Are You Ready For Opportunities?

Were you able to identify some hidden assets in your environment? I am confident that if you spent some time observing and going through the action items from the last article you definitely made some progress and potentially uncovered some "gem" opportunities.

Before we go too much further into understanding and experiencing the world of entrepreneurialism let's make sure we get our arms around one of our favorite words, opportunity?

People have a very hard time understanding the complexities of Love. I would like to conjecture that understanding Opportunity can be equally confusing.

This can be illustrated by trying to answer the following questions:
1. What is Opportunity?
2. How do you know when it is real and genuine?
3. How do you know when and how to take action?
4. What will be the potential outcomes/results of your action or non-action?
5. Where do you seek advice and opinions?
6. Should you let the advice and opinions of others affect your decision?

1. What is opportunity? Opportunity is defined as a good chance for advancement or progress. That's a start, but the next questions should be advancement or progress towards what objective and is their other, better alternative opportunities available?

Knowing what you want and constructing a life plan is the backbone for opportunity. Developing your plan combined with our Balance Matrix (introduction coming soon) will dictate what type of opportunities you will consider to act on, how to decide if the opportunity can take you closer to your goals or further away and to create "buy in" from your family members.

Identifying alternative Options - this is paramount! Once you know what you want and your plan has been created you need to know what all the applicable opportunity options are that can bring you closer to your goals and objectives and ultimately your definition of success. The simplest example I can give you is the following:

1. Your goal is to watch an hour of television and you want to watch something inspiring.
2. Your strategy is to find the TV program by looking at your TV guide.
3. Your Opportunity Options are every channel in your subscription.
4. Your Decision - you have 2 further options

a. Stop and watch the first TV show you come across that fits your criteria.

b. Consider every TV show and its programming content before you decide.

Which option A or B will give you a higher probability of getting what you want?

2. How do you know when it is real and genuine? This question stops most people from acting on an opportunity. Unfortunately, the "crooks", "scammers" and little value offers are everywhere and running "wild and free" in the information age. This has made this question even more relevant and more difficult to answer. Let's touch on a few key points that will surely help you identify the real from the "red flag" opportunities.

1. Is their web-site professional looking? This certainly is based on opinion and even though it may be professional does not guarantee anything. However, a site that is professional with a lot of content, extra features like video, sound, polls, forums, etc. at least demonstrates the web-site should remain on-line for some period of time.
2. Is there information about the company with contact information? If there is no contact information or phone number it could represent a "red flag". Try contacting them with a question and see if they respond, how long it takes to respond and the quality of their response.
3. Are there testimonials? If so, can you contact the testimonials? If not, ask the company if you can contact some of their testimonials.
4. Do a company search on-line to see if you can find additional information about the company. Just beware of the source of information. In some cases you will have to determine if the source is real and genuine before you consider their opinion or facts.

3. How do you know when and how to take action? Let's assume the opportunity is real and genuine and you have looked at several different options so far. If you have constructed a well thought out plan using the Balance Matrix this decision becomes relatively easy. Don't believe how easy it can become, keep reading. If you act on this opportunity will it get you closer to your ultimate goals? Will you have to sacrifice any other important elements in your life? If so, how many elements and for how long? Are there any key people in your life your decision will affect? If so, how do they feel about it and have they bought into your plan? If the answers to these questions are favorable your decision becomes much easier.

4. What will be the potential outcomes/results of your action or non-action? This is where any mindset, awareness and abstract thinking training become very important. Try to project into the future your decisions and actions. How do you see people responding, behaving and interacting with you? If you do not act on this opportunity will you ever have another chance to get involved again?

5. Where do you seek advice and opinions? I highly recommend getting second opinions about large decisions in your life. It costs you nothing, but some time to seek this advice. However, this can potentially lead to poor decision making if you are putting all of your faith into this advice. Why? No one knows what is best for you and your situation more than you do. Do the people you are seeking advice from truly have your best interest in mind? If you ask a non-risk taker about an opportunity with an element of risk, what do you suppose their answer will be? The best answer to this question is to have a circle or group of people you trust, have integrity, are like-minded, have previous experience or knowledge in the realm of the question you are asking.

6. Should you let the advice and opinions of others affect your decision? Depends. If you have a reliable, knowledgeable and trustworthy source I would suggest you take their advice into consideration. If you are in 100% agreement with what more than one reliable source has told you, you should feel good about moving forward in that direction. If you or any reliable source is less than 100% confident about the decision and you have more time to prepare your due diligence and weigh out your options and potential consequences take the time to do so.

The bottom line is to prepare yourself for decision making by creating a plan, setting goals, looking at all the options and opportunities, finding reliable sources, training your mind for decision making and practicing the process on smaller more insignificant decisions. Once you create confidence in yourself, your sources and your ability to make decisions you have increased your chances of success and capitalizing on opportunities immensely. Remember, there is no such thing as an opportunity unless you are prepared to take action.