of last year, my friend Michael Schechter was kind enough to invite me to chat on his 2×4 series.

The idea behind 2×4 is simple: one series that examines two topics, creativity and productivity, by asking those who make things on the web the same four questions on both subjects.

I had a blast answering Mike’s questions, and thought it’d be cool to share the answers here. In this second part, we talk Productivity – make sure you drop by Monday’s post for the creativity answers.

Can you describe your current personal and professional responsibilities?

Personally, I’m a father and husband, so my main responsibility is making sure they have food on the table and a roof over their heads, and that they feel secure in my ability to look after them. This leads to my professional responsibility – I’m the VP, Product Intelligence at Jugnoo, Inc., and my responsibilities there see me making sure we look after our users by providing the best tools possible, to ensure they can be truly effective on social media. It also sees me working on bringing products to the market that will make the social web simple, accessible and monetizable for everyone.

How do you go about balancing the personal, professional and digital?

Easy – I keep them separate, and dedicate the time solely to each one when I’m “there”. During the day, I’m in professional mode, so you’ll rarely see me online. In the evenings and at weekends, that’s my family time. Once the kids and wife have gone to bed, that’s my digital playtime, to catch up on all I’ve missed. You might get the occasional crossover, but generally I keep all three separate. It’s why I don’t do a lot of conferences or speaking – I like putting my son and daughter to bed, and waking up under the same roof as them and my wife. I wouldn’t swap that for the world.

What tools and techniques do you find yourself counting on to get through your workload?

I simply use a lot of Google’s tools – Docs, chat, calendar, etc. They’re good enough for what I need. I’m also a big fan of Hootsuite and how they’ve made social media dashboards so effective. Of course, there’s now a certain product called JugnooMe, which we’re creating for everyone from businesses to bloggers, franchisees, realtors, agencies, non-profits and more. And the reviews so far are pretty positive, which is nice, and with the update we’re releasing next week, hopefully that will continue!

What is the best starting point for the unproductive amongst us, who are looking to get more organized?

A notepad and pen. Seriously. Take an hour out of your day, and sit down with a notepad and pen, and divide a page into two columns – Must Have and Optional. Then write down all the stuff you do during the day – personally and professionally – and separate them into these two lists. Then prioritize what you need to do every single day to make your life easier/better, whatever, and begin to work from that. If you don’t recognize what’s really important versus what you can do if you want to, you’re never going to be more productive.

image: inju

The 2×4 Interview: Productivity originally appeared on Danny Brown - under a Creative Commons license.

Take a moment and ask yourself these two questions:

- How are we encouraging hope in those around us?

- How are we helping to grow the leaders of tomorrow?

I once wrote about the roles of companies needing to team-build differently, and I think some of the ideas mentioned in that post can help.

But they’re not the complete answer – they just look at what companies can do.

We also have to look at what we’re doing every single day, both in our own lives and our professional lives.

Like it or not, we’re all acting in a role of leadership with every action we do.

• Our reactions to situations and people around us shape the mindset of today’s kids, tomorrow’s leaders. We swear; they swear. We smoke; they smoke. We do drugs; they do drugs. If we’re not setting the example, how can we expect our kids to?

• How we work with colleagues dictates how we lead our workforce. Even if we’re not managers, we’re part of a decision-making process that defines that company’s culture and success. Work smart; work intelligently; work respectfully.

• Our voices define our outlook. Disagree with something or someone by all means, but respect their view to differ. Religion; simple points of view; movie tastes, etc – wouldn’t it be boring if we were all the same? Make your point but allow more than yours.

• Speaking for the voiceless when words aren’t enough. Actions speak louder than words – know someone that’s right but afraid to say so? Say it for them – don’t be a passer-by when the slightest encouragement can offer so much hope.

None of us are born leaders – that takes time to cultivate. Even then, leadership is born from respect of our peers, employers, friends and colleagues. People earn leadership – bought leadership is just politics.

Leaders make changes that others wish for but never act on. Imagine if we encouraged everyone around us to be leaders in their own right?

Think Bigger Than You originally appeared on Danny Brown - under a Creative Commons license.

In life, we often place merit on someone by the job they have. We may not mean to, but it’s no real fault of ours if we do – it’s been ingrained from us almost since we could walk.

Parents tell us to get an education, or we won’t get a good job.

Teachers tell us to study harder, or we won’t get a good job.

Potential girlfriends and boyfriends can decide whether or not we’re worthy of their attention, based on the job we have and the material things that can bring.

We see someone being chauffered from place-to-place and feel they must be really important.

Ironically, in social media, this feeling can be exacerbated.

Our blogs become popular; we get hundreds of thousands of followers on Twitter; conferences invite us to speak; we have badges of merit that show how smart we are.

When you have that kind of “adulation”, it’s easy to mistake your importance and think your job is something it’s not. Sure, you may have a great job with a personal secretary; or your golf course fees cost more than it takes to send a child through college; or your blog is quoted in the New York Times.

But does that make you owner of the most important job in the world?

Think about it:

If every single blogger in the world stopped blogging tomorrow, we’d still get our news and opinion pieces. They might be watered down a little, but we’d still get them.

If every chauffeur quit tomorrow, we’d still have cabs, buses, trains, motorbikes and even bicycles to get around on.

If every girlfriend or boyfriend dumped their partners tomorrow, we’d still get by on our imaginations. Life would go on.

Now think about some of the jobs we often look at as lesser, and ask the same question:

If every trash collector quit tomorrow, we’d be faced with disease on the streets as the rats came to town.

If every security guard quit tomorrow, our businesses might follow suit, as we see the bad people come to town.

If every sewage worker quit tomorrow, our streets would be overrun by crap.

If every school crossing guard quit tomorrow, how long would our children stay safe at busy intersections?

We look at life through funny lenses. We see people in lesser light when often we should be shining the light on them. We celebrate our own importance when, often, that importance could be survived if it were to disappear overnight.

The point is, we all have important stuff to do and offer. Let’s try remember that more – yes?

image: Auntie P

The Most Important Job in the World? originally appeared on Danny Brown - under a Creative Commons license.

People. Want. Things.

That’s it.

It can be anything – good luck charms; medicines; food; drink; news; shoe polish. Anything.

With the exception of air, everything else costs. So there’s a need to be filled.

How you fill that need is where the difference comes into play.

Some folks will go for service; some folks will go for price; some folks will go for nationality; some folks will go for the people behind the product.

That’s where your dividing factor comes into play. Your knowledge. Your smarts.

But the starting point? That’s the same for everyone.

People. Want. Things.

Ready?

The Only Marketing Tip You’ll Ever Need originally appeared on Danny Brown - under a Creative Commons license.

No, this isn’t an ego post. It’s not driven by, “Oh, I really need to impress that Scottish/Canadian/Brit (what the heck is he??) Danny Brown guy.”

Screw that – ego is for chumps (hat tip Shannon Boudjema for the phrase).

But you seriously don’t need to impress me.

I’m not your life mate. I’m not your boss. I’m not your editor. I’m not your parents. I’m not your font of all wisdom.

But then, you don’t need to impress these people either (more on why you don’t need to impress your boss in an upcoming post).

Nope, the only person you need to impress is yourself.

If you blog and you hit publish and know that you’re happy with the post, that’s all that matters.

If you’re in business for yourself and you know you’re doing the best you can for your clients, that’s all that matters.

If you’re employed and know you’re doing all you can in your role, that’s all that matters.

If you look in the mirror at the end of the day and know you did every thing you could that makes a difference in whatever you do, that’s all that matters.

Impress yourself. The others will follow.

Why You Don’t Need to Impress Me originally appeared on Danny Brown - under a Creative Commons license.

We all have them. Bad days that make us wonder why we do what we do, whether in our own business or for our employer.

Or we wonder why we’re with our partners when we have an argument. Or we see the size of our email inbox and wish we could just skip the day and begin again tomorrow.

But are we really having such a bad day?

I took my dogs out for a walk this morning, and one of them crapped on a snail. I mean, seriously – how bad does your day have to be to look up and find that someone is shitting on your house?

So, yeah, we may be having bad days. But do they compare to a child beaten and abused by their parents, or bullied at school?

Do they compare to a good, law-abiding person fighting terminal illness and wondering why that rapist lived to 97?

Do they compare to people that are jailed and tortured for wanting to live in a democracy?

Maybe we feel like nothing can be worse than the day we’re currently having. But if all we have to complain about is the noise of social media, or the commute to work, or the amount of emails we still have to answer, or the waitress not getting our drink order right, or a myriad of other things, ask yourself one thing.

Is it really all that bad?

image: DanRhett

So You’re Having a Bad Day originally appeared on Danny Brown - under a Creative Commons license.

Some of this is calculated; some, natural. After all, perception is everything. It gets you work; clients; a promotion; a date; a raise; and more.

No-one wants to be perceived as anything but awesome, so they build the perception about them carefully. Others buy into it, and the perception crafting reaps its reward.

The problem is, perception – by definition – is fragile. All it takes is for one slip, and the house of cards that is your perception comes crashing down. And the funny thing is, it doesn’t even have to happen in public for it to start making a difference in public.

All the more reason to be consistent across the board, no?

The Problem With Perception originally appeared on Danny Brown - under a Creative Commons license.

Most people have probably heard the story of how Jesus fed 5,000 people with just five fish and two loaves of bread. It’s one of the most popular tales from the Bible and whether you’re religious or not, it’s likely you’ve heard it.

What does it tell us? That success isn’t dictated by numbers. You can have the biggest company and satisfy the fewest people. You can have the smallest company and satisfy every single customer, every day.

Numbers aren’t the important thing. It’s what you do with the numbers that is. You might be a solitary fish in the sea, but you can still satisfy 1,000 people.

image: elisecathlene

Numbers originally appeared on Danny Brown - under a Creative Commons license.

I took this picture on the way to a meeting the other day. As you can see, the lady driving the car has her little dog right up front with her in the driver’s seat.

Because we were driving (and I know how some of our local drivers are – think New York cabbies!), I couldn’t help but think of some of the things that could go wrong:

• A car suddenly brakes in front of her.
• A child runs out in front of the car.
• She’s rear-ended by the driver behind.
• The dog sees another dog and starts going wild.

All of these scenarios – and probably a few more – would all lead to the same result, and it wouldn’t be pretty for either the driver or her dog.

Because she didn’t plan ahead.

She didn’t take into consideration what might happen, so she let everything go to fate. Fair enough – but sometimes we need to make sure that planning ahead is core to all we do. Some of this could include:

Planning Ahead For Your Business

We like to think we’ll know what to do when our business hits a rough patch. But do we? Do we know to have X amount set aside to pay the bills, employees, contractors and ourselves? Do we make our business and/or marketing plans flexible enough to be able to change on the fly? Do we plan for trends in the marketplace and how we’ll overcome them? Do we plan ahead on changes in the administration of our countries and different mindsets to our current business approaches?

Planning Ahead In Your Job

There used to be a time when you had a job for life. No more. Now, you’e lucky you’re at the same place for more than a couple of years. So how are you planning ahead for that? Are you taking a night school course to expand your skills for a new career? Are you keeping on top of industry news about your employer or their industry? Are you planning ahead in case your employer goes bust tomorrow? Are you planning how to use the contacts you’re making when/if push comes to shove?

Planning Ahead On Your Blog

If you blog, you may or may not have a blogging schedule. Myself, I pretty much write when an idea comes to me and I’ll write almost there and then – I don’t have any drafts. But what if I fell ill, and my blog was dead for a month or more? Are you planning on having a back-up plan for you falling ill? Or vacations? Or if your server goes down, or your host goes out of business?

Planning Ahead In Your Life

Okay, this is probably the hardest to plan ahead for, since life is pretty good at throwing us curve balls. But there are still ways we can plan ahead, either for us or for those around us. For instance, have you planned how much extra you can put to the mortgage to make your home your own faster? Or how you’ll cope if your partner falls seriously ill, and you have children? Who can you reach out to? Or how about the discussion that’ll arise if your son or daughter comes home one day and says their views on a topic you’re passionate about have changed and they’re in direct – and possibly harmful – conflict with you?

Your Turn

These are just some of the ways we can all plan ahead, whether in our personal or professional lives, or somewhere in-between. There are many more – the main point is that they’re all related. What happens at work affects your home life, and very often vice versa.

Planning ahead might not stop certain events from happening; but it sure as hell can prepare you better. After all, you never know when you’re going to get hit by a flying dog…

How about you? Are you planning ahead, and if not, should you be, at least just a little?

Planning Ahead originally appeared on Danny Brown - under a Creative Commons license.